The Most Uncomfortable Megyn Kelly Interviews Ever

Kelly started her tenure on NBC News months before her daytime program launched by sitting down for an exclusive one-on-one interview with the Russian President Vladimir Putin. 

Considering how embattled the U.S. government has been in the wake of reported Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, this opportunity may have seemed like a surefire way to get Kelly's new career started on a prestigious note with some hard-hitting journalism.

However, Kelly was panned for taking a supposedly softball approach with Putin, allowing him to control the narrative regarding his country's hacking of the election and his murky relationships with certain Donald Trump campaign officials. 

She was later shown complementing Putin–who is widely suspected of having journalists in his own nation killed for unfavorable coverage of his administration–in unedited footage from the chat. "We have been here in St. Petersburg for about a week now. And virtually every person we have met on the street says what they respect about you is they feel that you have returned dignity to Russia, that you've returned Russia to a place of respect," Kelly said. As icing on the cake, she also called him "personable" after the interview, citing the lush accommodations he provided for her while in Russia.

When Megyn Kelly Today finally launched in September 2017, she had a chance to turn things around by focusing on public figures who weren't embroiled in government affairs. In fact, her very first words on the new series were a declaration that she was "done with politics," but even a seemingly simple interview with the cast of Will and Grace on her very first day went wildly awry.

When Kelly invited a super fan of the show to the stage, she bungled the interview by asking, "Is it true that you became a lawyer—and you became gay—because of Will?" The audience guest managed to answer her question sincerely, without launching into a tirade about the "nature versus nurture" sexuality debate, but Kelly made things even more awkward with her headdesk-worthy send-off. "I don't know about the lawyer thing," she said, "but the the Will & Grace thing and the gay thing is going to work out great." 

The backlash directed at that segment prompted the show's lead actress, Debra Messing, to declare that she was "dismayed" by Kelly's comments and "regrets" going on the show. Ouch.

Kelly was condemned for her interview of Lyle Menendez, one-half of the notorious Menendez Brothers convicted in 1996 of murdering their parents in 1989. The segment correlated with the release of Law & Order True Crime: The Menendez Murders, but Kelly failed to impress a lot of viewers.

One detective who'd been part of the original case blasted Kelly's segment for pandering to Menendez, saying, "I thought the whole thing was self-serving to Lyle, with questions like, 'When was the last time you saw your brother Erik?' and 'You're married now—how does that work out?" 

To her credit, Kelly did manage to get Menendez to admit, "I still cry over my mother," but for many, the interview was still too slim on substance. 

To be fair to Kelly, this one wasn't exactly her fault. In November 2017, actress-turned-author Suzanne Somers appeared on the show alongside her husband, Alan Hamel, to promote her lifestyle book, Two's Company. Considering the book is all about how to keep things spicy in the bedroom, it was expectable that some risque commentary might make it into the interview, but when Somers joked that she and her husband made whoopie all the time, adding, "Sometimes I'm not awake for it, though," people flipped.

Somers' blithe joke about non-consensual sex was not well received, but Kelly missed the mark on pointing out the danger of her words and simply laughed along, saying, "Alan's like, 'Those are some of the best times!'" 

It got worse from there as Somers and Hamel started comparing notes on the international legality of intercourse with a sleeping spouse. Somers eventually apologized for taking things too far, but the damage was definitely done.

There's no doubt that Russell Brand has made an entire career out of being extreme, and he certainly brought that sense of unusual enthusiasm to the set of Megyn Kelly Today in October 2017. At the time of his appearance, Kelly's show had just been through a widely maligned first week, so he attempted to comfort her with a series of saccharine compliments that were secondhand embarrassing.

"I love you in the daytime," he doted. "Well done coming into the glorious light. You seem beautiful here. It's like you've escaped. You're like an escaped Stormtrooper who took its helmet off to reveal great beauty. You belong here in the light." 

As if that weren't weird enough for one sitting, he later responded to her reading a sample of his book, Recovery: Freedom From Our Addictions, by lapping even more praise upon the host: "God, you should have done the audio book, that was amazing. You have such incredible gravitas." He even ended the interview by saying, "Now that I've met you as an actual human being, I feel appalled that anyone would ever be rude to you. You're glorious." 

Kelly responded with an "Aww, thank you" and some complimentary words of her own. Alas, what Kelly really needs is some love in the ratings department.