It turns out that even millionaire radio hosts can be unhappy.

Or perhaps, especially millionaire radio hosts can be unhappy.

Imagine winning the financial independence of a $10m per year contract. But the price to pay is getting out of bed while the rest of the world is asleep, and then spending four or five hours in a studio with somebody you no longer have much in common with. Every single day until you turn 60. Something like 10,000 hours of your life.

This week, Jackie Henderson decided she did not want to pay the price. What’s the point in having the money if you can’t live your life? So she has walked away from (some of) the money.

The flashpoint was an in-air confrontation with co-host Kyle Sandilands over her fascination with horoscopes, but there was a lot more leading up to that moment.

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A collision of talent, controversy, competitive tension and human nature got us to this moment. As Jackie would say (and Kyle would not), the planets aligned.

The duo, both from Queensland, came together at Austereo. They first made their mark together with the Hot30 Countdown but blew the doors off when they were given Sydney breakfast on 2Day FM. As Craig Bruce – their boss at the time – observed during last weekend’s edition of the Game Changers podcast, they were “killers”, willing to do whatever it took to win. That took Breakfast with the Stars to the top FM breakfast show in the city, where it reigned for the next two decades.

They got even more hungry when Southern Cross Austereo failed to offer them a long contract to stay at 2Day FM. It spurred Sandilands to pick up the phone to Australian Radio Network’s then content boss Duncan Campbell. Along with CEO Ciaran Davis, they built the plan that saw the pair defect to launch Kiis.

They had loads to prove. And once they proved it, things hit a good equilibrium. Previously there had been a string of on-air controversies which had coincided with the worse of Sandilands’ substance abuse’, something he has since talked about. Calling a female journalist “a piece of shit” live on air; the lie detector segment with a child who said she had been raped; suggesting Magda Szubanski could lose weight in a concentration camp.

After moving to Kiis and constantly winning the FM ratings battle, the insecure Sandilands calmed down, and grew up a little. As........

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