CBS This Morning co-host Gayle King will get the coveted pre-Super Bowl interview with President Obama on Feb. 7. Adweek’s Jason Lynch, covering the news at the Television Critics Association’s winter press tour, reports the interview will also include First Lady Michelle Obama. Lynch also reports that Charlie Rose will sit down with Sean Penn whose Rolling Stone interview with Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman continues to make headlines.
“It’s a remarkable story, and I’m really looking forward to that,” Rose said. The two met last night, but the interview hasn’t happened yet. “I’m definitely doing an interview, but at what time, we don’t know yet. I would hope sooner rather than later. I’m prepared to do it whenever I get the green light from him” and his team, Rose said.
King and Norah O’Donnell appeared via satellite for the TCA panel, while Rose was in Pasadena, Calif., along with CBS News president David Rhodes and CBS News vp programming/CBS This Morning EP Chris Licht.
“You cannot produce your way to a winning program,” Licht said of the success of CBS This Morning, touting “39 consecutive months” of growth. “If you want to see the traction that we are seeing, it comes down to the talent,” Licht said.
“I remember when we started four years ago,” King said, even their close friends said, “this will never work.”
“I think this is really our year, to capitalize on everything we’ve put together,” said O’Donnell, who is now heading to D.C. to co-anchor CBS’s State of the Union coverage.
“When I first began this, I did not know how much I would like it,” Rose said.
“To the best of my knowledge,” Licht said, the pre-Super Bowl interview “has never been done with the First Couple.”