7 Talk Show Interviews That Took a Surprisingly Dark Turn

Talk shows are a simple concept. Bring the host and the guest together and see what happens. Most of the time something does happen. The famous actor advertises his new movie. The politician manages not to answer the question asked. The artist performs and leaves waving. The system produces entertaining material within a predictable range.

But live television can’t possibly control people’s actions. Producers can book the guests, write the questions, employ the staff, and run a segment through ten layers of pre-interview, and still end up with footage that nobody planned for and nobody knows what to do with. Sometimes that footage is just uncomfortable. Other times, it reveals something the subject would have preferred to keep hidden. 

These are the shows where something broke, on camera or shortly after, in ways the format was never built to handle. Some of these episodes ruined careers. Some of these shows killed the show itself. One even killed a person.

The Jenny Jones Show (1995): An Interview That Ended in Murder

In March 1995, Jonathan Schmitz agreed to appear on The Jenny Jones Show after producers told him a “secret admirer” would be revealed on air. What they had not disclosed was that the admirer was a man, his acquaintance Scott Amedure. Schmitz had expected the admirer to be a woman. Instead, he was surprised on camera, in front of a live audience, by a man declaring his feelings for him. 

Three days later, Schmitz drove over to Amedure’s mobile home in the Detroit suburbs, bought a shotgun on the way, and shot him two times in the chest. He then called 911 from a local service station and confessed to the crime. Schmitz later told police he had been humiliated on national television and couldn’t live it down. 

Schmitz was found guilty of second-degree murder in 1996 and sentenced to 25 to 50 years in jail, but then he was granted parole in 2017. Scott Amedure’s family filed a lawsuit against Warner Bros., and won $25 million in 1999, though the decision was later overturned on appeal. The broadcast was never shown and the show ran four more years before being quietly canceled in 2003.

Geraldo (1988): A Flying Chair and a Broken Nose

On November 3, 1988, Geraldo Rivera taped an episode entitled “Young Hatemongers,” where civil rights activist Roy Innis sat across from white supremacist John Metzger. Rivera set the interview up as a civilized debate. It wasn’t.

Metzger directed a slur at a Jewish audience member and called Innis an “Uncle Tom.” Innis attacked Metzger and a metal chair flew and struck Rivera square in the face. His nose was broken. Blood ran down his chin while the camera was still rolling. In a later interview, Rivera explained that he had not pursued charges because he didn’t want to get involved “with the roaches.”

He broke his nose once more in 1992, in a confrontation with Klansmen at a rally in Janesville, Wisconsin. Some people need to learn the same lesson twice.

The Tomorrow Show (1981): Tom Snyder Interviews Charles Manson

Tom Snyder’s late-night NBC program Tomorrow had a reputation for booking guests nobody else would touch. In 1981, he interviewed Charles Manson, the notorious convicted orchestrator of the Tate-LaBianca murders, and aired it to American audiences without any framing narrations or meaningful pushback.

Manson was interviewed from the California Medical Facility in Vacaville. He alternated between collected and erratic, speaking about the environment one minute and ranting nonsensically the next.

The families of his victims were never consulted. The network filed it under “unusual booking” and moved on.

CBS This Morning (2019): R. Kelly Stands Over Gayle King

Early in 2019, amid criminal charges, R. Kelly agreed to do an 80-minute interview on CBS This Morning with Gayle King. He wanted to declare his innocence on camera.

Gayle King asked direct questions, and R. Kelly lost control very quickly. The singer got up, walked around, beat his chest, and shouted into the camera: “Stop it. Y’all quit playing. I didn’t do this stuff. This is not me. I’m fighting for my f***ing life.” A handler had to enter the frame to calm him down. During the entire time, Gayle King remained seated and addressed him as “Robert.”

The image of the singer towering over a seated Gayle King became viral before the segment even ended. King later stated that during the outburst, her only concern was that he might leave before she had a chance to ask all of her questions. He was convicted in 2021 and sentenced to 30 years in federal prison.

The View (2013): Barbara Walters Tells Corey Feldman He Is Damaging Hollywood

In October 2013, Corey Feldman appeared on The View to discuss the longstanding claims that he and the late Corey Haim had been sexually abused as child actors, and that the perpetrators were still active in the industry. Barbara Walters told Feldman directly that “You are damaging an entire industry.” His persistence in naming predators was being treated as the problem.

Feldman described it as “a knife in his heart.” However, he kept trying to make his documentary but was basically ignored by mainstream media for years. Walters passed away in 2022 without having made any public remarks about this discussion. 

Jon Grissom, whom Feldman talked about, was arrested in 2001 for sexual abuse of a minor. 

Late Show with David Letterman (2009): Joaquin Phoenix’s Breakdown That Wasn’t

On February 11, 2009, Joaquin Phoenix appeared in an episode of The Late Show with dark shades and an untidy beard. He chewed gum while barely responding to the questions. Joaquin stopped chewing halfway through the interview and stuck the gum underneath David Letterman’s desk. He went on to declare his retirement from acting to pursue a hip-hop career. Letterman could not make sense of any of it. The show ended with Letterman’s line: “Joaquin, I’m sorry you couldn’t be here tonight.”

This episode received instant attention nationwide with viewers speculating that Joaquin Phoenix was having a real breakdown. He was actually filming a mockumentary called I’m Still Here with Casey Affleck. Letterman was not told.

In July 2025, Phoenix returned to The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, where he described the entire incident as “horrible,” “so uncomfortable,” and “one of the worst nights of my life.” Phoenix explained that he would never do it again, then acknowledged that the segment made it to his mockumentary.

The Jeremy Kyle Show (2019): The Episode That Canceled a Show

In May 2019, a 63-year-old construction worker, Steve Dymond, took part in a lie detector test on the Jeremy Kyle Show in the UK to demonstrate that he had not betrayed his partner. The episode never aired. It was reported that two hours before taking a taxi home, Dymond said to a researcher, “I wish I was dead.” In front of cameras, Kyle said that he would not trust Dymond with “a chocolate button” and advised him to “grow a pair.” Seven days later, Dymond’s body was discovered in Portsmouth.

ITV canceled the show soon after. The inquest, which concluded in September 2024, found no direct causal link between Dymond’s appearance and his death. The son of Dymond read a statement outside the court saying the only good thing about his father’s death was that the show was gone.

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