Calling the shots
Singer-songwriter Kelly Clarkson comes back stronger with her talk show that has already become a big hit
Kelly Clarkson had just come striding through an aisle of the Appel Room one afternoon in late August, accompanied by Kristin Chenoweth and a troupe of dancers as they sang the final bars of the uplifting Imagine Dragons ballad On Top of the World.
In the minutes between catching their breath and performing the number for a second time — part of an elaborate musical sequence that will open the third season of The Kelly Clarkson Show — the host called out from her stage here at Jazz at Lincoln Centre and offered a tongue-in-cheek apology to Chenoweth and the ensemble if she had missed any steps in this earlier take of the routine.
“I was freaking out,” Clarkson said. “You do not want your entrance to depend on.”
Though she has already been many things in her career — the winner of the inaugural season of American Idol;a best-selling, Grammy Award-winning pop and country musician; a coach and adviser on The Voice — Clarkson will gladly admit she is still a novice when it comes to starring in her own syndicated daytime talk show.
Throughout a day spent taping segments for her show’s premiere week, the spirited, self-deprecating Clarkson had been telling her studio audience she felt rusty after coming back from a scheduled filming break of about three months. But there was not much time for her to get back up to speed and, as she has gotten used to, she would have to figure things out on her feet.
GREAT EXPECTATIONS
At a moment like this, much is expected of The Kelly Clarkson Show, a blend of celebrity interviews, games and slice-of-life segments informed by the 39-year-old host’s pop-cultural sensibilities. The programme is coming off its first Daytime Emmy win for best entertainment talk show, a category in which Clarkson has vied with established competitors like Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest (the longtime Idol host) and newcomers to the field like Drew Barrymore.
NBCUniversal, which produces The Kelly Clarkson Show, has renewed the series through the 2022-2023 season and has said it will give Clarkson’s programme the slot now held by The Ellen DeGeneres Show when its veteran host steps down next spring after 19 years.
These decisions provide added incentive for Clarkson while significantly raising the stakes: At a time when her show is still finding its footing — and has yet to have anything resembling a normal season — she is already being groomed as DeGeneres’ heir.
A few days before shooting her season premiere, Clarkson was speaking in a video interview from Los Angeles, comfortably dressed down with her hair held back in a ponytail while her dog Henry played at her feet. “I appreciate that I can do this in sweats and no bra,” she said with delight.
That relentless candour has a lot
Everybody was like, Oh man, you would be great at doing a talk show — except for me, I wasn’t one of those everybodies. I’m just like, Where do I fit in there? Why would I? No one will watch that. I’m very honest with myself.”
KELLY CLARKSON
to do with how Clarkson got this gig — it’s a quality that her fans and advocates find relatable. But it also gave her the freedom to nearly turn down the show. Thinking back to the period a few years ago when she was being sought as a host, she said: “Everybody was like, Oh man, you would be great at doing a talk show — except for me, I wasn’t one of those everybodies. I’m just like, Where do I fit in there? Why would I? No one will watch that.”
She added, “I’m very honest with myself.”
Alex Duda, the showrunner and an executive producer of The Kelly Clarkson Show, said that she was among those early recruiters who were impressed by Clarkson’s energetic, unpredictable appearances on The Voice.
Duda, who previously produced daytime talk shows for Steve Harvey and Tyra Banks, said that Clarkson was also distinguished by her formative American Idol victory in 2002, a process in which millions of viewers witnessed and participated in her ascent to fame.
“We chose her,” Duda said. “She connects with us in a way that nobody does because we helped with that. People are rooting for her in a different way.”
With a blueprint that allowed her to perform a new cover song in every episode (or Kellyoke, in the show’s parlance), and a guest list that enabled her to share a stage with musical heroes like Trisha Yearwood, Reba McEntire and Garth Brooks, Clarkson embarked on the first season of her program in September 2019.
In March 2020, in-studio production of the show was halted by the pandemic. But Clarkson, who had left Los Angeles with her two young children to hunker down in a cabin in Montana, continued to produce new segments for the program that she recorded on an iPhone.
FOLLOWING PROTOCOLS
By the end of last spring, ‘The Kelly Clarkson Show’ was drawing an average daily audience of about 1.3 million viewers, frequently putting it ahead of ‘Ellen’ and other competitors.
In its second season, The Kelly Clarkson Show was able to return to its Los Angeles studio with pandemic protocols in place: Panel discussions were socially distanced, and audience members could participate only virtually, appearing as heads and torsos on flat screens. (A limited studio audience will be allowed to return in season three.)
These circumstances were not ideal for a fledgling program still trying to find its footing. “You’re trying to build on momentum,” Duda said. “For us, it was difficult being a show about connection when you can’t connect physically. We haven’t been able to realise our mission.”
By the end of last spring, The Kelly Clarkson Show was drawing an average daily audience of about 1.3 million viewers, frequently putting it ahead of Ellen and other competitors like The Rachael Ray Show, though it doesn’t surpass category leaders like Dr. Phil or Live With Kelly and Ryan.
Despite the obvious indicators that Clarkson is being positioned to step in as successor to DeGeneres (whose show is produced by Warner Bros.), no one is quite ready to talk about this explicitly while DeGeneres is still on the air.
Clarkson — who has featured DeGeneres as a guest on her show and appeared several times on Ellen — played down comparisons between them. “No one can take over for Ellen. It’s an iconic show,” she said.
She argued that her efforts as a talk-show host shouldn’t be measured against those of her illustrious predecessors, any more than she should be gauged as a singer in comparison to the vocalists who inspired her.
“I’m never going to be Whitney Houston — I’m never going to be Cyndi Lauper, Reba or Trisha or Mariah,” she said. “I’m going to be me. I think that’s fine. There’s room for everyone at the table.”