Clay Aiken Congratulates His Friends

Two colleagues and good friends of Clay Aiken announced some exciting news this last week.

On September 2nd, ABC announced that Diane Sawyer will replace Charles Gibson in January as anchor of the flagship ABC evening program World News.

For the first time in television history, two of the three major U.S. networks will have a woman anchoring their nightly news broadcasts. Replacing Charles Gibson as anchor of ABC’s World News, Diane will be taking over in January.  Diane’s appointment makes her only the second woman to hold a lead solo anchor position on a top three network–behind Katie Couric, who took over the CBS Evening News from Dan Rather in 2006. Other women, notably Barbara Walters, Jessica Savitch, Connie Chung and Elizabeth Vargas, have co-anchored or weekend anchored evening news broadcasts in the past, but none apart from Couric have taken center stage.

David Westin is the ABC News president.  He said of this move:

“Diane Sawyer is the right person to succeed Charlie and build on what he has accomplished.   She has an outstanding and varied career in television journalism, beginning with her role as a State Department correspondent and continuing at 60 Minutes, Primetime Live, and most recently Good Morning America.

Diane worked at CBS for 10 years before starting at ABC in 1989.  She graduated from Wellesley College and worked in the Nixon administration and helped the president write his memoirs after his resignation.

Clay was asked at the OFC if he had spoken to Diane about her new assignment.  He stated that he sent her a text of congratulations to her.  According to Clay, she asked for his input and Clay joked around with her.

Diane will be missed on Good Morning America.  The morning show usually finishes second to NBC’s Today and has won the daytime Emmy for best morning show three years running.  Diane will continue for the next four months while the network searches for a replacement on GMA.

I am sure that all of you here hope that whoever joins the team is a big Clay Aiken fan.  We need to see Clay on morning TV.

Clay’s AI buddy, Ruben Studdard announced two career moves this past week.  First, Ruben will appear in a movie being shot in Alabama. The movie is about a young singer whose family life is disrupted when his father is deployed to Afghanistan by the Marines.  A 12-year-old named Uriah Shelton will star as Henry Matthews. Country star Trace Adkins will be in the movie, too. The movie is due out in year.

Ruben plays a kindly minister named Pastor Johnson.  He befriends the young lead named Henry and helps inspire his love of music.

Ruben’s second announcement was found on his Official Website.

Ruben to perform with David Foster and Friends Tour!

Ruben will be joining Philip Bailey of Earth, Wind and Fire, Charice, Peter Cetera and Michael Johns for the 10 city tour kicking off October 21st in Chicago!  Go to the tour section for a list of dates!

I was lucky enough to see the David Foster and Friends Concert in Las Vegas in the spring when Clay Aiken was performing.  The entire show was wonderful and I am sure that Ruben will be a wonderful addition to the show.

Since Clay’s friends are announcing good news, maybe they can encourage Clay to spill some news to us.  That would be the best news!!


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