Pittsburgh’s queen of morning and afternoon talk shows is ready to expand her court.
KDKA-TV announced Thursday morning that starting Monday, “Talk Pittsburgh” host Heather Abraham will be joined on that recently launched 3 p.m. infotainment show by new co-hosts Mikey Hood and Kelly Dzanaj. Boaz Frankel will also begin his new gig as a “Talk Pittsburgh” correspondent on Monday, according to a KDKA press release.
That press release specified that in addition to hosting, Hood will also do some on-location reporting.
Abraham and Hood have been working together on “Pittsburgh Today Live” for almost five years now. Both Frankel, a local writer and filmmaker, and Dzanaj, a 100.7 Star radio personality, had made occasional appearances on both “Pittsburgh Today Live” and “Talk Pittsburgh” before becoming permanent fixtures on the latter show.
“Talk Pittsburgh” launched on March 20, 2023, and received a “better than expected” response from Channel 2 viewers, according to KDKA president and general manager Chris Cotugno.
“Heading into our second year, we wanted our community to know that we are committed to providing them with the highest quality local content,” he continued in the press release.
“So, the decision was made to add resources to take the show to the next level. When we saw the chemistry between Heather, Mikey and Kelly combined with the energy and creativity of Boaz, we knew we had a winning formula.”
Abraham is still all over KDKA despite taking a step back from co-anchoring “Your Day Pittsburgh” in September 2022. She still hosts “PTL” on weekday mornings with David Highfield and recently appeared in the KDKA 75th anniversary special that premiered on Jan. 20.
As Abraham told the Post-Gazette Thursday morning, she’s proud of how “Talk Pittsburgh” has already “built some great new segments with regular guests” in such short order.
“Any time you start a brand-new show, it’s going to have its challenges,” Abraham said via text. “But it’s been fun to work through them and find our way!”
She plans to carry the momentum of “Talk Pittsburgh” into the show’s next iteration that will now include Hood, Dzanaj and Frankel.
“Having the experience with ‘Pittsburgh Today Live,’ it’s been great to use some of what works there and expand in a different way on ‘Talk,’” Abraham said.
“It’s been really exciting to watch it grow and enter our second year on air soon with some great changes ahead.”
Joshua Axelrod: jaxelrod@post-gazette.com and Twitter @jaxelburgh.
First Published: February 1, 2024, 4:24 p.m.
Updated: February 2, 2024, 10:47 a.m.
