New Trend - People Clandestinely Disappear
Over the past few years, Howard has cut back on the practice of talking about staffers too much and has also kept his mouth shut when people leave the show. In 2013, when executive producer Gary Dell'Abate was asked if Tim Sabean, former SVP of the Stern channels, had left the show, he infamously proclaimed that Tim was "around".
Back in the day (February 2010), Howard grilled Sussy the lighting guy for leaving his great job with HowardTV. However, he made no mention that it was the last day of work for many of the other HowardTV guys in October 2013 even though he had put them on the air many times over the years. They got the ax when HowardTV was cut from InDemand and many of them did not have new jobs lined up when they were canned.
One may think that the reason for not providing any airtime for the HTV guys was that Howard had a jam packed show that day, but the here is the summary of the radio gold that the Stern show delivered:
Howard could have easily had the HTV guys on the air for a final good bye, but it would have drawn attention to the failure of HowardTV. He also claimed that 'other plans' were in the works and that he had "a different approach on how to do TV for the show", but as of this date, there has been no replacement for HowardTV.
Howard also didn't mention that former intern wrangler Tracey Millman left the show in early 2014 - some have speculated that this was another cost cutting move, but Tracey claims that she did not get fired and that she left to pursue other options in a different state. However, there has been no mention of her replacement and there is a gap of several months between when she left the Stern show in February 2014 and when she started her new job at a local station in North Carolina in the fall of 2014.
Breaking News - Howard 100 News Team is Shrinking
File this under 'stories not likely to be discussed' when Howard returns for his next live show next week after a week of vacation at his mansion in Palm Beach, Florida.
Folks online have found that former (?) news person Lisa G may be the latest person who has clandestinely disappeared - her profile is no longer visible on the howardstern.com website, although the cached version is still available.
Mike Hambrick is yet another former Howard 100 news guy who is "around". Like Lisa G, his profile on the Stern website is also gone (see cache of old profile) but his LinkedIn profile confirms that his time with the Stern channels ended in February 2015.
New Faces
While some familiar people are now former Stern channel employees, others are joining the ranks as Howard is "all in" to deliver quality content to his audience, with bits such as fake Bruce Jenner and Casey Kasem's corpse. In case fans are still in the dark about some newer additions to the cast of characters behind the scenes who help bring the funny to the 2015 Howard Stern show, let's meet a few of them:
1. Marci Turk. Marci is the Chief Operating Officer of the Stern channels and has been working for the channels for a while. The howardstern.com website used to include her profile; however, for some strange reason, someone must have told Jason Kaplan to remove it from the site. Of course, one can still see an archived version of her profile on the Stern website. While some disgruntled fans who aren't amused by the recent content on the Stern channels blame Marci, it is likely that she's just following Howard's instructions lest she also disappear and end up as the former COO of the Stern channels.
2. Brent Hatley. Brent was formerly with the Bubba the Love Sponge show and he has been a producer on the Stern channels since August 2014. I don't think Howard has ever mentioned on air that Brent is now working with the channels.
3. Steve Nowicki. - Steve Nowicki is an Assistant Writer/Producer on the Stern show - Mr. Nowicki graduated from college in 2014, and he claims that while he was an intern, he wrote/produced 17 bits that aired on the show:
Apparently he had more substantive duties than the former Stern show intern who's part of class action suing Sirius/XM over labor law issues who claimed that her tasks as an intern included "running errands, reviewing news clips and fetching food for on-air personalities and guests."
4. Nik Ruckert. Nik is a writer on the Stern show and unlike the other new employees in this post, Fred Norris slipped up and mentioned his name on the Stern show on October 8, 2014.
Audio clip: https://soundcloud.com/howardstern/stern-staffer-shocked-that-robin-doesnt-recognize-him
Unfortunately for Nik, Howard said he couldn't pick Nik out of a lineup and Robin said she doesn't know him (not surprising, as Robin does many Stern shows from her home via ISDN line).
5. Kyle Simon. Kyle is another Assistant Writer/Producer on the Stern show - although Mr. Simon's Twitter account has "LOL" at the end of it, a quick review of the tweets he sends out would lead one to believe that he must be saving his humorous material for the Stern show.
One interesting item of note - last month he sent a tweet to a bi-sexual guy with two dicks telling him that the show was interested in his book. Not surprising, as Howard seems to have a very unusual interest in the length and girth of male genitals, so this "Diphallic Dude" would be extra interesting to him.
This isn't the first time that the Stern show has reached out to this gentleman - in 2014, super producer Will Murray asked the dude to email him:
Even with the quiet disappearance of some familiar faces and additions of new 'talent', Howard is still looking for more help - there is a job listing on the Sirius/XM site for the "Head Writer" position on the channel:
Who knows what is next with the behind the scenes changes at the Stern channels - unfortunately for what's left of Stern's listeners, it is unlikely that Howard will mention these changes on his radio show.
