Today Show stars and crew – plus the roughly 35,000 people that NBC employs – are seeing quite the shake-up and the long-running company.
Over the weekend, NBCUNiversal's CEO, Jeff Shell, stepped down from the lead role he has held since 2020. NBCUniversal, which houses both the Today Show and NBC News, is owned by Comcast, whose own chief executive is Brian Roberts.
His departure comes following an investigation from an outside law firm into a complaint about an inappropriate workplace relationship, to which the now former CEO has admitted to. Though he only became CEO in 2020, Shell, 57, was part of the NBCU team since 2013, and worked for parent company Comcast since 2009.
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The news of his departure was addressed on the Today Show with a brief and straightforward overview by Craig Melvin.
Sunday marked Shell's last day as CEO, and in a statement, he said: "Today is my last day as CEO of NBCUniversal. I had an inappropriate relationship with a woman in the company, which I deeply regret."
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He added: "I'm truly sorry I let my Comcast and NBCUniversal colleagues down, they are the most talented people in the business and the opportunity to work with them the last 19 years has been a privilege."
While it has yet to be revealed who will succeed him, Roberts did say Shell's senior team would be reporting to Comcast's president Michael Cavanagh, putting him in control of NBCUniversal.
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The shake-up comes at a time of upheaval for the company, as it tries to shift from its dwindling cable presence into a more expansive streaming audience through its own platform, Peacock, which launched in April of 2020.
Plus, it isn't the only departure NBC has seen from an established fixture of the company due to sexual misconduct.
In November of 2017, the cable giant announced that former Today Show anchor Matt Lauer's tenure on the morning show had been terminated, following news that he sexually harassed a female employee during the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. Several other allegations, including those of rape and indecent exposure, followed, and were exposed in detail in Ronan Farrow's explosive 2019 book, Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies, and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators.
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