Despite the sudden departure of ‘Wickie’, Nine is set to send the long-serving executive off with style.
Staff at Nine News are still in a spin after the departure of news boss Darren Wick was suddenly announced late on Friday afternoon.
Rumours had been circulating for weeks, if not months, that the popular executive would not be returning to his role.
In an exclusive interview with TV Blackbox, Nine programming boss Hamish Turner revealed staff would soon have the chance to say a proper goodbye to Wick.
Turner was also pressed about possible replacements (you can watch in the video player of read the exchange below):
Wick is part of the furniture here. He’s been here since I’ve been up in Sydney. Well-loved. He’s done a great job holding the reins of the biggest newsroom in the country and he’s got his big shoes to fill, but he’s obviously made a personal decision and we really support him in that. And look, news never stops and so very sad to see him go, but we need to move on with the news cycle. So look, Wick, we’ll farewell him in the right manner and obviously there’ll be announcements made around who’s going to fill those shoes moving forward.
Rob McKnight:
Do you think it’ll be an internal candidate or someone external?
Hamish Turner:
I think probably both are on the cards, but I think we tend to look internally to find the right candidate and we’ll go from there and go through the process, the due process.
Rob McKnight:
Well internally you have a lot of good candidates. You’ve got Simon Hobbs, who’s the TCN news director, Hugh Nailon, you’ve already mentioned, Tom Malone’s been on the cards for a while now. He’s done 60 Minutes, he’s done radio, he was the EP of Today Show, his name would certainly be in the mix.
Hamish Turner:
Well, you’re obviously speculating, Rob, and thought about it. I’ll leave the speculation to you.
Rob McKnight:
You know me, it’s not always speculation.
The full interview will air tonight in the TV Blackbox vodcast at 8pm NSW/VIC/TAS | 7.30pm SA | 7pm QLD | 5pm WA.
You can watch HERE.
