Gene Shalit reaches end of 'Today'

They were born about a month apart in the spring of 1926, and yet one wouldn't immediately think of them as classmates.

The loud puckish one whose unruly trademark hair remains suspiciously dark said this week he is stepping off the media platform that amplified his views for 40 years. The stoic one who epitomizes the idea of "the old gray lady" made her debut this week on Facebook to help convey her message.

Gene Shalit and Queen Elizabeth II are two blips passing in the digital night.

Shalit today plans to kiss "Today" goodbye, if not forget about tomorrow. His presence already had been reduced of late to two "Critics Corner" segments a month on the long-dominant network morning show that introduced the genre in 1952.

"Gene is not just a 'Today' show treasure but a television legend and an American icon," Jim Bell, executive producer of "Today," said through a spokeswoman. "We salute him for his unprecedented 40-year run on a single television program, a feat unlikely to ever be matched."

Shalit's announcement this week said the one-time senior film critic for Look Magazine was not leaving "Today" in order "to 'spend more time with his family' or to 'pursue other opportunities,' " then quoted him: "It's enough already. But I just changed my mind, I will pursue other opportunities."

Shalit, a "Today" contributor since 1970, always has had his fans. For some, however, his penchant for puns in movie reviews began to undercut his critical authority as Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert started to have real TV conversations on new releases in the mid-1970s.

But, by then, those plays on words were as much a part of Shalit's public persona as the mustache, the glasses and the hair that comedian John Belushi once compared to an "ant farm on fire."

Shalit's celebrity interviews back in the day, like those of soon-to-depart-CNN Larry King, benefited from the fact that there were a lot fewer celebrity interviews 30 years ago, and NBC could give him more time to work with when viewers had fewer options and were less apt to change channels at the first lull.

Lately, perhaps, Shalit's greatest contribution to "Today" has been as a nostalgic link to the days of Barbara Walters, Jim Hartz, Tom Brokaw, Jane Pauley, Edwin Newman and Frank Blair.

This story was originally published November 11, 2010 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Gene Shalit reaches end of 'Today'."