Kelly Ripa Reveals Sexist Work Conditions on ‘Live With Regis & Kelly’: ‘I Was Working in the Janitor’s Closet’
Kelly Ripa has revealed the alarmingly sexist working conditions she faced during her first 10 years on Live With Regis and Kelly and beyond.
Ripa joined Regis Philbin on Live in 2001. The longtime talk show star says she wasn’t given an office setup until her fourth season despite being its co-host, and when she did get one, it was in the janitor’s closet she had been working from before. That small space was her “office” through the late Philbin’s exit from the series in 2011. In contrast, Philbin had his own private office.
Ripa also said she had to use public restrooms used by audience members, even when she was pregnant, instead of being provided a private bathroom like Philbin, who died in 2020.
“It was the strangest experience I’ve ever had in my life,” Ripa told Variety in a cover story interview. “I was told that I couldn’t have an office. It didn’t make a whole lot of sense, especially because there were empty offices that I could have easily occupied.”
She was told the empty offices were to be held for when executives visited from the West Coast. The network finally agreed to set up her work space after several seasons on-air.
“It was after my fourth year that they finally cleaned out the closet and put a desk in there for me,” the All My Children alum detailed. “And so I was working in the janitor’s closet with a desk so that I could have a place to put things.”
Philbin left the show in 2011. As she was now the sole host, Ripa assumed she would get her former co-star’s office. But as Ripa told Variety, she was denied the office space as it was being held for “when the new guy comes.”
“I looked at them, and I said, ‘I am the new guy,’” Ripa shared. “I just moved my things. I forced my way into the office because I couldn’t understand how I would still be in the janitor’s closet and somebody new would come in and get the office.” Michael Strahan joined as her co-host in 2012.
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“Initially, I thought this is just what happens, and they don’t have to fill me in because I’ve only been here 10 years,” she continued. “I’m still the new girl. But then, when I was the more senior on-air person, it was like watching the same movie all over again: All of those offices that were not available to me were suddenly made available, with walls knocked down to make them twice as big. It was fascinating for me to watch — the need to make the new guy comfortable and respected, but I couldn’t use those offices. I had to use the broom closet.”
Referring to the bathroom situation of her early years, Ripa said it seemed like a “very needlessly difficult situation.”
“Picture this,” Ripa explained. “We have a studio audience — like 250 people! — and I have to queue up. Particularly, when I was pregnant, it was extraordinarily exhausting to have to wait in line. I have to host the show, and I’m still waiting in line to use the bathroom. It just seemed, you know, a very needlessly difficult situation.”
Ripa wasn’t given equal pay to boot. Pay equity didn’t come until her contract ended and she had an out. Her possible departure was the leverage behind her eventual pay increase.
“I don’t think they wanted to pay me,” she said. “I think they had to pay me. I was trying to walk out the door and close it behind me. And I think they really figured out rapidly that they had screwed up in a major way, and it was not a good look. I think that was really the impetus behind paying me fairly. They had no choice.”
Ripa said she doesn’t hold her male co-hosts responsible for these unfair working conditions. She said the disparity was “the collective fault of many” and that she still feels protective of her co-stars, saying she’s the type to “go out of [her] way to protect people.”
The host said: “The network had a duty and an obligation to keep all things equal. I don’t blame the fellas. They were just doing what they had been told, or what they were instructed to do, or what they thought they deserved.”
Ripa has been hosting Live! With Kelly and Ryan with Ryan Seacrest since 2017 following Strahan’s sudden exit the year prior. Seacrest’s final day on the series will be April 14, and Ripa’s husband, Mark Consuelos, will step in as full-time co-host on April 17.
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