The Greg Gutfeld Show debuts Sunday at 10 p.m. ET on the Fox News Channel. The former Red Eye host’s new program will have a comedic-commentary format, with parodies of current events and humorous monologues on news-worthy topics. We sent Gutfeld 5 questions by email (which you should keep in mind when you read his answers) mostly about the new show, but also those Jon Stewart comparisons, what he watches on TV and his favorite meal in New York City.
TVNewser: What elements of Red Eye will you take to The Greg Gutfeld Show?
Gutfeld: Any of the latex I ordered. Joanne Nosuchinsky is tagging along – someone has to pay for her box wine – and I took a producer named Tom O’Connor, whose voice you hear a lot in Red Eye and in the new show. I also took some of Andy Levy’s ugly sweaters as a reminder that he owes me his career. And life. I’m glad the first question was easy.
Ten bucks says your next question will be “you get compared to a Fox News Version of Jon Stewart…”
TVNewser: Well, I owe you $10 dollars. But you have been called a Fox News version of Stewart. Do you consider the Stewart comparisons a compliment or annoying?
Gutfeld: It’s an angle that media reporters use because it’s pretty simple, obvious and lazy. The Atlantic managed to do two of those stories in a year. The ocean should sue them for defamation.
No one ever asks a fork, “so you’re the fork version of a knife?”
Jon is a talented performer with many gifts. I’m a writer who does television as a second career after the first one went away. His persona is someone who points out the absurdity of politics, but he sticks pretty close to one ideological target. He’s about as balanced as I am tall. It leaves a space for me – someone who can go after the absurdity on the left, and I will. But if you know my history, I’m not one for fulfilling roles or meeting assumptions. I do my own thing – I write stuff, then I say it. Hopefully it makes your eyeballs stay put. That’s the goal – not trying to be a version of something. Just being that “something.”
I predict surprises. Which, technically makes such unpredictability unsurprising. And therefore banal, but in a refreshing manner. Like Fresca.
Why don’t you relax a little? Sit down. Not there. There. Ask me what I watch for entertainment.
TVNewser: You obviously consume a ton of news, but what do you watch for entertainment?
Gutfeld: I’m more into music than other stuff, so I read blogs heavy into psych and experimental stuff. As a young one, my ecstasy was picking through record bins in Berkeley – Rasputin Records and Tower especially. That experience is gone. I recreate it by sifting through obscure websites for odd music. Dressed as Mary Worth (left).
As for TV – Justified is done. So is Mad Men. I’m looking forward to more Better Call Saul. I watch Louie. Silicon Valley. Black Mirror was great, really great. Watch the one called White Bear Park. I watch old British stuff, like “Look Around you” – genius; The Day Today, Brass Eye, Peep Show (my all time favorite) and an unknown but awesome show called Nighty Night. I like finding old shows that affected my youth – like Fernwood and/or America Tonight. I watch the Rockford Files, which gives a better sense of southern California in the mid-seventies than anything. You can almost feel the wind in your hair and the red velvet banquettes of the cocktail bars.
I rattle off this crap because, frankly, we – as a group – need to get out more. To win back the culture, we have to embrace it. I just started a Klezmer ska band that only covers songs by Kansas.
I have a ukulele upstairs if you’d like to hear me play it. Do you have any tattoos?
TVNewser: I don’t have any tattoos… my body isn’t good enough and I’m not ready for a Mike Tyson-like face tattoo. You recently joked about eating rare mammals on the new show. Well, I think it was a joke. Anyway, what’s your favorite meal in New York City? The restaurant and your exact order, please.
Gutfeld: Right now I’m waiting for a plate of spare ribs from King Wok, which is downtown on Broadway around Canal maybe. The key to the best Chinese ribs is to burn them, so they’re black and sticky. I can eat an entire plate in 10 minutes. Ribs included.
In an actual restaurant, the rib eye at West Side Steak House in Hell’s kitchen; the strip at Fanellis, the Jaeger schnitzel at Blaue Gans in Tribeca might be the best meal of all. The Spatzle is deadly.
TVNewser: Can you tell us how you feel about this photo? We’re hoping you bust out that shirt for the premiere of The Greg Gutfeld Show?
Gutfeld: What a special time that was. I believe I was at Men’s Health – editing or writing – though I’m not sure. And I was doing a fitness segment for a show called America’s Talking. I was into exercise, and what a waste of time that was. I should have been doing things, instead of lifting them.
I was in ridiculous shape back then, but didn’t know it, because it’s that dysmorphia that keeps you working out. you should read my latest piece on it. It will change your life forever.
More champagne? Oops. Sorry about that. That was an accident. The robe has a mind of its own, I’m afraid. Let me tell you about my charity work –
Editor’s note: Our follow-up questions were edited slightly to better reflect Gutfeld’s answers. This was a fun one to do.