Savannah Guthrie Says This Celeb Was Her Most Embarrassing "Today" Interview

Guthrie was nervous for this interview because she was still new to the show.

Appearing on Watch What Happens Live in June 2017 with former co-host Matt Lauer, Guthrie was asked if she could redo one interview from Today, which would it be, and what would she do differently. She answered that it was a conversation she had with Khloé Kardashian in February 2012, not long after Guthrie, who'd previously held other Today roles, became co-anchor of the show. At the time gossip questioning Kardashian's parentage was circulating in the tabloids and on social media. But Guthrie wasn't keen to address them with her.

"There had been these rumors that her father, Robert Kardashian, wasn't really her father," Guthrie told host Andy Cohen. "I didn't really want to ask it, because it was kind of like, probing and personal and intrusive, but I was new. And I was like, 'Ugh, I feel like they want me to.'"

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Against her better judgment, Guthrie blurted out the question.

Throughout the interview, Guthrie was consciously putting off the question she felt she had to ask.

"So I delayed and delayed and delayed," the anchor said on WWHL. "And they were like, 'five seconds, four...' and I was like, 'And is Robert Kardashian really your father?'"

Kardashian answered affirmatively, right before the show cut to commercial. Guthrie said she felt mortified afterwards.

"That was embarrassing," she recalled. "So I would redo that."

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Guthrie's co-host ribbed her about it.

Guthrie said on Cohen's show that Lauer found her interview mishap amusing. (The WWHL appearance took place before Lauer was fired from NBC News later that year due to accusations of sexual misconduct.)

"He ran down the stairs going, 'What just happened? How did you ask her with three seconds who's her father?" Guthrie remembered. "He loved it so much." Sitting next to her, Lauer laughed and noted that he thought it was "hysterical." Guthrie made sure to point out, however, that Kardashian was "lovely" to her, despite her faux pas.

In September of 2018, Guthrie returned to WWHL with Hoda Kotb, and Cohen asked them if they ever asked a question that they wished they hadn't. Guthrie reiterated that she still regretted asking Kardashian about the paternity rumors.

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Kardashian took the question in stride.

During that 2012 Today appearance, Kardashian and Guthrie mainly talked about the former's latest reality spinoff, Khloé & Lamar, which she starred in with now ex-husband Lamar Odom, and whether or not she wanted to have a family. When Guthrie snuck in the question about her dad under the wire, the reality star was quick with a joke.

"Nothing more to say about what people said about who...your father, your biological father?" Guthrie quickly asked.

Kardashian joked, "I don't know who my daddy is." Guthrie responded, "Yes, you do," and the two of them laughed it off.

A 2012 episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians focused on the speculation, with a storyline involving matriarch Kris Jenner trying to persuade her daughter to take a DNA test to prove who her biological father is. "I don't need someone to tell me who my family is," Kardashian said, ultimately declining the test.

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