welcome to hardtalk. i m stephen sackur. what do you really want to watch on tv? of course, i d like to believe it s the serious, challenging interviews you get here on hardtalk, but my guest today maybe has a different take. jerry springer is the king of tabloid trash talking television in the united states. his show specialises in dysfunctional relationships and sex. his guests curse. they throw chairs. sometimes they fight. critics call it cynical and manipulative tv, but it s made him famous and rich. so, does he care? jerry springer, welcome to hardtalk. it s nice to be here. thanks for having me. it is pretty incredible. your show, from small beginnings in cincinnati more than 20 years ago, has made you famous around the world, and it is still going across america and internationally. how come? probably because it has a niche. when it first came on, we had never, at least in the states, i can only speak about what goes on in the states, we had never seen people that are
jerry springer is the king of tabloid trash talking television in the united states. his show specialises in dysfunctional relationships and sex. his guests curse. they throw chairs. sometimes they fight. critics call it cynical and manipulative tv, but it s made him famous and rich. so, does he care? jerry springer, welcome to hardtalk. it s nice to be here. thanks for having me. it is pretty incredible. your show, from small beginnings in cincinnati more than 20 years ago, has made you famous around the world, and it is still going across america and internationally. how come? probably because it has a niche. when it first came on, we had never, at least in the states, i can only speak about what goes on in the states, we had never seen people that are on my show on television before. american television was primarily upper middle class white. all the sitcoms, whether it was friends or seinfeld or whatever, always well scrubbed people speaking the queen s english and all of
yeah. nancy panitz came on the show with her ex husband, ralf. he was in a new relationship. yes. the new woman came on the show, too. and the new woman and ralf panitz panned the ex wife, nancy. they called her old, they called her fat. the audience got involved. there was a lot of booing and shouting. nancy panitz went off that show, distraught, apparently, but not so long after, when the show was actually aired on tv, within hours, there had been a murder. and ralf panitz was convicted of murdering nancy panitz. having exactly nothing to do with the show, which is a part you didn t bother to tell. how do you know? because the court determined. but frankly. i m answering your question. you ask me how do we know. you just made the inference that because someone was on a show, four months later, they commit a murder, that that has to do with the show. you don t know what happened that day. that day, they got into a big fight over being evicted from a house, which had nothing to do with
during that interview process, it becomes clear, for example, that a person may not be mentally stable orjust, as you say, really, really vulnerable. and then they don t get on the show. but unfortunately, they sometimes do get on the show. i mean, i m thinking about the panitz story. you knew i would. i asked you to ask that question because. which is, fine, ask me anything you want. but the asking of that question assumes, which is exactly what i m fighting against, it assumes that because a person is of low income. you in the news would never, ever ask a question about. this is nothing to do with income. this is to do with what happened after one of your shows. let me explain to everybody. yeah. nancy panitz came on the show with her ex husband, ralf. he was in a new relationship. yes. the new woman came on the show, too. and the new woman and ralf panitz panned the ex wife, nancy. they called her old, they called her fat. the audience got involved. there was a lot of booing and sho