Meredith Vieira

Meredith Louise Vieira was born on December 30, 1953, in Providence, Rhode Island, and was raised in nearby East Providence. Her father, Edwin Vieira, is a medical doctor, and her mother, Mary Elsie (Rosa), worked as a homemaker; both parents are first-generation Portuguese Americans whose own parents emigrated from the Azores, specifically Faial Island, to New England in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The family name Vieira translates to "scallop" in Portuguese. The youngest of four children, Vieira has three older brothers. She was raised in the Roman Catholic faith and attended the Lincoln School, a Quaker all-girls institution in Providence, graduating in 1971. She went on to earn a degree in English from Tufts University in 1975.

Vieira launched her broadcasting career in 1975 as a news announcer at WORC radio in Worcester, Massachusetts, where she worked afternoon-drive news during the B. J. Dean Show. She transitioned to television as a local reporter and anchor at WJAR-TV in Providence before joining WCBS-TV in New York City as an investigative reporter from 1979 to 1982. Her national profile grew when she joined CBS News, first as a reporter in its Chicago bureau from 1982 to 1984, then as a correspondent on West 57th from 1985 to 1989 and on 60 Minutes from 1989 to 1991. Her final CBS assignment was as co-anchor of the CBS Morning News from 1992 to 1993.

Following her departure from CBS, Vieira joined ABC as one of six regular correspondents on the news-magazine program Turning Point, a role she held from 1994 to 1999. Concurrently, she hosted the Lifetime Network series Intimate Portrait, which debuted on January 3, 1995, and ran until August 28, 2004. On August 11, 1997, she became the original moderator and co-host of ABC's daytime talk show The View, a position she held until June 9, 2006. In that role, she was responsible for opening and closing each live episode, introducing the "Hot Topics" segment, guiding discussions, and managing commercial breaks.

On September 16, 2002, Vieira became the first host of the American syndicated daytime version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, a program that American audiences had previously known as a primetime ABC series hosted by Regis Philbin. That same year, she also appeared on Broadway in Thoroughly Modern Millie. Vieira won two Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Game Show Host for her work on Millionaire, one in 2005 and another in 2009, making her the second woman ever to win an Emmy in that category, after Betty White, and the first woman to win it multiple times. In addition to hosting, she served as co-executive producer of the show from 2005 until her departure. Prior to hosting the syndicated version, she had competed as a celebrity contestant on the primetime edition, winning $250,000 for the Windows of Hope Family Relief Fund. Over the course of eleven seasons and more than 1,800 episodes, contestants on her watch were collectively awarded over $70,000,000. She announced her departure from the show on January 10, 2013, with her final episodes taped in November 2012.

On April 6, 2006, Vieira accepted an offer to succeed Katie Couric as co-anchor of NBC's Today, a role she held from 2006 to 2011. She also served as a contributor to Dateline NBC, Rock Center with Brian Williams, and NBC Nightly News. From 2014 to 2016, she hosted her own syndicated daytime talk show, The Meredith Vieira Show. As of 2019, Vieira hosts the syndicated weekday game show 25 Words or Less.