The Today Show is celebrating 40 years on air this week, and for current host Karl Stefanovic, it’s been part of his life since he was a kid.
He remembers watching Steve Liebmann and Liz Hayes over breakfast when he was growing up.
“You’d wake up with them in the morning and feel like they were your friends,” Karl, 47, tells TV WEEK.
Today is celebrating 40 years on the air this week.
(Image: TV WEEK)But, as a kid watching the show, Karl never thought he could host it himself.
“Even when I sat there to do it for the first time I didn’t think I could do it!”
On July 1, some of Today‘s former hosts will be returning to celebrate the show’s 40th anniversary. The celebrations will also include a look back at standout news events, celebrities and bloopers.
Karl and co-host Allison Langdon can’t wait to celebrate.
(Image: TV WEEK)“You’re fairly safe to assume that I’ll have more bloopers than Liebo,” Karl says. “You just have to go to one of those bloopers reels on the internet that seven billion people have watched.”
He thinks it’s the “everyday stuff” that’s funniest.
“Lisa [Wilkinson] and I with the Wii, Georgie [Gardner] and the ‘long stabby thing’, the hot pies… it goes on and on.”
Karl, who started hosting Today in 2005, says there’s plenty that makes him cringe when he sees it.
“You look back at how I looked like Keith Richards – I was that skinny when I started – and now I’ve got a little bit more of a Bert Newton look about me. That’s just called getting older and embracing it.”
