Kelly Clarkson is looking back on her seven-year journey hosting her own talk show, The Kelly Clarkson Show, ahead of its final episode.
“You know what? [In our] seven seasons, a lot has happened in my personal life and a lot has happened in life for everyone,” Clarkson, 44, said in a YouTube video published Friday, August 28. “There’s been a pandemic. I think, if there’s a word to describe The Kelly Clarkson Show, it’s ‘pivot.’ There’s not been one normal season, I feel like, but at the same time; what a necessary thing to have to come to work and focus on other people.”
She continued, “I think that saved me, honestly, a lot of times [and] I think this show has made everyone better at what they do.”
Clarkson debuted her eponymous NBC daytime show in 2019, one year before the coronavirus pandemic forced production to go virtual. The former American Idol champ later moved the show to New York City in 2023 following her messy divorce from ex-husband Brandon Blackstock. (Blackstock died in 2025 at age 48 after a private battle with cancer.)
Clarkson announced in February that she decided to wrap her show to prioritize her family, including kids River Rose, 12, and Remington, 10, she shared with Blackstock.
Ahead of the Monday, August 31, finale, Clarkson recalled her tenure as a talk show host.
“Well, it was brought up to me with my ex and he was like, ‘Hey, NBC was talking about maybe doing a talk show with me,’ and I was, like, ‘OK, that’s the worst idea ever ‘cause I never shut up,’” Clarkson recalled of Blackstock’s pitch for the then-new show’s concept. “You know, nobody really knew my personality to the extent of what it is until The Voice, and I think they saw how comfortable on-camera I am and how, like, I’m all in.”
Kelly Clarkson with her two kids during the final episode of ‘The Kelly Clarkson Show.’ Weiss Eubanks/NBCUniversal
She added, “I’m very present. I think they saw that and it’s really just me. I’m the same kid at 19 that auditioned for Idol that everybody got to know in the first place. Working with those producers on that show and having to do the little segments here and there and that probably prepped me a little, and I didn’t realize it.”
Once Clarkson filmed the talk show’s pilot episode, she admitted her “ignorance [was] kind of bliss” before producers found the series “really worked” with test audiences.
“Sometimes, a lot of times, I’m just sitting across from people going, ‘How did I get the chance to talk to you?’” she quipped of her onscreen celebrity interviews. “All these incredible people that I’ve really looked up to. You know, Julie Andrews, I’ve talked to her a couple times. Who says that? We’ve literally had people that are in the White House. I mean, it’s been everyone from Heart to Alanis [Morissette] to, I mean, I’ve had Pink on here. I’ve been singing with people that I’m just, like, ‘What?’”
Receiving a yearbook of her The Kelly Clarkson Show memories on Friday, the singer mused how much has changed in the seven years since the show’s inception.
“See, I forget some of these things. And honestly, for me, my kids have grown up on this show, too,” she said. “Like, it’s been seven years, and these are the growing years for them right now. It’s been crazy.”
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