Clarkson joins Peyton Manning & Mike Tirico as host with Savannah Guthrie & Hoda Kotb also contributing
Emmy Award-winning talk show host and Grammy Award-winning artist Kelly Clarkson and Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback and two-time Super Bowl champion Peyton Manning will join two-time Sports Emmy Award-winner and NBC Olympics primetime host Mike Tirico to host NBCUniversal’s coverage of the Opening Ceremony of the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad in Paris this summer. The announcement was made on a recent appearance of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
Plans for the highly anticipated Opening Ceremony in Paris are unlike any other. Rather than a stadium, the organizers are turning one of the world’s most famous waterways, the River Seine, into the world’s biggest theatrical stage. A four-mile-long flotilla of more than 90 boats will carry thousands of athletes from more than 200 countries past hundreds of thousands of spectators seated on the banks of The Seine and finish at the Eiffel Tower.
Joining Kelly, Peyton, and Mike for NBCU’s Opening Ceremony coverage will be Today Show hosts Savannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb. The Olympic veterans will be stationed together on a bridge along the route, reporting on the pageantry and excitement as the athletes sail by. Clarkson, Manning, and Tirico will be positioned at the Trocadero near the ceremony’s finish, with spectacular views of The Seine and Eiffel Tower. Additional Opening Ceremony commentators will be announced soon.
NBC and Peacock will present live coverage of the Opening Ceremony on Friday, July 26th, beginning at noon ET. Telemundo will provide Spanish-language coverage beginning at 1 pm ET. Primetime coverage will begin at 7:30 pm ET/PT on NBC and Peacock.
This is the first time Clarkson and Manning are joining NBCU’s Olympic coverage although Manning did star in a promotional spot to kick off NBCUniversal’s fall campaign for Paris 2024. Clarkson, the original American Idol, currently hosts and produces the hourlong The Kelly Clarkson Show, distributed by NBCUniversal Syndication Studios.
In Paris this summer, the world’s greatest athletes will compete against the backdrop of one of the most beautiful cities in the world where the modern Olympic Games were conceived 130 years ago. This will be the third time Paris has hosted the Olympics (1900 and 1924), tying London for the most as a Summer Games host. Los Angeles (1932, 1984) will tie those two cities when it hosts the first Summer Games in the US in 32 years in 2028.
The organizers of Paris 2024 are reimagining the Games to make them more accessible to the public and to showcase their city to the world. In a first, competitions will be held amidst iconic Parisian landmarks – beach volleyball at the Eiffel Tower, equestrian at the Palace of Versailles, and urban sports at Place de la Concorde.
Last May, NBCU announced that the NBC broadcast network and streaming service Peacock would be the company’s primary platforms for its coverage of the Olympic Games Paris 2024, scheduled for July 26-Aug. 11. Click here for more programming information.
NBCU owns the US media rights to the Olympic Games through 2032, which are scheduled for Paris (2024), Milan Cortina (2026), Los Angeles (2028) and Brisbane (2032). The host city for the 2030 Olympic Winter Games has not yet been chosen.
