The Daily
'The Interview': Fox News Wanted Greg Gutfeld to Do This Interview. He Wasn’t So Sure.
08 Nov 2025
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
This is Andrew Ross Sorkin, the founder of Dealbook. Every year, I interview some of the world's most influential leaders across politics, culture, and business at the Dealbook Summit, a live event in New York City. On this year's podcast, you'll hear my unfiltered conversations with Gavin Newsom, the CEO of Palantir and Anthropic, and Erica Kirk, the widow of Charlie Kirk.
Listen to Dealbook Summit wherever you get your podcasts.
From The New York Times, this is The Interview. I'm David Marchese. Why can't conservatives break through on late-night TV? For years, that was an open cultural question. The left had The Daily Show and Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, not to mention other liberal-leaning hosts like David Letterman, Stephen Colbert, and Jimmy Kimmel. The right had no one. That is, until Greg Gutfeld.
Formerly a health and men's magazine editor, Gutfeld joined Fox News in 2007 to host a later-than-late-night chat show called Red Eye. Then he worked his way up the schedule until 2023, when his new show, called Gutfeld — it's got an exclamation mark at the end — moved to weekday nights at 10 on the East Coast and started dominating.
Its format is a little different from traditional host-driven late-night shows, because rather than chat with celebrity guests, Gutfeld presides over a roundtable of regular panelists, Kat Timpf and Tyrus chief among them. The overall vibe is insult-heavy, defiantly anti-woke, and relentlessly pro-conservative. It's a highly successful formula.
The show averages over 3 million viewers a night, numbers that dwarf its competitors. But if Gutfeld, who also hosts Fox's daytime show The Five, can now credibly call himself the king of late night, his kingdom is in turmoil. Earlier this year, CBS announced it was canceling The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
And as you probably know, Jimmy Kimmel's show was briefly suspended after comments he made related to Charlie Kirk's murder. Both decisions were viewed by many as politically motivated and also as possible threats to free speech. This is coming at a time when questions about the future of late night, as well as censorship and comedy, are thick in the air.
All of which Gutfeldt, in highly provocative fashion, had plenty to say about. Here's my conversation with Greg Gutfeldt. Greg. Yes. Thank you for being here.
My pleasure.
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Chapter 2: Why can't conservatives break through on late-night TV?
The only reason why they were around for so long, despite the fact that their numbers were dropping, was the fact that they kind of like towed the line. So I guess when I heard that they were gone, it really didn't surprise me because the numbers were saying it. I don't think it was political. I didn't know anybody. And I'm counting by many liberal friends who watched them.
And I think it's because it wasn't entertainment anymore. It was more like a therapy session for people that were upset at the world.
So you don't give any credence to the notion that there were larger corporate political considerations that went into there, it wanted to happen with both Colbert and Kimmel?
I think people kind of understand that There's never been anybody who's ever really folded because of Trump saying you suck. You know what I mean? If the numbers were there, it wouldn't make any difference. Was it extra noise in the story? Probably. But I honestly think that this stuff was the grumbling was already there.
You described both their shows as being akin to therapy sessions for people who are mad at the world.
Yes.
Is there not a way in which your show functions similarly?
Oh, no. Our show is fun. But you can be fun and mad at the same time. Yeah, you can. But generally, I usually like to be at least part of the punching bag. And I encourage that among the guests that I am... If I come off as petty about something that they have to like come after me for being equally as absurd and stupid. I enjoy that.
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Chapter 3: How did Greg Gutfeld rise to dominate late-night television?
The teasing makes it fun. And also I genuinely like people that I tease. In fact, If you want to know the people I don't like, it's the people I don't tease.
People know that when- So you must love the women on The View then?
Yes. I adore, I love Whoopi. And I like the other lady. Rosie O'Donnell, you must be a big fan. But I mean like personally, I guess I put the people I don't know are in a different kind of room, but I make fun of everybody that I love and relentlessly. There are a lot of, and I won't mention it, but there are a lot of like, say, conservative commentators who will not be teased.
This is a very serious vocation. I think the success of my show and the success of The Five is based on the ability to tease. People try to replicate The Five and they don't understand. It's so obvious. The secret sauce is that we make fun of each other. And I think that is something that you don't see in the left at all. And I think we're the only people doing it. You asked me something else.
I forgot what it was. I do think there are issues that upset me, but I have to always kind of step back and go, this thing cannot take over my life. It's like, you know, I'd say that Trump derangement syndrome is now an addiction. It's moved into something that is like, it's creating a filter
which everything that you look at, the people that you know, your coworkers, your relationships are all seen through this. If you don't see this my way, we're gonna have a problem. So I try to, my reflex is to always, no matter what the story is, is to always kind of put it back in its box so it doesn't become something that I think about and change the way I view people.
You don't think there's a way in which your show also sits behind a Trump filter? And if people don't agree fundamentally with the positions that are sort of sympathetic to Trump, that's upsetting for people? I look at it... It's like you're saying it only works one way.
And to my mind, watching the show, it seems like it clearly... I think that the difference is... Trump influences in both directions.
Yeah, but there's a key difference here, is that, let's say... I may think you're wrong. You might think I'm evil. That's where the difference is. The teasing and the ridicule is not you're Hitler or you're a fascist or an authoritarian. If I'm to insult you over the top, it's because it's obviously a joke. But I don't put a target on your back.
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Chapter 4: What is the significance of the recent cancellations in late-night shows?
No, but I mean, but I mean, no, but I'm saying I don't remember the specific out of. And was it part of some kind of amplifying narrative where it's like, these people are a threat to democracy. It's gonna lead to World War III. This is like the most damaging thing that has happened in the United States, I believe.
Because if you look at everything from the Palisades fire to Charlie Kirk getting shot, these are all the product of amplified narratives. The repetition, the brainwash, the persuasion of being told over and over again, I'd have to look at that and see what I said.
I imagine that it was in some kind of like paragraph of hyperbole where I was having fun because if it was in all caps, especially, or I could have been mocking the actual language. I don't know. I'd have to trust you on that. You seem like a nice guy for now anyway. Well, anyway, go ahead. I know where you're going.
Where do you think I'm going? I was going somewhere else.
Oh, good, good.
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Chapter 5: How does Gutfeld view the current state of comedy and censorship?
Then go somewhere else. But where did you think I was going?
I thought you were going to bring, because you were talking about insults. I figured you were going to go into the, like the world of insults and ridicule.
Oh, that was not where I was going. That might come up later. But you've been the top rated host in Late Night for a minute now. And, you know, you sort of, Kind of like you did right at the top of our conversation. You hold that up. It's like a triumph over.
Yeah, but I'm having fun. You're having fun. Yeah, it's kind of like the same thing that Trump does where he says, I got the biggest crush. It's just something fun to say. But more people say it to me than I say it to anybody else.
A lot of people, when they commented on your success, they folded in with this idea that prior to Gottfeld, there hasn't been a hit conservative late night show. Do you think there's something that you cracked the code with, or do you think it's just your right time, right place because of changes in the culture? Like, why hasn't there been?
I think it's a little of both. One is that late night shows were not political, and then they became political There's half of the – let's say half of the population that doesn't share those politics. So they're for the taking. They don't want Kimmel or Colbert in their living room telling them they're stupid for voting for Trump. So there's all those people.
But then the other thing is what you said of the change in the culture. It's like everybody was walking around going like, am I going to get canceled? Do I have to be scared of not just what I'm saying, but what I'm thinking? And do I actually change my behavior? And I had always been about sharing the risk that somebody's got to do it. Like J.K. Rowling.
In the trance movie, she obviously is a billionaire. She can share the risk. She has FU money. But I thought like somebody has to break the ice and say, I'm here and I'm going to do this. And whether it's Rogan or Tim Dillon or Theo Vaughn, who's the guy that from the show Tires? I always forget. Shane Gillis. Shane Gillis. Like Shane Gillis is a great example.
He was a guy that was shoved off to the side because he didn't fit the the right formula for SNL. And then he comes back, what, four years later and is hosting it.
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Chapter 6: What is Gutfeld's hierarchy of smears?
If I expected coming into this interview that this thing was going to somehow change my life and I was going to own the libs, then I would be a cranky, cantankerous,
asshole but in this case i'm like you know we'll see what happens he'll probably have some penetrating questions he'll probably try to psychoanalyze me he might even bring up dominion you know but i can but knowing that ahead of time i'm like pleasantly surprised david is not a bad guy he doesn't mind my dog
That's Greg Gutfeld. To watch this interview and many others, you can subscribe to our YouTube channel at youtube.com slash at symbol the interview podcast. This conversation was produced by Wyatt Orme. It was edited by Annabelle Bacon. Mixing by Sonia Herrero. Original music by Dan Powell, Rowan Nemisto, and Marion Lozano. Photography by Philip Montgomery.
Our senior booker is Priya Matthew, and Seth Kelly is our senior producer. Our executive producer is Alison Benedict. Video of this interview was produced by Paola Neudorf. Cinematography by Zebediah Smith, with additional camera work by Andrew Smith and Thomas Trudeau. Audio by Nick Pittman. It was edited by Caroline Kim. Brooke Minters is the executive producer of podcast video.
Special thanks to Rory Walsh, Renan Barelli, Jeffrey Miranda, Nick Pittman, Matty Macielo, Jake Silverstein, Paula Schumann, and Sam Dolnick. Next week, Lulu talks with journalist Tina Brown about the Royals, Jeffrey Epstein, and how the magazine world has changed since her days editing Vanity Fair and The New Yorker in the 80s and 90s.
This was when work was so much fun. It's like all the fun has come out of work. This was a period that I lived through where it was this hell for leather pursuit of great stuff. And the offices of Vanity Fair were just the HQ of interesting, adventurous talent.
I'm David Marchese, and this is The Interview from The New York Times.
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