New Talk Shows from Katie Couric, Jeff Probst Premiering Monday

Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images(NEW YORK) -- More than a year after leaving CBS for ABC, Katie Couric will launch her new syndicated daytime talk show on Monday. Simply titled Katie, the one-hour program promises to tackle news and entertainment topics.

The premiere episode will feature interviews with Jessica Simpson and Sheryl Crow. Katie will be distributed by ABC.

Couric says the show will be a nice change of pace for her. She says she's looking forward to not having to "play beat the clock, to roll up my sleeves and let a conversation breathe and have intelligence and humanity."

Couric signed her ABC deal not long after Oprah Winfrey ended her long-running talk show, but she's glad she waited this long to get her program off the ground. She says it was "OK for me to give some time for the landscape to kind of settle before I jumped into the fray."

Couric isn't the only one jumping into the fray -- Survivor host Jeff Probst's new talk show also premieres on Monday. He says The Jeff Probst Show will be different from those of Jerry Springer and Maury Povich.

He recently told reporters, "I'm not interested in people fighting on stage, I'm not interested in paternity tests. I'm looking for an audience that is ready for something new. And we believe that they are out there, and that if we build this show correctly, they will come."

Ricki Lake, who hosted a popular talk show in the 1990s, launches her own daytime program on Monday, too. Check your local listings to find out when each of these talk shows will be televised in your area.

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