emmy®magazine Features Archive: 2007 issue 1 • back to emmy®issues index
Hosting the country's number-one show might be enough for some. Not American Idol's Ryan Seacrest. With his can't-slow-down mindset, he's built a multi-layered career that could take others a lifetime to create.
By Shirley Halperin
Every Sunday through Friday, the alarm clock sounds at 4 a.m. In Ryan Seacrest’s Hollywood Hills home.
In darkness, he makes his way to the car and down the winding but relatively short drive to the E! Entertainment building, where a million-dollar radio studio (newly built for him) awaits his 5 a.m. start.
There he’ll spend five hours kibitzing on KIIS FM, sharing celeb gossip (Eva Longoria’s engaged! Lindsay Lohan is in AA!) and entertainment news with several hundred thousand commuters — before most of us have even had breakfast.
From KIIS, Seacrest heads upstairs to the newly decorated Ryan Seacrest Productions wing of 5750 Wilshire to finish up his morning.
In the next four hours, he will strategize, rehearse and execute that day’s airing of E! News (he co-anchors six shows a week with Giuliana DePandi), do voiceovers for his other radio gig (hosting American Top 40), squeeze in a little press of his own and maybe lunch (sushi at his desk).
Then it’s off to host American Idol, which, fortunately, goes live at 5 p.m. mere blocks away, on Fairfax Avenue, at CBS Television City. The number-one Fox show, with an audience of nearly 40 million, is his last stop of the day. He is done by 7 and home by 8 to hit his 8:30 bedtime. Soon, it’s beep, beep, beep....
Seacrest thrives on the hustle, and it’s why he’s become one of America’s most recognized faces and voices. Not since the glory days of Dick Clark and Merv Griffin has an entertainer worn so many hats and reached so many people—an estimated 66 million a week.
There’s E! News, where, besides anchoring, Seacrest is managing editor; E! Entertainment’s red-carpet coverage, for which he is permanent host; plus his production company, which is readying the March roll-out of its first reality series, Paradise City, about a group of Las Vegas locals.
There are the aforementioned radio shows and the network New Year’s special that he executive produces and co-hosts. And there’s American Idol, which eats up at least five months of the year.
For this thirty-two-year-old, the work never stops. “I think it takes that mentality, that you can’t take anything for granted,” says Seacrest in his usual don’t-hate-me-because-I’m-successful manner.
“Even if you’ve had a certain amount of success, you can’t slow down. You need to take that and parlay it into more. The moment you relax or think you’ve made it, you begin to lose it.”
It’s a mantra Seacrest has sworn by for half of his life. Since landing his first radio job at sixteen, the affable and ever-ambitious Dunwoody, Georgia, native has been double- or triplebooking his schedule to make all his show-biz dreams come true—simultaneously.
It started innocently enough: one night, while he was still an intern at Atlanta’s STAR 94 FM, the deejay on shift called in sick and left Seacrest specific instructions to do a simple station ID. Call it his rarely seen rebellious side, but Seacrest didn’t do as he was told.
Rather, he turned on the microphone and started talking. The station’s owner happened to be listening, liked what he heard and the rest, as they say, is broadcasting history.
Still, being a big fish in the small pond of Atlanta in no way guarantees success in Los Angeles, the country’s second-largest market. But Seacrest drove cross-country in a Honda Prelude packed to the gills, reaching the West Coast in 1993 as bright-eyed and bushytailed as that Clay Aiken kid from North Carolina.
“I was impressed and depressed,” he says. “I was depressed because I didn’t know anyone, I didn’t know my way around and I knew I had to figure out a way to live here."
"I didn’t want to go back home. I wanted to be able to say I did something, because my parents were a little unsure about the move. But I also remember looking at the freeways and saying, ‘Oh my God, it looks like CHiPs!’ And all the cops looked like T.J. Hooker!"
"I was enamored by the things that were antithetical to my life growing up in Georgia—the Hollywood sign that you’d seen in movies, the sexiness of the city," he continues. "Of course, my mother was like, ‘There are crazy people there!’”
Turns out Seacrest fit in just fine with the crazies, and it didn’t take long to start making a name for himself. He dropped out of Santa Monica College to pursue radio full-time, and by 1995 had taken over the afternoon drive slot at Star 98.7 FM.
Soon he landed at KIIS, at the doors of two of his idols—Rick Dees and Casey Kasem, both of whom he would later unseat, albeit amicably.
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| Idol Makers: Ryan Seacrest (c) with American Idol executive producers Nigel Lythgoe (l) and Ken Warwick (r) at the 2007 Primetime Emmy Awards Governors Ball. |
In December 2003 he was named host of the weekly countdown show American Top 40—where Kasem had reigned since 1970—and two months later he was given the morning drive, which had belonged to Dees for twenty-two years.
“They were stars to me,” Seacrest reflects. “I was a radio geek, so it was surreal when I got the opportunity to go to KIIS FM.” But, he maintains, “I wasn’t privy to Rick’s situation. I assumed he was retiring or on his way out."
"I was already under contract with the company and I was his fill-in guy, so it seemed like a really natural, easy thing to do. He was there for a long time, and I think they wanted to give KIIS a shot of something new.”
That something was On Air with Ryan Seacrest, which has taken the station, owned by Clear Channel Communications, to the top of L.A.’s ratings game. But if it sounds like Seacrest was confident going in, think again.
“I remember sitting in those first meetings and telling people, ‘Oh, yeah, I can pull this off,’ then walking out scared to death,” he confesses. “Radio in the morning is very competitive in this market, and I had no clue if I could really do it—if I could get up that early every day or be on for that many hours. But I think the beauty of it was that I didn’t know what I was doing."
"I didn’t have a show that we brought in—we created this thing!" he recalls. "It took a year and a half to build it, but now the ratings are on top and everybody seems happy.”
Certainly he must have been elated when he got the call for a network show set to debut in 2002. It was an American version of England’s latest reality phenomenon, Pop Idol.
Seacrest, whose TV experience at that point included hosting stints on such shows as ESPN’s Radical Outdoor Challenge and kids’ game shows Gladiators 2000 and Wild Animal Games, watched the tape that the producers sent over.
“I thought, ‘How cheesy is this? I can’t imagine that this will catch on—it’s just so corny!’ he says. "Turns out, corny works, but we had no idea [Idol] would take on the life that it did.”
Six seasons and thousands of auditions later, host Seacrest—along with judges Simon Cowell, Randy Jackson and Paula Abdul—may still go into convulsions when the umpteenth tone-deaf contender tackles “I Believe I Can Fly,” but he also exudes the excitement for the unknown that makes Idol must-see TV.
“There’s a total adrenaline rush to being on live television,” he says. “And we don’t plan anything we’re going to say to each other—ever. Up to the last second that starts the telecast, we’re joking and winding each other up. It’s become very relaxed on the set, and I think that translates.”
What do his colleagues think? Jackson, for one, says by e-mail: “You can tell by watching Ryan that he absolutely loves his job and there’s no place he’d rather be than on that stage.”
Indeed, Idol was the launching pad for Ryan Seacrest, the personality. It’s where he coined his sign-off, “Seacrest out” (“Honestly, it was not strategically planned,” he swears.
“We were running out of time and it was quicker than ‘I’m Ryan Seacrest. Thanks for watching and good night’”) and where his perfectly coiffed-and-colored hair made him a national punch line on shows like Saturday Night Live and The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (“I love it,” he admits, “and at times I will throw things out as fuel”).
It’s also where Seacrest officially became a bankable star. Networks, both broadcast and cable, were willing to invest money not just in Seacrest—as Fox did in 2004 when it hired him to host its New Year’s special—but also in his production company. Twentieth Century Fox did just that in 2004 when it agreed to let him bring On Air to television, as a live, syndicated afternoon talk and entertainment news show.
If there have been any bumps on Seacrest’s road, it would be those two events in succession. On Air was the bigger blow to the ego. Yanked after only eight months, Seacrest’s daily dose of TRL–flavored interviews and field segments failed to find its audience.
“I learned the hard way that syndication is a really difficult business,” he says. “I remember getting into the sales process for the show and going, ‘I feel like there’s a [place for a] big, destination-type program which isn’t shot in a perfectly lit studio, [something that] could feel less contrived.’ I learned that just because you think this type of show needs to exist, doesn’t necessarily mean it has to."
"Was I let down? Sure. You never want people to lose their jobs, and you feel an obligation to all those who put their time and energy [into it], but you can only control so much. And in some ways, I was relieved [at the cancellation] because I could breathe.”
The New Year’s show, on the other hand, put him up against his longtime hero Dick Clark, who did not mince words when it came to a new player challenging his two-decade-old institution, Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve. In fact, he had no words at all.
When asked to comment about Seacrest for a 2004 story in Entertainment Weekly, Clark responded through his publicist: “Dick sees Ryan as competition. Why would he talk?”
“I was heartbroken by that quote,” says Seacrest, who first met Clark by cold-calling his office for a meeting, which the veteran took. “But looking back now, I love that he’s competitive. He wants to win.”
And if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. That’s what Seacrest decided to do when he pitched himself as a potential partner, rather than rival, for Clark’s ABC countdown. Seacrest recaps:
“I thought, ‘Dick Clark is the man, and if I’m ever going to be considered as a component to his show, I have to put myself in that context so maybe he would think I could help or be a part of it in the future. And in a strange way, that’s what happened. Before we did the deal, he said [to me], ‘I think you are the guy to be a part of this show and eventually go on with it.’ I was thrilled.”
Your classic Hollywood ending? Perhaps. After all, in his relatively new position at E!, Seacrest is getting a second chance at that non-formulaic daily news show he craved, and it looks to be catching on.
“We were hoping to put E! News in a much higher profile and, at the same time, increase the ratings,” says E! President and CEO Ted Harbert. “Both those things have happened since Ryan’s come on board."
"Ryan has helped in every possible way," Harbert explains. "We have so much more access to stars now; we get the interviews he does every morning for KIIS. It’s been an influx of high-profile names.”
Not only does he get the big names, he gets them to break, refute or confirm the gossip that circles the water cooler for days. “I try to do [interviews] in a way that’s tactful, respectful and many times playful,” Seacrest explains.
“I try not to make anyone feel uncomfortable, but I also don’t want to be told, ‘You can’t ask [these] questions.’ It’s a constant balancing act. You don’t want to take the tacky route of being invasive," he says, "but at the same time, if someone’s just been through a divorce, you want to know how they’re doing and if they’re okay.”
To that end, Seacrest could consider working on his own love life, which he admits has taken a backseat to his career. “My personal life suffers in that I can’t spontaneously decide to do something, like go away for a long weekend,” he says.
“And there are weeks where you almost disappear from your friends, [not] even returning phone calls. Not that I’m complaining, because I’d rather be so busy where you can barely keep up, but it’s probably why I’m single.”
Something else Seacrest doesn’t have time for? Watching TV, despite appearing on it and developing content for it on a daily basis. “I rarely get to watch shows in their entirety,” he says.
“I watch Larry King every night [he has subbed for King] and TiVo all the entertainment shows, but I’ve become less of a recreational TV viewer and more of a quick study of what’s happening. So if a show’s being talked about, I’ll quickly scroll through to see what the vibe was.”
But there’s one show Seacrest never misses, and that’s Idol. “If I got shot, I would still try and host the show from the hospital by remote satellite,” he adds without a hint of sarcasm, “introducing the contestants and giving out the phone numbers from my hospital bed.”
Somebody really needs a vacation. •
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