Chris Hardwick is expanding his AMC empire.
The cable network announced Wednesday that it will air Hardwick’s popular Talking franchise every Sunday. Hardwick hosts popular post-show breakdowns after The Walking Dead and Fear the Walking Dead, and AMC’s announcement expands the franchise to when the shows are on hiatus.
Without the zombie franchise, hourlong episodes of Talking With Chris Hardwick will feature a single guest or cast and air Sundays at 11 p.m. Like Hardwick’s Comedy Central pop culture game show @midnight, Talking will feature a strong social media presence and interactivity. The series will premiere April 9 at 11 p.m., a week after the season seven finale of The Walking Dead.
Hardwick will exec produce Talking alongside Embassy Row’s Michael Davies, Brandon Monk, Jen Patton and Brillstein Entertainment Partners’ Alex Murray.
“Chris Hardwick is just the ultimate fan guide, advocate and conversationalist. He took our desire to serve the fans of The Walking Dead with an hour of discussion and analysis following each new episode and turned it into the No. 1 talk show on television, and a model that has been widely emulated but never quite duplicated, because Chris is the key,” AMC president of originals Joel Stillerman said. “Between Talking Dead, his podcast and panel moderation at events like Comic-Con, there is just no one better at drawing out guests’ humanity, celebrating content and serving fans. We are looking forward to expanding our relationship with Chris through this new version of Talking that will allow him to do what he does best — give our viewers a front row seat to some of the biggest topics in pop culture today and a host who has an incomparable affinity for the content they love.”
The Talking expansion comes at a busy time for Hardwick, who hosts NBC game show The Wall as well as Comedy Central’s four-night-a-week @midnight. He’s repped by UTA and Brillstein.
