I believe that it’s a combination of a couple of things. We focus on stories that are not getting enough attention in the news and not doing the same stories that have been done by other programs all throughout the day.
Second, we try to take stories that other people have focused on, and we try to go deeper into them, put them into a historical or even current event context. So there is an educational element to what we do. We hope that by the end, you understand whatever it is we’re talking about a little bit more.
The third component is entertainment, and the entertainment that I would like to offer an audience is authenticity. I’m gonna be myself, and I’m not looking to make perfect television, but I’m trying to make real television, and I’ll make mistakes. I’ll laugh at myself. I’ll laugh with the audience. I’ll debate people who disagree with me, and I want it to be this visceral, real experience.
What has worked and what has not worked so far?
Many of the things I just described to you have worked. I have a wall of monitors that I use as a visual element to step back and put things into context and move around the studio. I got a lot of great feedback on that. We have often invited people from the left on, including yesterday (August 7) with one of the runaway Texas Democrats, and, yes, the conversation will be open to have disagreements and debate. But hopefully, I have also created an environment where they are like a guest in my house and not be rude, interrupted, talked over, and yelled at. Those things have worked.
I don’t like the prompter. I don’t like script. I like being unscripted. The more we’re in the prompter, the more that I read, the less good the show is, and so I’m always trying to push it away from anything that is hermetically sealed and written and prompter-driven.
What did you learn from working in sports TV that you have used in the cable news world?
Something I learned in sports—presentation, entertainment. I was around the master in presentation. You have to make the audience want to watch what you have to say. Otherwise, they change the channel.
Second, thinking on your feet and debating. I was on a radio show for three hours a day, and I was on a debate show on [ESPN’s] First Take. There is no way you can go into that with canned talking points. You are going to have to think, be alive, and be in the moment.
Third, you have to answer for the audience what you’re talking about and why you’re talking about it. I always call it the frame. What is the frame so that anybody can drop in at any moment and understand this is what they’re talking about and this is why it’s important. You could be mid-conversation, you can be indulging a parenthetical, you can chase curiosity wherever you want, as long as you have advanced to the audience why you are talking about something and what you’re talking about.