Joe Scarborough’s been a host on Morning Joe since 2007, but the MSNBC personality has some big ideas on how to propel the show forward.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter published on Wednesday, January 29, Joe, 61, mentioned that he wants to incorporate more segments on Morning Joe to interviews with cultural figures instead of just political figures.
He said that before 2015, “it would be very normal for us to have Steven Spielberg, Ron Howard, Bradley Cooper, Pete Townsend, all of these pop culture figures on the show.”
“For years, I have wanted us to push back and go more into the original concept of Morning Joe, which was like, yes, politics and foreign policy and the economy, but also music and film and Broadway,” the former politician revealed.
It’s an idea that he’s wanted to bring to the forefront of Morning Joe for several years. After some big leadership changes at the network, it seems it’s all coming to fruition.
“We’ve wanted to do it. And in 2022 everything was just so hot. I knew that if I wanted to actually interview artists and actors and directors, people that I’ve always loved, whether it’s Christopher Nolan or Al Pacino, that I needed to create a different space for it,” Joe explained during his sit-down with the outlet. “So we originally created a primetime show where we would do it [Joe Scarborough Presents], and we would interview these people and pop culture figures and influential artists.”
“But then after a while, I said, wait, this stuff is so good. I don’t want to have Christopher Nolan on at 8:00 at night,” Joe said. “I want my Morning Joe family to be able to hear Christopher Nolan and Robert Downey Jr. and all the Oppenheimer people. I wanted that in the morning. So we moved it back to the morning, and we’ve just focused on it a lot more.”
He referenced a time on the show when he got broadcaster Roger Bennett to come on and talk about soccer every Monday morning.
“I remember Tom Brokaw asking, ‘What? What are you talking about soccer on a news show for?’ It was because I like soccer! I like the Premier League, and it caught on,” Joe revealed. “I definitely know there’s a big appetite for it. I mean, who doesn’t want to hear Al Pacino talk about his life and his work? Who doesn’t want to hear Christopher Nolan talking about his creative process, or Matt Damon and Emily Blunt and Cillian Murphy, all of them talking about what it was like making Oppenheimer? I think there’s a big appetite for that.”
Currently, Joe cohosts Morning Joe with his wife, Mika Brzezinski, Today’s Willie Geist and a number of political figures and reporters who sit at their table each week and engage in some heated conversations.
At the end of the interview, it was revealed that Mick Jagger and Anjelica Huston are in talks to appear on the show and Joe is hoping that another music legend will agree to come on. “I want to interview Paul McCartney,” Joe said.
