NBA legend Charles Barkley joked on Saturday night that amid the recent upheaval at CNN, his friends have told him to “abort” his upcoming weekly show on the cable news network because it’s like he’s “jumping on the Titanic.”
Before he was ousted last week following a tumultuous 13-month tenure, one of Chris Licht’s big moves as CNN chief was to announce a new primetime show featuring Barkley and CBS morning host Gayle King. The series, titled King Charles, is set to debut this fall and is expected to air on Wednesday nights.
Barkley, who works for CNN’s corporate cousin TNT as a basketball analyst, popped up on NHL on TNT to help preview Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Finals between the Vegas Golden Knights and Florida Panthers. And he decided to have a bit of fun at CNN’s expense in the process.
“You don’t need to go take that news job,” NHL icon Wayne Gretzky told Barkley at one point. “You can come on our show, you know more about hockey than we do!”
Not missing a beat, Sir Charles referenced the turmoil that his soon-to-be cable news home has experienced in recent weeks—which culminated in Licht’s firing.
“Apparently with this new talk show I’m jumping on the Titanic,” he chuckled. “Everybody keeps saying, ‘abort, abort, abort!’”
Eventually, though, Barkley expressed excitement for his new talk show while hyping up King.
“No, you know what? I’m, looking forward to it,” he declared. “Gayle is awesome.”
When announcing his brainchild this past spring, which CNN is hoping will help turn around the network’s plunging primetime ratings, Licht said he was “thrilled” about the project. “This show will be an exciting new way we are delivering culturally relevant programming and unique perspectives to our audience, from two incredibly dynamic personalities,” he stated.
While co-hosting the show, King will remain as an anchor of CBS This Morning and Barkley will continue to provide analysis on TNT’s sports programming, most notably NBA basketball.
