Debbie Matenopoulos

Despina "Debbie" Matenopoulos (born 1975 or 1976) is an American television host, journalist, and lifestyle expert.^[1]

Matenopoulos was born in Richmond, Virginia, of Greek ancestry. She is the daughter of Efrosini, a hair stylist, and Nicolaos T. Matenopoulos, a furniture maker, She also has an older sister, Maria, and older brother, Ike.^[1] Her birth name is Despina Matenopoulos, named after her grandmother. Despina was later anglicized to Debbie.^[2]

Matenopoulos went to John Randolph Tucker High School, and then attended Virginia Commonwealth University for one year before transferring to the Journalism Department at New York University. She was a member of the women's fraternity Alpha Omicron Pi. While at NYU she also worked at MTV as an intern. She quickly moved up the ranks, soon becoming story coordinator for MTV News: Unfiltered.

In 1997, Matenopoulos was an

Matenopoulos starred in the claymation show Celebrity Deathmatch as herself.^{[citation needed]}

In 2004, Matenopoulos served as a panel judge on the TBS series He's a Lady.^[4]

In January 2004, Good Day Live brought in Matenopoulous (along with Arthel Neville) to co-host the nationally syndicated program.^{[citation needed]} On September 29, 2004, she was hospitalized for an injury that was the result of a stunt she attempted for a segment of Good Day Live.^{[citation needed]} The segment was focused on firefighter training, in which she practiced a fall from a three-story building at a Los Angeles fire station. She landed incorrectly on an airbag and was rushed to the hospital for a possible head injury. It was a closed head wound and she was temporarily blind.^{[citation needed]} Despite massive promotion, including a mall-tour featuring Matenopoulous and Arthel Neville, Good Day Live was canceled by its syndicators in March 2005.^{[citation needed]}

In January 2006, Matenopoulos joined

Debbie's first cookbook, It’s All Greek to Me, was released in the Spring 2014. A revised paperback edition was released in 2018.^{[citation needed]}

On July 6, 2015, Matenopoulos was named the co-host of The Insider, a position she held until the show's cancellation on September 9, 2017. Debbie was subsequently named as a Special Correspondent for Entertainment Tonight.^{[citation needed]}

In 2016, while still co-host of The Insider, Matenopoulos became co-host of Home & Family, replacing Cristina Ferrare.

On July 5, 2003, Matenopoulos married Jay Faires, the president of Music at

Matenopoulos eloped with Jon Falcone in Greece in the summer of 2013.[6] She gave birth to their daughter, Alexandra Kalliope Falcone, on October 29, 2014.