Craig Ferguson has broken his silence about leaving CBS, and “The Late Late Show,” this December after a 10-year run.
“It’s time for a change, man. It’s time for a change,” Ferguson told “Larry King Now” host Larry King Thursday on Ora.tv. “I don’t want to stay and keep doing the same thing over and over again. I want to do the same thing over and over again somewhere else.”
King asked Ferguson — who began hosting “The Late Late Show” in January 2005 — if he would have stayed had CBS chosen him, instead of Stephen Colbert, to succeed David Letterman on “Late Show.”
“I don’t think I would have,” Ferguson said. “I don’t think I would have. Maybe.”
Ferguson said he would be open to hosting another talk show — “But not right away” — and denied that he received a $5 million buyout when CBS passed over him in favor of Colbert.
“It wasn’t $5 million,” he said — but didn’t offer any money figure to King. Maybe it was $4.9 million.
Back in 2008, I was a guest on Ferguson’s “Late Late Show” to talk about my biography of Raymond Burr, which brings me, in a roundabout way, to veteran actor/voiceover artist Joe Sirola, a tried-and-true New Yorker. Joe guest-starred in two of my all-time TV favorites — Burr’s “Perry Mason” (three times) and “Get Smart” (twice) — and is still going strong in his early 80s.
Sirola, sometimes called “The King of the Voiceovers” — you’d recognize his baritone voice from those Boar’s Head commercials — is also busy in the digital world, where he plays Volkswagen spokesman “Sluggy Paterson,” the guy who invented the “punch dub” game (in which you punch someone — hard — every time you see a Volkswagen). The first six “Sluggy” Webisodes were released during the Super Bowl in February and continue to be popular.
Sirola, who lives in a Fifth Avenue penthouse, was also a co-producer of the Tony-winning play “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder” and has a TV and movie acting resume too long to list here. (Richard Burton was one of his drinking buddies — how cool is that?)
Last, but not least …
Season 2 of “Eat! Drink! Italy! with Vic Rallo” is now streaming on Create TV (the digital network of PBS available at createtv.com). Rallo owns Central Jersey eateries Basil T’s Brewery and Italian Grill (Red Bank) and Undici Taverna Rustica (Rumson) … “Married” (Nat Faxon, Judy Greer) premiered to 1.5 million viewers last Thursday on FX … The 100th episode of “Ice Road Truckers” airs Monday (10 p.m.) on History. The series, now in its eighth season, premiered on June 17, 2007 … The iconic 1985 miniseries “Lonesome Dove” is now streaming on Hulu and Hulu Plus. Its cast includes Robert Duvall, Tommy Lee Jones, Danny Glover, Diane Lane, Jon Voight, Louis Gossett Jr. and F. Murray Abraham.