Nine have reportedly entered into 'crisis talks' after Karl Stefanovic was a no-show at work, taking an unscheduled absence ahead of Easter due to personal family matters.
Insiders told news.com.au the breakfast TV show presenter, 50, who is due up to renegotiate his $3million-a-year contract with the network, has taken a second week off to handle 'issues at home relating to his blended family'.
Bosses reportedly asked Sydney prime time sports reader James Bracey to fill-in for Stefanovic for another week at the last minute on Friday.
Daily Mail Australia has reached out to Nine for comment.
Stefanovic shares daughter Harper, four, with his current wife Jasmine Yarbrough, and three other children -- Willow, 20, Jackson, 25, and River, 18 -- with ex-wife, journalist Cassandra Thorburn.
Stefanovic and Yarbrough began dating in September 2016, just months after he separated from Thorburn following 21 years of marriage.
His divorce from Thorburn was finalised in October 2017, with the media personality proposing to Yarbrough just four months later in February 2018.
They married that same year in December in Mexico.
Stefanovic and Thorburn's divorce drudged up a wave of controversy when a widely-cited report by The Sydney Morning Herald in March 2017 said Thorburn was left 'blindsided' when her husband walked out on her.
According to a 'family source', she 'had no inkling' their relationship was in trouble when she 'returned from doing the weekly grocery run to discover her husband had packed his bags and would not be returning'.
Stefanovic then met shoe designer Yarbrough at a boat party five months later and the pair hit it off.
The nature of Stefanovic's split from Thorburn dealt damage not just to his family, but to his career as the popular co-anchor of Today.
He was dumped from the show during his Aspen honeymoon with Yarbrough in 2018 as his ratings took a sharp decline.
At the time, he had been the host of Today for 14 years, and while he has since made a return to the program, Nine have yet to steal back the number one breakfast spot from Seven's Sunrise.
Stefanovic's relationship with his eldest son Jackson was also strained after his split from Thorburn.
It was widely rumoured in 2018 the father and son were 'estranged'.
Jackson attended the presenter's wedding to Yarbrough in Los Cabos, albeit for the reception only -- he didn't attend the ceremony.
In an interview with Woman's Day published in 2019, the university student chose his words very carefully when asked about his father.
'What's done is done,' he said when quizzed about Stefanovic's decision to leave Thorburn in 2016 after 21 years of marriage.
'Despite what happened, he's still my dad. I'll leave it there for now -- who knows what happens next.'
While this seemed to suggest Jackson's relationship with Stefanovic was on shaky ground, he had nothing but praise for his mother Thorburn.
'My mother is the most extraordinary person, and what she has weathered in these past few years, no one deserves the backlash,' Jackson said.
'To watch my parents' private lives play out so publicly was incredibly destructive for all of us -- someone had to step up to protect her, and I knew that person was me.'
Tellingly, Jackson declined to answer questions about his father's tarnished public image and career woes, instead choosing to discuss his mother -- who was a contestant on Dancing with the Stars at the time of the interview.
He spoke warmly about her 'remarkable courage', but cheekily acknowledged she wasn't the world's most accomplished dancer.
In December 2018, Jackson said of Stefanovic’s three-day wedding to Yarbrough: ‘I didn’t go to the ceremony, I went to say congratulations after they’d all left the chapel but it was a lot later.
‘My brother and sister didn’t want to go, and I was not going to leave them on their own so I looked after them.
‘I figure at their age they may not have an understanding of watching a parent get remarried. They might not understand it’s just a parent moving on.’
Jackson also denied reports he and his English girlfriend at the time, Anna Blackwell, had been kicked out of the wedding.
‘I left with my girlfriend and they said it was because we were too drunk which is just stupid,’ Jackson said. ‘We left because it was s*.’
When asked about the wedding experience and the trip to Mexico, Jackson spoke of his time positively.
However, when it came to his relationship with his new stepmother, Jackson was reluctant to say too much.
‘She’s nice, yeah. I don’t really know what else I can say,’ he said.
Rumours of animosity between Jackson and his famous father intensified in April 2018 when Jackson changed his Instagram handle from ‘Jackson Stefanovic’ to ‘Jackson Thorburn’.
Thorburn was last reported to be working in sales and support for the aged care sector in Sydney, and could not be happier with her new quiet life after giving up her career as a journalist.
‘During Covid I became a carer for the elderly and this aligned with wanting to work in the aged care sector,’ she told The Daily Telegraph in January 2024.
‘The aged care sector is one that has a lot of good people working in it but there is a lot of work that needs to be done to allow aged people to live their best lives.’
Since 2017, following her split from Stefanovic, Thorburn has mainly worked in the not for profit sector to support the local community, including a role helping homeless youth and her current job at RSL LifeCare.
She added she was happy to put life in the spotlight 'behind' her and preferred to live a peaceful and quiet life away from the public eye.
Stefanovic thanked Thorburn in his 2011 Logies winning speech for 'giving up' her budding career as a journalist to focus on their family.
According to The Saturday Telegraph, Thorburn moved jobs to become a dental nurse when her daughter, Willow, was taking her HSC in 2022, as she wanted to be closer to home.
Thorburn spent most of her adult life conducting herself as a media personality and television journalist before she put her career on hold to raise her three children while Stefanovic continued to build his TV persona.