Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos make 'Live' co-hosting debut days after Ryan Seacrest's exit: 'Can't back out now!'
The new chapter of Live has begun.
Live With Kelly and Mark, featuring Kelly Ripa and her husband Mark Consuelos as co-hosts, premiered on Monday. It's a new beginning for the long-running morning talk show, just days after Ryan Seacrest said goodbye.
The pair walked out to the newly redecorated set — featuring Live with Kelly and Mark signs and coffee mugs — holding hands. She made the new co-hosting situation official, starting the show by saying, "It's Monday, April 17, 2023. Joining me today — and permanently, until one of us dies — is Mark Consuelos."
In the audience for her parents' first show as co-hosts was the couple's 21-year-old child, Lola Consuelos, who recently moved back in with her mom and dad. Other guests included the couple's longtime friends, MLB star Willie Randolph and his wife Gretchen.
Needless to say, husband and wife, both 52, quickly fell back into their on-screen routine. After all, they did play a couple on All My Children in the 1990s before becoming a pair in real life. Consuelos acknowledged the fandom around their characters, saying "Hayley and Mateo forever," while Ripa said fans constantly still address them by their characters' names, even all these years later.
Consuelos has also long been a Live fixture. He was first a guest on the show 27 years ago, sans Ripa, as viewers were reminded of on Monday with a clip of him being interviewed by Regis Philbin and Kathie Lee. The Riverdale actor has also filled in as guest co-host many times through the years when Ripa's co-hosts, also including Michael Strahan, were out.
"It's as if you've always been here," Ripa remarked after a montage of past "Mark moments" on the show played.
They also showed a billboard of the new co-hosts outside the NYC studio, as well as their images on the marquee above the Good Morning America studio in Times Square.
"This is all feeling very permanent," Consuelos said, with Ripa shooting back, "Oh honey, as you know — nothing here is permanent — except for me, evidentially." She added that he "can't back out now! You're in."
Guests for the first show included TLC's Chili (real name: Rozonda Thomas) as well as the psychic Char Margolis, who famously helped Ripa land her Live job in 2000. Back then, Ripa, who was auditioning for the permanent host spot, was about five weeks pregnant with Lola, which nobody but she and Consuelos knew, when Margolis rightly predicted she was pregnant, live on air. Philbin looked stunned and Ripa landed the co-host job soon after.
"I'm convinced she's the reason I have my job here," Ripa said of Margolis, calling it a "full-circle moment" to have Lola in the audience as Margolis returned. However, she joked, "If she predicts I'm pregnant today, there's also going to be a funeral." Lucky for Ripa, there was no such prediction. When she did a reading for Ripa, she told her, "You're not pregnant," to which Ripa replied, "That would be a real miracle, Char."
Margolis did predict longevity for Ripa and Consuelos hosting the show together, saying Live will be "better than ever," despite many viewers being sad over Seacrest's exit. She predicted both Ripa and Consuleos acting again, which Ripa's done little of since Hope & Faith ended in 2006. ("Oh, god," Ripa replied.) She also predicted the pair will buy real estate in Palm Springs, which they said they had been looking at, and that their marriage will remain strong.
The show also featured old footage of the couple's kids on the show, including Lola's first appearance as a baby after Margolis's prediction turned out to be accurate. The psychic also offered to do Lola's reading, which presumably took place backstage after the show. (Ripa and Consuelos are also parents to Michael, 25, and Joaquin, 20.)
Ripa and Consuelos ended the show together arm in arm.
"Thanks for today," she told him. "You did a great job."
