It’s the end of an era. After 25 seasons, Judge Judy will be ending its run on CBS. While Judge Judy Sheindlin is hanging up her robe at the network, she has a new series called Judy Justice that is just around the corner.
Sheindlin appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show on Monday and made the announcement official. Sheindlin had this to say about the end of the show:
“CBS sort of felt, I think, they wanted to optimally utilize the repeats of my program. Now they have 25 years of my reruns. What they decided to do is sell a couple of years’ worth of reruns. But I’m not tired, so Judy Justice will be coming out a year later.”
The parting of the ways between the network and Sheindlin doesn’t sound like rainbows and unicorns according to reports. The network and Sheindlin haven’t seen eye to eye on a few matters over the last few years. The problems began when the former head honcho of the network, Les Moonves, was ousted back in 2018. With a new regime taking over, many of the plans that Moonves and Sheindlin were square on, never seemed to come to be when he left. Judy was being shut down left and right on possible new shows she developed and this was something was she’d be able to do under her latest contract with them, but that hasn’t been realized. Sheindlin has been gracious in announcing her exit publicly but this other quote on the situation does take a bit of a dig at CBS:
“I am looking forward to a banner 25th anniversary season. CBS has been a fine partner for 20 plus years. They have decided to monetize their ‘Judge Judy’ library of reruns…I wish them good luck with their experiment.”
One thing is for sure, her new show Judy Justice will not be airing on CBS. While no premiere date or network home has been set, it appears that streaming services are very interested in picking up the series.
Judge Judy is the top-rated daytime syndicated program since the end of The Oprah Winfrey Show. It was most recently renewed by CBS TV Distribution in 2018 through 2021. New episodes will air all of next year before it wraps its 25th and final season. The blockbuster deal that got the show to air through 2021 reportedly included a $47 million a year salary for Sheindlin and CBS acquiring the Judge Judy library from Sheindlin for $80-$90 million.
