The TV personality is gushing over her 21-year-old daughter's moxie.
Kelly Ripa is learning from the younger generation. On Tuesday, the Live With Kelly and Ryan host spoke with ET at Variety's 2023 Power of Women event in New York City, and shared what she most admires about her and Mark Consuelos' 21-year-old daughter, Lola Consuelos.
"I am the most impressed with her ability to really speak about what she needs when she needs it," Ripa tells ET. "She unapologetically does that. ...I still am learning how to not apologize for everything all the time. And you shouldn't have to apologize for asking for what you need or what you think might make your work environment better or what may make your life easier."
The 52-year-old TV personality adds, "We need to learn to reframe our minds collectively."
Ripa is about to face some changes in her work environment when Ryan Seacrest steps down as her Live co-host on Friday, April 14, and her husband steps in as her new co-host on Monday, April 17. The show's name will then change to Live With Kelly and Mark.
In a recent interview with Variety, Ripa opened up about the ups and downs of co-hosting Live, and having to fight for what she deserved, including just having her own office.
"It was the strangest experience I've ever had in my life," she recalled. "I was told that I couldn't have an office. It didn't make a whole lot of sense, especially because there were empty offices that I could have easily occupied."
Instead, Ripa allegedly set up shop in an empty janitor's closet after her fourth year on the show. "They finally cleaned out the closet and put a desk in there for me," she told the outlet. "And so I was working in the janitor's closet with a desk so that I could have a place to put things."
When speaking to ET on Tuesday, Ripa said it wasn't the host changes that bothered her on Live so much as how those switchovers have been portrayed in the media. The TV personality has hosted the show since 2001, first with Regis Philbin, then with Michael Strahan and currently with Seacrest.
"It was really unfair on a lot of levels. It's not really the changeover, change is good for everyone. When a change happens, it's good. It's not necessarily bad," Ripa tells ET. "But it's always been portrayed as bad and evil and nefarious on the woman's part -- and that I would really love to see change."
That being said, Ripa says she has lots to be grateful for these days. "I pinch myself all the time with the good fortune I've had and with the collective group of women that I've been surrounded by in my career," she gushes. "Things don't happen in entertainment overnight. They don't happen swiftly and it's really much more than me. It's really a collective, it's a group effort of women and men who advocate for women and we've been able to achieve great things together. I am benefiting from being the figurehead of our show."
She adds, "So many of my producers are here right now and I plan on acknowledging them because they are really the reason that our show has maintained the excellence that it's maintained for four decades. I've been there for longer than half that time and they are the reason why."
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