Tyra Banks Quitting ‘America’s Got Talent,’ Per ‘Page Six’
When NBC announced in September that Brooklyn Nine-Nine actor Terry Crews would be hosting the America’s Got Talent spinoff, AGT: The Champions, initial reports indicated that the main series’ host, Tyra Banks, would be back in mid-2019 for the regular edition of the program. Now, Page Six is reporting that Banks is quitting the show to focus on producing.
“Tyra’s been inundated with producing and acting requests… she wants to produce and create TV. She will not be returning to AGT in the new year,” the gossip website’s inside source revealed in an article published on Tuesday, December 25.
The 45-year-old entertainer has been riding high on the success of the Freeform television movie that she starred in and also executive produced, Life-Size 2: A Christmas Eve, which debuted on the channel in early December.
“Life-Size 2 went beyond expectations… it was Freeform’s biggest premiere of the year,” the source told Page Six about the long-awaited sequel to Banks’ 2000 ABC movie Life-Size.
During a November 30 interview with Access, she told the hosts that she wasn’t sure if she would be returning to America’s Got Talent or not.
“I think I had a really nice run with AGT. I had a lot a lot of fun,” said Banks before teasing that she has a “massive project” coming out in the fall of 2019 “that has never been done before.”
The mother of 22-month-old son York also recently spoke about wanting to do a sequel to the 2000 film Coyote Ugly, as previously reported by the Inquisitr.
“I’m dying to do Coyote Ugly 2. I want to produce it — I just need to get the rights from Mr. Jerry Bruckheimer or work with him,” she said.
And, of course, she still has her America’s Next Top Model empire to take care of.
Banks is the fourth host in America’s Got Talent history. When the show first debuted in 2006, Regis Philbin presented the program. For Seasons 2 and 3, Jerry Springer hosted the program. Nick Cannon helmed the series for its next eight seasons, leaving AGT in 2016. Banks then joined the show for Seasons 12 and 13.
If Banks does leave the show, will The Champions host Terry Crews get her position? He has been very vocal about his excitement in hosting the AGT spinoff, which will debut on NBC on Monday, January 7.
“NBC’s America’s Got Talent is a show I love to watch with my family and now to actually be a part of this special edition, The Champions, is more than I could have asked or dreamed. Now America’s Got Terry Crews,” he stated in the fall, according to a previously published Inquisitr piece.
