‘Dr Phil’ to end after 21 seasons

Presenter and TV personality Dr Phil McGraw tied for #4 on the 2016 Forbes list of top-earning celebrities. File picture: Joe Cavaretta

Presenter and TV personality Dr Phil McGraw tied for #4 on the 2016 Forbes list of top-earning celebrities. File picture: Joe Cavaretta

Published Feb 1, 2023

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“Dr. Phil” is to end after 21 seasons.

Psychologist-turned-TV star Phil McGraw, 72, has confirmed his popular daytime talk show will wrap after its 2022-23 season.

He said: “I have been blessed with over 25 wonderful years in daytime television.

“With this show, we have helped thousands of guests and millions of viewers through everything from addiction and marriage to mental wellness and raising children.

“This has been an incredible chapter of my life and career, but while I’m moving on from daytime, there is so much more I wish to do.”

McGraw and the show’s production company, CBS Media Ventures, are working on a “strategic prime-time partnership”, details of which will emerge soon.

He added: “I am compelled to engage with a broader audience because I have grave concerns for the American family, and I am determined to help restore a clarity of purpose as well as our core values.”

Steve LoCascio, the president of CBS Media Ventures, said: “Phil is a valued partner and member of the CBS/King World family, and while his show may be ending after 21 years, I’m happy to say our relationship is not.

“Phil changed the daytime landscape as the force behind one of the most popular talk shows ever on daytime TV.

“We plan to be in the Dr. Phil business with the library for years to come and welcome opportunities to work together in the future.”

Last year, McGraw thanked Oprah Winfrey for “changing his life”.

The star met the legendary talk show host when she hired his legal consulting firm, CSI, to prepare her for the Amarillo Texas beef trial in 1995, and she was so impressed with him as an individual that she convinced him to appear on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” as a relationship expert before helping him create his own show in September 2002.

Speaking in May, he said: “Oprah and I met in the late ’90s when she was in trial, and I was on the trial team, then I started doing the show, and started doing the show a lot, and then we launched the show, and it really changed my life a lot.”