Peter Kramer/NBCAnn Curry and Matt Lauer on Tuesday, with their guest, the comedian Jimmie Walker.Ann Curry is likely to announce her departure from NBC’s “Today” show on television on Thursday morning, people with close ties to the network said on Wednesday evening.
The announcement would cap weeks of private negotiations between Ms. Curry and NBC officials, who have been trying to ease her out of the “Today” show co-host chair that she has held for a year.
This week, NBC officials began negotiations with Savannah Guthrie, Ms. Curry’s expected successor on the show. But Ms. Guthrie will most likely not be mentioned when Ms. Curry informs viewers about her intentions to leave “Today.”
The announcement plans are subject to change up until Thursday morning, according to the people close to the network, who insisted on anonymity to describe internal deliberations. It is unknown whether Thursday will also be Ms. Curry’s last day as co-host.
NBC has not commented on Ms. Curry’s status at the show since last week, when The New York Times reported that the network had offered her a new job within the news division. The offer was made after senior NBC executives concluded that they had miscast Ms. Curry as the co-host of “Today” alongside Matt Lauer, who has held the job for more than 15 years. In April, Mr. Lauer renewed his contract at the network.
Ms. Curry rebuffed the offer at first, according to several people with knowledge of the negotiations, but in recent days she has come to accept it.
Ms. Curry’s lawyer, Robert Barnett, did not respond to a request for comment about the announcement plans. A spokesman for NBC declined to comment.
The transition is exceedingly sensitive because “Today” is a profit center for NBC, responsible for nearly $500 million in advertising revenue a year, according to the research firm Kantar Media. Despite pressure from ABC’s “Good Morning America,” it remains rated No. 1 on most days.
Last Thursday, the morning after the negotiations were reported, “Today” out-rated “Good Morning America” by about half a million viewers, its best margin in two weeks. People at both networks attributed this to curiosity about whether Ms. Curry would come into work — and she did, and she continued to do so through Wednesday. Ms. Curry and Mr. Lauer have made no mention of her expected exit on the show.
For several days now, NBC officials have been eying Thursday for an announcement by Ms. Curry, in part because she is scheduled to have Friday off. The officials are eager to make the change at “Today” before the Summer Olympics, which will be broadcast by NBC beginning in late July.
On Wednesday, when the network held a news conference to promote its Olympics coverage, the NBCUniversal chief executive, Stephen B. Burke, said he viewed the games as a chance “to revitalize the ‘Today’ show.” Jim Bell, the executive producer of both “Today” and the Olympics coverage, declined to comment on the transition plans at the news conference.
The network may wait until early July to publicly identify Ms. Guthrie as Ms. Curry’s successor in the chair next to Mr. Lauer. Ms. Guthrie is now the co-host of the 9 a.m. hour of “Today” and the chief legal correspondent for the news division.
The people with close ties to NBC said that Tamron Hall, an MSNBC anchor and frequent fill-in host on “Today,” was the leading contender to replace Ms. Guthrie at 9 a.m.
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