NBC cancels Megyn Kelly’s show after blackface controversy IN THE SPOTLIGHT

NEW YOrK — Megyn Kelly, the former Fox News Channel personality who made a rocky transition to softer news at NBC, was fired from her morning show Friday after triggering a furor by suggesting it’s OK for white people to wear blackface on Halloween.

“‘Megyn Kelly Today’ is not returning,” NBC News said in a statement. The show occupied the fourth hour of NBC’s “Today” program, a time slot that will be hosted by other co-anchors beginning next week, the network said.

NBC didn’t address Kelly’s future at the network. But negotiations over her exit from NBC are underway, according to a person familiar with the talks who wasn’t authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Kelly is in the second year of a threeyear contract that reportedly pays her more than $20 million a year.

A representative for Kelly did not respond to a request for comment.

The cancellation came four days after she provoked a firestorm for asking on the air why dressing up in blackface as part of a Halloween costume is wrong. Social media condemnation was swift, and Kelly apologized to fellow NBC staffers later in the day and made a tearful apology on her show Wednesday

Kelly, 47, made her debut as a NBC morning host in September 2017, taking over the 9 a.m. slot at “Today” and saying she wanted viewers “to have a laugh with us, a smile, sometimes a tear and maybe a little hope to start your day.” She did cooking demonstrations and explored emotional topics.

Her ratings have been consistently down from what “Today” garnered in the 9 a.m. hour before Kelly came on board. In its first year, Kelly’s show averaged 2.4 million viewers a day, a drop of 400,000 from the year before.

Kelly