TV Q&A: What did Celina Pompeani-Mathison announce on ‘PTL’?

Q: What did Celina Pompeani-Mathison announce on “Pittsburgh Today Live” on Dec. 20? Is she retiring to be a mom? I wasn’t able to watch.

— Karen, via email

Rob: Yes, Pompeani-Mathison, who already pulled back on her duties after the birth of her first child, Sonny, in 2023, decided to exit “PTL” fully.

“It really has been the most difficult decision,” she told me. “I love my KDKA and ‘PTL’ family so much, but I love being with my little Sonny and don’t want to miss any milestones or moments with him. I reduced my hours when he was born, and I was still having a hard time leaving him even working part-time.”

Q: The NFL games on Prime and Netflix are being picked up by local stations, obviously for ratings. What do the local stations pay Prime and Netflix for this privilege?

— Bob, via email

Rob: Reports suggest Netflix paid about $75 million to stream each of the two 2024 NFL Christmas Day games. The same report suggests the NFL had to make concessions to CBS and Fox for the two games that otherwise would have been played the weekend after Christmas.

Netflix paid CBS to produce both games. In addition, CBS received ad inventory in the broadcast coverage of the games in the local markets of the competing teams. It’s unclear if CBS paid Netflix for the local broadcast rights or if the production deal included those local broadcast rights. A CBS representative did not respond to a request for comment.

As for Prime’s NFL games that air locally, that’s not a question WPXI executives would ever answer and I could find no national sports TV reporting on what Prime games cost for local stations to air.

Q: Have there been an above-average number of celebrity deaths this year compared with past years? This year seems to have had an extraordinary number of deaths in the field of entertainment. At least this seems to be the case when talking about it among my friends. Is there any way to research this or somehow get an answer?

— Jim, via email

Rob: Not my area of expertise, but it makes sense that there is at least a perception of more celebrity deaths. The entertainment industry and the rise of the celebrity began in earnest post-1920, but it really started cranking after World War II and reached its peak beginning in the 1960s. A star in their 20s in the 1960s is in their mid-80s today so it stands to reason that with more stars formed over the past 64 years, we’re at the point where there would seemingly be more celebrity deaths.