Australians have threatened to boycott Channel Seven after the network debuted a new satirical segment hosted by comedian Mark Humphries.
The 6:57pm News will be a weekly segment after the news bulletin on Fridays and is just one of a series of changes being introduced to the channel.
Humphries chose to crack several jokes about President Joe Biden after he suffered several gaffes during a high-pressure press conference.
‘Today, people around the globe waited with bated breath to hear from Joe Biden, the leader of the Free, for now, World,’ the comedian began.
‘His press conference was delayed by over an hour, presumably because the President was running late or more likely, waddling late.
‘And you know it was serious because of how it was being billed by the White House. A big boy press conference. And that’s technically correct if you’re using the Benjamin Button definition of ‘boy’.
‘Biden, who is 81 but doesn’t look a day over 90, spoke smoothly on a variety of issues and allayed voters’ fears about his age, is what I wish I could tell you.’
‘Well, he didn’t miss,’ Seven anchor Angela Cox said at the end of the segment.
However, viewers were divided over the skit.
‘You’ve sacked Sharyn Ghidella and now at the end of the news you have a very unfunny, stupid, moronic idiot on!’ one woman wrote on X.
‘I will never watch Seven News again.’
‘Channel 7 news doing a terrible job of copying @cheapseatsau lol,’ a third said.
‘A fourth shared: ‘Only one problem with the new 6.57pm news idea from @7NewsSydney. It’s not funny.’
However, others said they enjoyed the segment.
‘A bloody triumph,’ one man wrote on Instagram.
‘Nailed it!’ a second wrote.
It comes after veteran Channel Seven presenter Sharyn Ghidella was axed from the network after almost four decades in the industry.
Ghidella, 58, the face of Seven News in Queensland since 2007, confirmed the news in a fiery Facebook post on Friday.
She said her ‘tap on the shoulder’ finally came while she was at the salon, admitting it was a ‘relief’ of sorts after several anxious weeks of media job cuts.
But she was determined not to go quietly as she took aim at the failing network for prioritising gimmicks like astrology readings over veteran talent.
‘When you work in TV for as long as I have, not a day goes by when you aren’t expecting the proverbial tap on the shoulder… After 38 years, my shoulder tap has finally come,’ Ghidella wrote online.
‘It wasn’t quite how I expected it to end at Channel Seven.
‘I was actually sitting at the hairdressers for work, when I got the call informing me, that after 17 years with the network, my time was up.’
Insiders have told Daily Mail Australia that changes to the network came when morale was already at an ‘all-time low’ after the Spotlight show’s Bruce Lehrmann fiasco and the sacking of veteran reporter Robert Ovadia.
De Ceglie, Seven’s new director of new and current affairs, has confirmed for the first time that star signs will be part of the revamped weekday news – just as they have in some newspapers and magazines for decades.
The new boss insisted that morale is ‘great’ and that ‘trying new things’ is part of the network’s bold new future.
Humphries gained prominence as on the ABC’s satirical show The Roast and also appeared on the network’s 7.30 program and Insiders.
The comedian hosted the Australian version of the BBC show Pointless, which was cancelled after four months in 2019. Humphries revealed later that the franchise didn’t fly here because it ‘lacked the comedic banter’ of the UK version.
Humphries has also previously appeared on SBS’ The Feed and ABC’s Insiders.
Click here to resize this module