Jennifer Hudson Show honoured as Variety Changemaker after $3M in donations
The Jennifer Hudson Show has received the Variety Changemaker Award, presented by Waymo, at Variety's L.A. Power of Women event in Beverly Hills.
Waymo chief marketing officer Suzanne Philion presented the honour on Wednesday, 23 September. Jennifer Hudson accepted it on stage alongside the team behind the daytime talk series, which includes co-executive producer Michelle Salemi, according to Variety.
The award recognises impact beyond broadcast. The show premiered in September 2022 and has now completed five seasons. Over that run it has donated more than $3 million to charitable causes and community initiatives.
The numbers are big. The production has passed more than 11 billion views online across its five seasons.
A large share of that audience comes from one segment. The Spirit Tunnel, the cheering walkway where staff and guests dance and clap as celebrity visitors enter the studio, has amassed more than 6 billion views across social media platforms. Clips from the tunnel are posted as short vertical videos, built for sharing on phones.
Growth sped up in the 2025-2026 season. Social media followers rose 90.7% to 17.5 million. The show recorded 7.5 billion impressions, meaning the number of times its posts were displayed on screens, up 242.8%. It also logged 537 million engagements, meaning likes, comments, shares and other active responses, up 164.1%.
That run has put The Jennifer Hudson Show at No. 1 among daytime talk shows on TikTok and Threads, the short-video and text-conversation apps where talk clips now travel furthest.
The Power of Women event celebrates women across film, television and business. This year's Beverly Hills edition also drew Sharon Stone, Melissa McCarthy and Universal Studio Group chairman Pearlena Igbokwe alongside Hudson, according to Variety.
For viewers, the Changemaker title does not change the slot. The show continues in daytime syndication, meaning it is sold station by station across the United States rather than airing on one national network.
