Mark Consuelos Talks Replacing Ryan Seacrest as Co-Host of ‘Live’ With Kelly Ripa, Marriage Counseling and Virtual Sex

variety.com:

Marc Malkin Senior Film Awards, Events & Lifestyle Editor Welcome to this week’s “Just for Variety.” Mark Consuelos doesn’t mind hand-me-downs from Ryan Seacrest.

Consuelos tells me he’s inheriting Seacrest’s dressing room when “Live With Kelly and Ryan” becomes “Live With Kelly and Mark” on April 17. “I’m no dummy,” Consuelos says on this week’s episode of the “Just for Variety” podcast. “Ryan is very fancy — he’s got fancy stuff.” At the same time it was announced in February that Seacrest was leaving “Live,” it was revealed that Consuelos will replace him as his wife Kelly Ripa’s co-host on the syndicated daytime talk show. “The first conversations started with like, ‘That is the worst idea ever,’” Consuelos recalls. “Kelly and I were like, ‘Yeah, that’s insane.

Why would we do that?’ Then I was like, ‘Well, I have filled in a lot over the past few years.’ She goes, ‘You have.’” As Variety’s Elizabeth Wagmeister first reported in March in a cover profile of Ripa for the annual Power of Women issue, the longtime host’s deal now sits at about $20 million a year.

Consuelos says of his pay, “This is my first contract on the job, so I shouldn’t make anywhere near what she makes. … I’m the newbie, so yeah, I won’t be playing hardball for sure.” And he won’t be discussing their sex life on “Live.” Ripa opened up, during her recently launched “Let’s Talk Off Camera With Kelly Ripa” podcast, about how she and Consuelos engage in virtual sex when he’s out of town. “She is an open book,” Consuelos says, explaining he thinks that’s one reason audiences have stayed with her for 22 years of “Live.” Then he adds, “I definitely do not think we’ll be talking about that from 9 to 10 a.m.