‘The Voice’ Producers ‘Want The Coaches Together On The Same Stage’ For Season 19, Source Claims

The Voice producers allegedly don’t want to do another remote season amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. According to a new report, those behind the scenes of the NBC show are taking notes from America’s Got Talent on how to film new episodes safely, as they want coaches Kelly Clarkson, Blake Shelton, John Legend, and Gwen Stefani to all be in the same room and not connected via video going forward.

That’s according to Hollywood Life. The site claimed this week that Mark Burnett and the production team have been looking at how AGT has managed to get its judges back together under social distancing guidelines and said the crew is looking to “adapt” things “to look a little more grandiose.”

AGT has managed to continue on with its live shows by filming without a studio audience and having the judges sit far apart. Kelly even recently got a taste of how things could be when she appeared on the show this week to sit in for Simon Cowell.

After Deadline reported that the upcoming episodes of The Voice have been pushed back from its usual late September slot, the site claimed that it is because they’re still working out how to safely get everyone together.

“One of the things that The Voice is known for is awesome staging and to pull that off is of major importance this season,” the insider alleged.

They added that the team really wants “the coaches together on the same stage” and don’t have plans right now to have the coaches and contestants appear from home as they did toward the end of the last installment when the pandemic first hit the United States.

“If it is safe, they want to film in The Voice studios at Universal with no audience,” the source added.

While nothing is set in stone just yet, they also claimed that “everyone appears to be on board and things should be finalized in the next couple of weeks,” which means new episodes could soon get a premiere date.

It’s likely the show will return to screens sometime in October or November.

The new report came shortly after longtime coach Blake admitted last month that there was a good chance the upcoming shows could be postponed due to the pandemic.

He said while chatting with SiriusXM’s The Storme Warren Show on The Highway Channel that they were supposed to start filming blind auditions in California last week, but he didn’t sound confident that it would go ahead.

“I still hope we can get it in and I know they created a safe situation for us, but we will see what happens,” he revealed at the time.