History
The series was initially hosted by Pat O'Brien in Hollywood on the ET Paramount Studios Stage 28 set with Lara Spencer in New York in MTV's 1515 Broadway studio overlooking Times Square. O' Brien remained a host up until March 5, 2008 when O'Brien was replaced with Donny Osmond. O'Brien returned to the series a month later after Osmond declined to become a permanent host. Spencer through the years was a solo host due at times to O'Brien's varied personal problems which forced him to take time off in extended periods to address them.
The program has gone through several formats through the years, with the news-heavy first season making way for a direction where subjects such as a pair of anorexic twins were regularly featured in sweeps periods, along with other fringe stories such as true crime stories and the Nadya Suleman octuplets story which had little or nothing to do with entertainment.
In September 2007, CBS Television Distribution moved the show, for its fourth season, to New York. Formerly Los Angeles-based O'Brien joined Spencer in a new Manhattan studio. The duo hosted from studio space within the Minskoff Theatre in Manhattan, home of the musical The Lion King, which has unobstructed views of Times Square, nearby the MTV studio facilities and also within One Astor Plaza.
On September 8, 2008, the program began to air in high definition with the move of both ET and The Insider from Stage 28 to Stage 4 at the CBS Studio Center as a final consequence of the 2006 split of Viacom and CBS . The set's focal point is a large life-size 3D construction of the program's logo, which was formerly used as the main portion of the set where segments took place until the September 2009 retooling of the program into a panel show. The New York aspect of the program was also abandoned, with Spencer relocating to Los Angeles and becoming a solo host, along with Victoria Recano, Steven Cojocaru and Cheryl Woodcock.
In the move, O'Brien became a Los Angeles-based correspondent for the program, but ten days later on September 18, was dismissed permanently from the program for comments he made in a staff email after a trip to Iowa, where he directed comments specifically at a mid-show daily segment of Spencer's which launched when the new season started. O'Brien proceeded to involve a rundown of the prices and labels of her clothing and accessories, saying that it made the viewers he talked to "vomit". Despite this pointed criticism the segment remained and continued to air at the end of every episode until Spencer's departure, expanding to the point where viewers made a multiple choice on what Spencer would wear on the next episode.
After the departure of O'Brien, the show was hosted by Lara Spencer alone until January 2009, when Samantha Harris joined the program from E! News as a permanent co-host. Harris also provided analysis and commentary as part of her duties as co-host of ABC's Dancing with the Stars until her departure from that series at the start of 2010.
In January 2013, The Insider will be renamed omg! Insider.
Read more about this topic: The Insider (TV series)
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