What happened to the biggest talk show icons of the ‘80s and ‘90s? Here’s the latest on Maury Povich, Jenny Jones, and more
- - What happened to the biggest talk show icons of the ‘80s and ‘90s? Here’s the latest on Maury Povich, Jenny Jones, and more
Randall ColburnJanuary 30, 2026 at 1:15 AM
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'Dirty Talk' explores the early careers of Maury Povich, Oprah Winfrey, Jenny Jones, and more
Everett Collection; King World Productions / Courtesy: Everett Collection; Paul Natkin/Getty
Key Points -
Dirty Talk: When Daytime Talk Shows Ruled TV revisits salacious daytime talk shows of the '80s and '90s.
The series recruits hosts like Sally Jessy Raphael and Maury Povich for insight into the era's popularity.
The ABC News docuseries is streaming on Hulu.
Once upon a time, daytime talk TV was where you went to get scandalized.
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, names like Sally Jessy Raphael, Jerry Springer, and Ricki Lake were on everybody's lips. While many talk shows began as fitfully amusing discussions around relevant issues, some soon devolved into sordid and exploitative freak shows that encouraged verbal and physical altercations.
This era of daytime TV is now being explored in an ABC News docuseries, Dirty Talk: When Daytime Talk Shows Ruled TV, which examines "the rise, fall and lasting impact of the most sensational era in television talk show history."
Familiar faces like Raphael, Maury Povich, and Montel Williams lend their voices to the series, each working to unpack how "these shows transformed from trusted confessional spaces into lightning rods of controversy."
Below, we revisit the key figures from this era, as well as what became of them after their shows left our screens.
01 of 09
Sally Jessy Raphael
Sally Jessy Raphael hosting 'The Sally Jessy Raphael Show' in 1991; Raphael on 'Dirty Talk: When Daytime Talk Shows Ruled TV'
Ron Galella, Ltd./Ron Galella Collection via Getty; ABC
Radio personality Sally Jessy Raphael (and her signature red specs) followed in Donahue's footsteps, first as a guest host on The Phil Donahue Show and then as the host of the Sally Jessy Raphael Show (later called Sally), which ran for more than 3,800 episodes from 1983 to 2002.
Raphael was known for her ability to connect intimately with her guests, though the host says in Dirty Talk that all she did was really try and listen. "I just looked at them, I would nod, and they would tell you just about anything," she says.
"It was a big deal for her to step into this arena as a woman, and as a woman who could relate in a more personal way to experiences that her guests had," adds Laura Grindstaff, a sociology professor at UC Davis and author of the 2002 book The Money Shot: Trash, Class, and the Making of TV Talk Shows.
Raphael nabbed five Daytime Emmy nominations and won Outstanding Talk Show Host in 1989.
In a 2022 episode of Lake's Raised by Ricki podcast, she blamed the end of her show on new owners who wanted Sally to follow the more salacious route of its competitors. That wasn't her interest or strength as a host, and ratings dipped.
After the end of Sally, she returned to radio and later hosted a 2014 Logo web series called Sally Jessy Rides, in which she'd interview famous folks on boats, buses, scooters, and other odd forms of transportation.
02 of 09
Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey on 'The Oprah Winfrey Show'; Winfrey attends the American Ballet Theatre 2025 Fall Gala at David Geffen Hall in New York City
King World Productions/Everett; Theo Wargo/Getty
Oprah Winfrey is as much a brand as a person these days.
Despite her impoverished childhood in rural Mississippi, Winfrey dreamed big. As a 1986 article in the Philadelphia Inquirer notes, as a teenager she replied to a question about where she'd in 20 years by replying, "Famous."
After years working as a TV anchor, she moved to Chicago in 1984 to host the fledgling AM Chicago, which, with her at the helm, became a ratings success, even outpacing The Phil Donahue Show.
She was so compelling that none other than Steven Spielberg gave Winfrey her first acting role in The Color Purple (1985), which earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress.
In 1986, The Oprah Winfrey Show debuted nationally, earning scores of viewers and rave reviews. "Oprah started something that no other talk show host at the time had started," says Maury Povich in Dirty Talk. "And that is, she talked about herself. And she made herself vulnerable."
She did so by opening up about her struggles with dating, dieting, and other issues familiar to women, thus helping to cultivate a devoted audience. As her success grew, she became known for lavishing studio audiences with gifts. (Surely you've seen the memes of the time she gave everyone in the audience a car.)
The Oprah Winfrey Show aired through 2011, winning so many Daytime Emmy Awards that Winfrey decided to stop submitting herself and the show for consideration. In July 2025, she told Live! host Kelly Ripa that while she doesn't miss the show itself, she does miss "the everyday conversation" it provided with audiences.
Following the end of The Oprah Winfrey Show, she launched the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN), where she produced and hosted several series, such as Oprah's Master Class (2011–2018) and Super Soul Sunday (2011–2021).
Elsewhere, she produced award-winning films and series like Selma (2014), When They See Us (2019), and The 1619 Project (2023), the latter of which earned her a Primetime Emmy for Best Documentary. She also won a Tony for producing the 2016 revival of The Color Purple, and has received honorary awards such as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award and the Golden Globes' Cecil B. DeMille Award.
Oh, and let's not forget the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which was bestowed onto her by President Barack Obama in 2013.
03 of 09
Phil Donahue
Phil Donahue, circa 1970-1976; Donahue receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House on Friday, May 3, 2024
Everett; Tierney L. Cross/Bloomberg via Getty
Known as the "King of Daytime Talk," Phil Donahue began his long, fruitful career as an announcer and TV anchor before launching The Phil Donahue Show in Dayton, Ohio, in 1967. By incorporating the audience into the conversation, he helped pioneer the daytime talk show format.
"Phil Donahue was the first host to step across the light grid and put a microphone in an audience's face," says Montel Williams in Dirty Talk. "No one else had done it before."
Donahue earned 20 Daytime Emmy nominations and nine wins, not to mention a prestigious Peabody Award in 1980. His show ran through 1996, amassing nearly 7,000 episodes across its run.
Donahue died in August 2024 at age 88, just a few months after he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Joe Biden.
"There wouldn’t have been an Oprah Show without Phil Donahue being the first to prove that daytime talk and women watching should be taken seriously," Winfrey shared in a tribute on Instagram following his death. "He was a pioneer. I’m glad I got to thank him for it. Rest in peace Phil."
04 of 09
Geraldo Rivera
Geraldo Rivera on 'Geraldo'; Rivera at the Chiller Theatre Expo on April 27, 2025, in Parsippany, N.J.
Paramount Television/ Everett; Bobby Bank/Getty
An attorney-turned-journalist, Geraldo Rivera was a high-profile reporter and host who entered a new echelon of fame after hosting an infamous TV special in which he cracked open secret vaults belonging to mobster Al Capone. While there was nothing of note in the vaults, the special nevertheless drew millions of viewers and helped turn Rivera into a household name.
The following year, he began hosting his own talk show, Geraldo, which was heavily informed by the rising popularity of tabloid journalism. "He starts where Donahue stops," reads one notable Geraldo slogan.
"Geraldo was the bigger character," says Marty Berman, a producer on Geraldo, in Dirty Talk. "He looked different, he sounded different. Geraldo was not a guy who was afraid of anything."
His show skyrocketed in the ratings after a 1988 episode in which his nose was broken during an on-air scuffle between white supremacists and antiracist activists. The incident was so highly-publicized that Rivera landed on the cover of Newsweek in the aftermath.
"The amount of coverage that it got ended up creating an appetite, a market for it, and people began to try to fill it," notes former Talk Soup host John Henson in Dirty Talk. "That was the shot heard round the world."
Geraldo aired from 1987 to 1998, the same year Rivera played himself on the finale of Seinfeld. Rivera also appeared (and occasionally as characters) in numerous films and series, including episodes of My Name Is Earl (2009) and Glee (2015). He also competed on The Celebrity Apprentice (2015), where he fared well, and Dancing With the Stars (2016), where he did not.
Following Geraldo, Rivera established himself as a news correspondent, first with CNBC, where he hosted Rivera Live through 2001. He pivoted to Fox News, where he worked in various capacities through 2023. According to Rivera, he quit the network after claiming he'd been fired as a cohost of The Five, saying that his departure was due to a "growing tension that goes beyond editorial differences."
Currently, he works as a correspondent at NewsNation.
05 of 09
Maury Povich
Maura Povich hosting 'The Maury Povich Show' in 1991; Povich attends SeriesFest Soiree Red Carpet at Asterisk on May 2, 2025, in Denver
Everett; Tom Cooper/Getty
Maury Povich was a household name prior to launching The Maury Povich Show thanks to his run on A Current Affair, which he hosted from 1986 to 1990.
"Everybody knew me in the country. I had a lot of recognition. But because of the tabloidism of A Current Affair, my popularity was not all positive. It was difficult," Povich says on Dirty Talk. "I thought, believe it or not, my personality alone would carry the show, so therefore the subject matter we started with was very tame when it came to cultural stuff."
That changed, as it did with many daytime talk shows throughout the '90s. But The Maury Povich Show (later retitled Maury) outlasted many of its competitors, running for 31 seasons from 1991 to 2022. Entertainment Weekly's Kristen Baldwin once called it the "the lone survivor of the silly-shock genre."
Throughout the show's run, Povich also briefly hosted a revival of the game show Twenty One on NBC, and cohosted a 2006 news program on MSNBC with his wife, news anchor Connie Chung. He memorably appeared in a 2010 episode of How I Met Your Mother.
In 2021, Povich collaborated with Lil Nas X on a fake episode of Maury to help promote the rapper's album Montero.
06 of 09
Jerry Springer
Jerry Springer hosting 'The Jerry Springer Show' in 1997; Springer at the 2nd Annual Global TV Demand Awards on January 21, 2020, in Miami Beach
Margaret Norton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty; John Parra/Getty
Jerry Springer had a one-of-a-kind career trajectory. He went from the mayor of Cincinnati to an award-running run as an Ohio news anchor to the hosting Jerry Springer, arguably the most scandalous entry in the daytime talk show space.
Jerry Springer ran from 1991 to 2018, starting as a standard daytime talk show with a political bent before fully embracing the industry's rising tide of salaciousness by highlighting sex workers, tawdry subcultures, infidelity, and scandal, with many episodes devolving into fisticuffs celebrated by a studio audience who couldn't get enough.
So popular were the show's brawls that Springer's head of security, Steve Wilkos, became a celebrity unto himself, resulting in his own talk show that's currently in its 19th season.
Springer cameoed in films like Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999) and episodes of The X-Files (1996) and The Simpsons (1998). He even starred as a fictional version of himself in Ringmaster (1998), a film about the behind-the-scenes drama of a Springer-style show. He was also a contestant on season 3 of Dancing With the Stars in 2006.
In the waning days of the show, Springer began hosting The Jerry Springer Podcast (2022), and later slammed a gavel on the courtroom show Judge Jerry (2019–2022).
He died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 79 in April 2023. "Jerry's ability to connect with people was at the heart of his success in everything he tried whether that was politics, broadcasting, or just joking with people on the street who wanted a photo or a word," said a spokesperson for Springer at the time. "He's irreplaceable and his loss hurts immensely, but memories of his intellect, heart, and humor will live on."
07 of 09
Montel Williams
Montel Williams, circa mid-1990s; Williams at the 2025 Hollywood Christmas Parade on November 30, 2025, in Los Angeles
Paramount Television/ Everett; River Callaway/Variety via Getty
A decorated naval officer, Montel Williams found success as the host of The Montel Williams Show, which ran from 1991 to 2008 and earned him a Daytime Emmy in 1996.
"When I went on the air, I was trying to make sure we did topics that interested the masses and dealt with the things that were happening in our day," he says in Dirty Talk.
Burt Dubrow, a longtime daytime TV producer, said that Williams' brand "was to get in [the guests'] heads and really talk about the psychology."
Williams, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1999, went on to found the Montel Williams MS Foundation. He later took on several hosting gigs, including on Lifetime's Military Makeover with Montel (2013–present), a home makeover show centering on military veterans.
He is also a seasoned actor, having played characters (and himself) on shows such as JAG (1997–2000), My Name Is Earl (2005–2007), Guiding Light (2008), and When George Got Murdered (2022).
08 of 09
Ricki Lake
Ricki Lake hosting 'Ricki Lake'; Lake on 'Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen'
Columbia Tri-Star Television/ Everett; Charles Sykes/Bravo via Getty
Before changing the landscape of daytime talk TV, Ricki Lake was known for her acclaimed turn in John Waters' Hairspray (1988) as Tracy Turnblad. She was only 24 when she began hosting her eponymous show, and her youth was key to her appeal.
"She was so much younger, her guests were so much younger, her audience was so much younger," says former Maury producer Amy Rosenblum in Dirty Talk. "There was a different feel to her show."
Deemed "Gen X's answer to Donahue," Lake's playful and light-hearted approach helped shift the perspective of the talk show industry. Instead of wagging a finger at youth, Lake allowed them to tell their stories — albeit in sensational fashion. As EW noted in a 1996 profile, some of her topics read thusly: ”Yeah, I’m Only 13, But I’m Going to Have a Baby!”; ”You Have No Friends and Today I’ll Tell You Why!”; "Today I Nominate You the Worst Boyfriend in America!”
Ricki Lake ran from 1993 to 2004, scoring a Daytime Emmy nomination in 1994. In a 2019 chat with RuPaul, Lake said that witnessing planes flying into the World Trade Center on 9/11 was what instigated her desire to stop hosting.
"After 9/11, which I witnessed firsthand living downtown in Manhattan, and having to go back to work two days after I watched the plane hit a building firsthand... I was like, 'This is not what I want my legacy to be,'" she said.
When asked if she missed the show, she replied, "Not for one second."
Lake has been involved in numerous projects in the years since, from competing on Dancing With the Stars (2005) and The Masked Singer (2019) to producing a documentary about childbirth, The Business of Being Born (2008). She even returned to daytime TV with 2013's The Ricki Lake Show. Though it was canceled after just one season, it earned her a Daytime Emmy nomination.
09 of 09
Jenny Jones
Jenny Jones hosting 'The Jenny Jones Show' in 1991; Jones via YouTube in 2018
Paul Natkin/Getty; Jenny Can Cook/Youtube
Stand-up comic Jenny Jones made a name for herself on Star Search in 1986, helping pave the way for a successful career in comedy that eventually led to her own talk show, The Jenny Jones Show. It ran for more than 2,000 episodes from 1991 to 2003.
Jones envisioned the show as more light-hearted than those of her competitors, weaving comedy skits and bawdy humor in with the tawdry affairs of her guests. "Jenny Jones was kind of like your clueless but curious aunt," says author Sarah D. Bunting in Dirty Talk.
The Jenny Jones Show, however, will forever be colored by an incident in which a segment resulted in a real-life murder. In 1995, an episode taped featured a Michigan man named Scott Amedure revealing himself as a secret admirer of Jonathan Schmitz, his acquaintance and a guest on the show. Days after the segment was recorded, Schmitz shot Amedure to death, then confessed to the murder, saying he'd been humiliated on national TV. The episode never aired.
In 1996, Schmitz was sentenced to to 25 to 50 years in prison. He served two years before being tried and convicted once more in 1999, since the previous verdict was overturned on appeal, per PEOPLE.
In a 2020 documentary about the incident, Amedure's brother claimed that Schmitz "was a victim, too," adding, "I blame the producers probably just as much, because it was their job to go out and find people that they could exploit. That's what they do for a living."
The Amedure family later won a civil suit against the show and its partners, but the verdict was overturned on appeal, per PEOPLE. In a 1999 interview with PEOPLE, Jones addressed the incident, saying, “It was not the ‘Jenny Jones murder.' It was the Jonathan Schmitz murder.”
Jones has maintained a relatively low profile over the past two decades. In 2005, she founded the Jenny Jones Foundation, which is said to "provide assistance to those who are underserved or forgotten with a focus on the health, safety, and recreation of smaller communities in the U.S. and Canada."
She also operated a cooking website and a YouTube channel in which she shared recipes.
Where can I watch Dirty Talk: When Daytime Talk Shows Ruled TV?
Dirty Talk: When Daytime Talk Shows Ruled TV is available to stream on Hulu.
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