Kelly Ripa Heats Things Up As Hiram Lodge’s Mistress In New ‘Riverdale’ Trailer

Kelly Ripa is set to heat things up on Riverdale— and she’s packing heat in the process. The Live with Kelly and Ryan host is set to guest star as Mrs. Mulwray on The CW hit — opposite her hunky husband, Riverdale regular Mark Consuelos — and now the network has released a trailer which shows that Ripa will make her debut with guns blazing.

TV Insider posted an exclusive new photo of Ripa as she makes her debut as the alleged mistress of Consuelos’ character, villainous tycoon Hiram Lodge. In the photo, Mrs. Mulwray is holding a gun — and it looks like she means business.

Kelly Ripa will make her grand entrance on The CW drama series during Riverdale’s January 30 “Chapter 46” episode, which airs two weeks after the show returns from winter hiatus. You can see Ripa in the new Riverdale trailer below.

Riverdale fans have known for months that Kelly Ripa would be joining the cast of the show as Hiram’s alleged lover. Ripa first teased the coveted role back in November, on her morning talk show with Ryan Seacrest. The actress, who met her future husband Mark Consuelos when they both worked on All My Children in the 1990s, also posted a teaser to Instagram. The star posed in a leather chair in a form-fitting black mini dress, captioning the pic, “It’s a family affair… Hiram’s mistress. 23 years of auditioning for a role I was born to play. Coming soon to the @thecwriverdale.”

Here’s your exclusive first look at @KellyRipa on @CW_Riverdale! https://t.co/iZwREX6y0K

— TV Insider (@TVInsider) January 9, 2019

In a statement posted by Us Weekly, The CW also confirmed Ripa’s guest star stint more than two months ago — describing Mrs. Mulwray as “confident and tough, she is Hiram Lodge’s alleged mistress. She’s a beautiful, icy, femme fatale who gets caught up in a conspiracy that’s much bigger than she initially realized.”

Mark Consuelos — who joined Riverdale as the nefarious Hiram Lodge during the show’s second season — dreamed up the idea of Kelly Ripa joining him on the show last year. In July, Consuelos told Us Weekly that he would love to have his real-life wife join him on The CW series. He even foreshadowed the perfect role for her.

“Wouldn’t it be great? She could play a nice little saucy character,” Consuelos told Us Weekly last year. “Hiram’s mistress or something like that?”

You can see Kelly Ripa as she makes her debut in the Riverdale trailer below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=br-6eOK1i2Y

Riverdale returns Wednesday, January 16 at 8 p.m. on the CW.