Melissa to replace Joan on 'Fashion Police'

Who could possibly replace the late incomparable Joan Rivers in front of the cameras on Fashion Police? The answer, the E! network announced Wednesday, is her daughter, Melissa Rivers.

Melissa, 47, will join Giuliana Rancic and Brad Goreski as co-host of the red-carpet-focused show, while continuing to serve as executive producer on the series, the network said in a statement.

"I'm very excited to be given the opportunity to continue to work with my E! and Fashion Police family," said Rivers in a statement.

The new hosting trio will be joined in each episode by two rotating celebrity guests, including comedians, stylists and actors.

Fashion Police returns for six episodes starting Monday, August 31st, with coverage of MTV's Video Music Awards — usually a parade of riotous fashion vulnerable to the stilettos of comic style criticism that is the show's signature.

"As an executive producer since the beginning, Melissa helped shape Fashion Police into an iconic TV series that couples fashion with comedy," said Jeff Olde, E! programming exec.

"And with the added flavor of rotating panelists, the show will deliver fresh, different and unpredictable fashion reviews with each new episode."

Joan Rivers, the pioneering comedian who re-invented herself as a comic foil of fashion faux pas, died last September, a week after a botched endoscopy procedure in a New York clinic. She was 81.

Her death provoked an outpouring of grief and tributes to the queen of comedy, and questions about the fate of Fashion Police, so inextricably connected to her.

Since then, Melissa Rivers has filed a lawsuit against the clinic, written a memoir about her mom, and just dedicated, along with her teen son, Cooper Endicott, the Joan Rivers Bakery at the God's Love We Deliver food charity in New York, one of Joan's favorite charities and beneficiary of her estate.

The show has gone through several crises in recent months, including a controversy over remarks by Rancic about Zendaya deemed offensive and for which she apologized.

Even worse from Melissa's point of view, comedian Kathy Griffin was hired to replace Joan, then abruptly quit after the Rancic uproar, saying she wasn't a good fit for the show. Melissa said Griffin's departure and remarks were an insult to her mother.