All good things must end. Rachael Ray’s daytime talk show, Rachael Ray, is coming to a close after 17 seasons on air.
“In my more than 20 plus years in television I have had 17 wonderful seasons working in daytime television with Rachael,” Ray, 54, told Deadline in a statement on Friday, March 3. “However I’ve made the decision that it’s time for me to move on to the next exciting chapter in my broadcast career.”
The Comfort Foods author shared that her “passions have evolved from the talk show format production and syndication model” and she plans to pursue projects that are “unencumbered by the traditional rules” of TV distribution.
“Thank you to all of our Rachael daytime show partners, crew, and affiliates, and the wonderful years we all worked together,” she added.
News of Rachael Ray’s cancellation comes just hours after Deadline reported that Ray would be teaming up with Intentional Content to launch a new production company, Free Food Studios, which the New York native said she will be putting all her “energies” into.
Following news that the program was ending, president of CBS Media Ventures, Steve LoCascio, released a statement praising Ray for her time on the show.
“When Rachael debuted her show 17 years ago, she was a game-changer in the daytime space. She made cooking accessible to the masses, taught viewers simple solutions on how to improve their lives and coaxed great stories out of celebrity guests with her relatable down-to-earth demeanor,” he told Deadline on Friday. “We’re proud to have produced such a successful show with Rachael and her team for so many years. We’ll miss Rachael on the air every day, but we’ll always be family.”
A mix of entertainment, musical performances, celebrity interviews and cooking, the ABC series has been nominated for 27 Daytime Emmys over the years, winning for Outstanding Talk Show three times. After its premiere in September 2006, it finished its first season as the No. 1 syndicated strip launched in the 2006-2007 season.
The talk show was one of the first original programs to return during the coronavirus pandemic, despite Ray’s Lake Luzerne, New York, home burning down in a massive fire in August 2020.
At the time, a rep for the Emmy winner told Us Weekly that the property was “unfortunately damaged and we don’t yet know to what extent,” but that the celeb cook and her family made it out safely.
Ray later detailed the severe damage from the accident, sharing a vulnerable moment with her audience during a September 2020 episode of her show. The Young & Hungry alum reflected on the memories she made there with her loved ones and thanked her fans for their support while she and her husband, John Cusimano, continued to rebuild.
“So many people have written us and been so kind to share their own loss — people that have been through fires, people that have lost their home to a flood [or] natural disasters and just accidents, like us,” she said at the time. “Thank you for letting us into your lives and trusting us.”
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