The ‘Good Morning America’ drama, explained

»Update: Where are Amy Robch and T.J. Holmes? ABC pulls ‘Good Morning America’ hosts off air amid affair rumors

Affair allegations centering on Good Morning America cohosts Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes — who are both married to other people and have been lauded for their on-air chemistry — have successfully engrossed both your parents and your kid sister all at the same time.

The scandal was initially sparked this week by tabloid revelations that Robach and Holmes had been engaging in an affair, complete with photos of the two holding hands and getting fresh.

The trove of paparazzi photos and tabloid releases call back the halcyon days of celeb gossip when the latest hot scandal on Britney or Paris was fueled by pap shots and Perez Hilton — not DM screenshots or teary-eyed YouTube confessionals. The gossip morsel is resonating with a younger audience, bridging the gap between a show that often plays in the background in doctor’s office waiting rooms and a hyper-online audience.

On Twitter, chatter about the hosts’ personal lives spread. Pop culture devourers published summaries of the drama so far on TikTok. Perhaps the most damning response: Robach and Holmes deleted their personal Instagram accounts.

Here’s what you need to know about the drama (so you can explain it to your parents or auntie who just love those GMA segments) and its impact.

Who: Robach, 49, and Holmes, 45, anchor a daytime segment called GMA3: What You Need to Know. They have worked together at ABC since 2014 and became coanchors in September 2020.

“The moment he started at ABC, I think we just clicked,” Robach previously told People. She added that the two would go on double dates with their spouses and that her children would babysit his.

Robach is married to Andrew Shue, best known for playing Billy Campbell on the prime time soap Melrose Place. They’ve been married since 2010. T.J. Holmes and his wife, Marilee Fiebig — an immigration attorney — have been married since 2010.

What: This week, the Daily Mail broke the story that the hosts were (allegedly) romantically involved, publishing a series of photos of the pair together after-hours, showing Robach and Holmes holding hands in an Uber, drinking wine at a bar, and getting cozy as they left an upstate New York cottage earlier this month. Videos and photos show Holmes playfully grabbing Robach’s, um, peach emoji while bent over. On social media, chatter surrounded how brazen the hosts were, seemingly flirting in broad daylight.

Soon after, Page Six published stories in which unnamed sources speculated on how far back the purported relationship spanned and where things stand with Robach and Holmes’ respective spouses. This is where the details get fuzzy.

When: Page Six said the pair began getting closer around March when they started training together for the New York City marathon. By June, the Daily Mail says, an unnamed source told the tabloid that ABC staff was “buzzing” about their “intimacy” when the pair covered the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee from England.

But a story from People, which also cites anonymous sources, said Robach and Holmes didn’t get together until both separated from their spouses in August.

The affair allegations have unraveled all over the social-sphere since the tabloid photos dropped.

Rolling Stone says it’s because this feels like “vintage” drama.

“Frankly, no one was prepared for this kind of throwback, and even people who had never watched or heard of Holmes and Robach were invested,” internet culture reporter Miles Klee explained. “It’s a drama that bridges generations, and it isn’t playing out in DM screenshots.”

Notably, Robach and Holmes aren’t influencers or flashy actors — they’re part of Good Morning America, a morning news show legacy brand that has been around since the 1970s.

The GMA drama merges analog tabloid news with today’s very online audience. Some followers are learning about Good Morning America for the first time just to follow along. One user joked about “how many seasons” do they need to watch to understand “the affair arc.”

In the internet’s equivalent to a perp walk, Holmes deleted his Instagram account Wednesday, while Robach set hers to private, and later deactivated it entirely. Neither spouse has spoken out about the allegations, but by Wednesday, Shue had deleted photos of him and Robach from his Instagram account.

GMA3′s Instagram account — predictably — has been inundated with comments about the alleged affair.

DeuxMoi, an Instagram account with a cultlike following that publishes anonymously sourced, unverified celebrity gossip, posted a series of Instagram stories addressing the scandal and quoting submissions from people who say they are close to the GMA drama.

On TikTok, pop culture analysts like Simone Umba (@SimplySimone) and Morgan Wright (@MorganPTalks) published commentary videos breaking down the allegations and aftermath.

“I think people are so interested in this because there are certain public figures [we] feel more connected to,” Wright, a Cleveland-based morning show host by day, told The Inquirer. “In this case, it’s these Good Morning America hosts who you sit and watch in your home every single day. You feel like you know these people, like they have a perfect life. The last thing you expect to read is a headline that two of them are having an affair with each other. There’s just so many layers to it that make it so intriguing for normal people like us watching at home.”

Mum’s the word.

On Thursday — the first time Robach and Holmes would be seen together on GMA3 since the allegations began spreading — everyone acted freakishly normal.

“Amy and T.J. are not only back at work, they are both at the table [and] nothing is acknowledged at all,” Umba said in a TikTok post.

Neither Robach nor Holmes has directly acknowledged the allegations. On Friday’s episode — which aired live at 1 p.m. — Holmes began by saying, “It’s too bad it’s Friday, it’s been a great week.”

Robach responded: “Speak for yourself.”

ABC has not addressed the controversy. A Good Morning America spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

As for whatever happens next, the world will be watching — and tweeting, and ‘gramming, and TikToking about it all.