MTV Announces ‘Total Request Live’ Reboot, Renames Iconic Moonman Statue
President of MTV Chris McCarthy revealed on Sunday that the network is “fast-tracking” a revival of Total Request Live or TRL, the popular 2000’s era music countdown show.
Writers at TV Line report that the soon-to-come TRL 2.0 will follow a similar format to that of its predecessor, with a collective of young “vee-jays” sharing the stage with entertainers and their fans alike, counting down the day’s hottest music videos.
“The original series, first launched as [MTV Live, then] Total Request in 1997 with host Carson Daly,” TV Line details, “was officially branded as TRL in the fall of 1998.”
Daly led the live show until 2003, prior to departing MTV and joining NBC for his late-night Last Call with Carson Daly chat series, now in its 16th season.
Hosts Quddus (seen above), Lala Anthony, Hilarie Burton of One Tree Hill fame and Damien Fahey, now a writer for Family Guy, were among a handful of names who reigned the helm of TRL until it’s cancellation and subsequent three-hour long retrospective, Total Finale Live in November of 2008 — which saw Daly pulling duty for the final time.
For the new Total Request Live, five burgeoning media personalities, including rapper and comedian DC Young Fly and Erik Zachary, a radio presenter from Chicago, are set to steer the teen-themed live show.
In an interview with the New York Times, McCarthy stated that the new TRL would begin in the fall from the heart of Times Square, just steps away from where the old TRL filmed Monday through Thursday at 1515 Broadway.
“McCarthy [revealed] that the new TRL will premiere in October — yes, as in less than three months from now — with construction on a new Times Square studio currently underway,” TV Line notes.
In 2014, MTV revisited Total Request Live “one last time” with singer Ariana Grande for a special themed around her My Everything album, Total Ariana Live, as FOX News reports.
#TRL Revival Eyed for Fall on MTV https://t.co/TWarG5AKVe pic.twitter.com/elYC97N9pc
— TVLine.com (@TVLine) July 30, 2017
In semi-related news, McCarthy also confirmed the updated moniker of the music network’s iconic figure, the Moonman, to the gender-neutral Moon Person, to mirror the retooling of gender-neutral categories for this year’s MTV Video Music Awards.
The first ever Moonman was handed out at the show’s seminal ceremony in August of 1984 from Radio City Music Hall in New York City.
The 2017 MTV Video Music Awards from Los Angeles with host Katy Perry airs Sunday, August 27. Other than the mention of October, no further information was relayed about the air date of MTV’s new Total Request Live.
[Featured Image by Frank Micelotta/Getty Images]
