Howard Stern hasn’t officially renewed his SiriusXM deal — but he did troll his listeners into thinking he had been replaced.
Fans were in for a surprise when the Monday, September 8, episode started with a flustered Andy Cohen introducing himself before claiming the channel was now called “Andy 100.”
“I know that you’re expecting a big announcement from Howard, and this is not how things were meant to go,” Cohen, 57, said. “There’s been a lot of talk about what’s going to happen with Howard’s deal. Is he fired? I don’t know how much I’m allowed to say, except that he’s not here and I am. Howard was supposed to start the show today, and this was supposed to be something of a cleaner hand-off. There is nothing clean about it. Here we are. I’m kind of winging it.”
Cohen called it a “surreal morning,” adding, “I can’t possibly fill his void.” The Bravo executive noted he was sure Stern would find success elsewhere before Stern joined him on the air and thanked Cohen for playing along.
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Stern, 71, then hinted he would remain on SiriusXM after rumors that his deal hadn’t been renewed. He recently played into the speculation by teasing that he would address listeners’ concerns on the September 2 episode of The Howard Stern Show, but his announcement was then postponed until Monday.
“I’m minding my own business, enjoying my summer vacation. [A reporter] says that I’ve been fired for being too woke. In light of the Stephen Colbert firing — because the word on Stephen was that it was all part of this merger, and they fired Stephen because he’s too woke — the story then became Howard Stern is fired because he’s too woke,” he explained on Monday about his decision to stay. “What pisses me off is that now I can’t leave. I’ve been thinking about retiring. Now I can’t.”
Stern said he considered retirement until false reports surfaced about his show getting canceled. He also hinted that “one of the positive things” about the situation was hearing from other companies interested in The Howard Stern Show.
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“I’m very happy at Sirius,” Stern said on Monday while praising SiriusXM CEO Jennifer Witz, who previously released her own statement, saying, “I think he’s been core to our platform for over 20 years, so I’m confident we’ll get to the right place.”
Stern originally signed with Sirius in 2004 before its merger with XM. This paved the way for The Howard Stern Show to debut on Sirius in January 2006. His most recent five-year renewal with SiriusXM was made official in 2020.
After signing a deal with Sirius worth $500 million (including stock) over five years, the more recent renewals “topped out at roughly $80 million to $100 million,” according to Bloomberg. When a Bloomberg report in 2020 stated that Stern was close to a deal with SiriusXM worth $120 million annually, the radio host said on his show that he and his team were “kind of baffled by it.”
