Shooting Straight: Guns, Gays, God, and George Clooney

by Morgan, Piers

  ‘Did you get him a present?’

  ‘He did,’ interrupted Nick. ‘A beautiful first-edition copy of For Whom the Bell Tolls, by Ernest Hemingway.’

  ‘It was signed too,’ George interrupted.

  ‘Wow,’ I said. ‘That’s impressive.’

  ‘Yes. Only it wasn’t signed by Ernest,’ chuckled George. ‘It was signed by me!’

  The pair of them laughed loudly.

  If you want to know where Clooney Junior gets his charm from, look no further than Clooney Senior – a delightful man.

  After the interview finished, George suddenly said: ‘By the way, I loved that Susan Boyle video of her audition on your other show.’

  ‘Really?’ I said, slightly taken aback.

  ‘It was so inspiring. I was filming Up in the Air at the time and I kept playing it to all the crew. She’s an amazing lady. Such a great story.’

  A single, now forty-nine-year-old woman from a tiny Scottish village being lauded by Hollywood’s number-one heart-throb. Now that’s an even better story.

  SUNDAY, 16 JANUARY 2011

  I asked people on Twitter to send me their best excuses for why they wouldn’t be watching the launch of my show tomorrow.

  Lily Allen, the fiery British pop star, won with this response: ‘I’ll be eating a shit sandwich.’

  Tonight Celia and I sat and watched the Golden Globes, or more specifically, the host Ricky Gervais tearing into Hollywood’s finest again with quite splendidly disrespectful enthusiasm.

  There’s something oddly self-flagellating about the way Americans like bringing Brits over to their country simply so they can be abused by them. Whether it’s the likes of Simon Cowell and I harshly judging on talent shows, Gordon Ramsay screaming in the kitchen, or Ricky pricking balloons at awards ceremonies.

  Everybody feigns outrage afterwards, but they must secretly love it, or we wouldn’t keep being hired.

  As for the inevitable uproar over Ricky, my view is that if you invite a shark to dinner, don’t be surprised when he eats all the guests.

  The best of his many great lines tonight? ‘Mark Zuckerberg is reportedly worth seven billion dollars. Heather Mills calls him the one that got away …’

  Before I went to sleep, I sent Jonathan and John an email.

  As we head into the final twenty-four hours, just want to say to you, Jonathan, that I think you’ve done an absolutely incredible job in building such a great team so fast. Really, bordering on miraculous.

  I love your passion, energy, sense of humour, and ‘control valve’ when I start going haywire. Above all, I love your leadership.

  May we kick some serious butt this week, then go on kicking it for a long time to come.

  To you, John, I simply say thanks for landing me the greatest job I could ever dream of.

  It’s everything I hoped it would be and more, already. And we haven’t even got to air yet.

  MONDAY, 17 JANUARY 2011

  Woke at 3.50 a.m., buzzing with adrenaline. Decided to take a walk through Manhattan, which was icily cold and eerily calm. I’ve no idea how the show’s going to go down tonight – all I do know is that we couldn’t have done much more to hype it up, and I genuinely think the Oprah interview is a strong one.

  I discovered late in the day that this is ‘Blue Monday’ – supposedly the most depressing day of the entire year.

  This may well still turn out to be true …

  Tonight I gathered the whole Piers Morgan Tonight team in the Presidential Suite of the Mandarin Oriental and made the best Churchillian ‘We will fight them on the bookings!’ speech that I could conjure with jangling nerves.

  They’re a fantastic bunch. Incredibly hardworking, determined, spirited and passionate.

  They also know that all their own immediate career prospects depend almost entirely on me now delivering the goods.

  At 9 p.m., we turned on CNN and started watching the Oprah show.

  No turning back now.

  Emails, texts and tweets started pouring in from all over the world.

  Viewers were split. Many tweeted delightfully positive things. Others wished to inform me that I had ‘squinty eyes’ and was a ‘toe-curling toady’.

  At midnight, John emailed me: ‘You will be the same guy tomorrow that you are today and that you were a year ago. The same father, the same brother, the same son and the same partner to Celia. Always remember that.’

  Which is all true. I’d just prefer to be the same guy next month hosting the 9 p.m. hour on CNN as the guy tonight …’

  Once the show finished, the team burst into raucous champagne-fuelled applause.

  I shook Jonathan’s hand.

  ‘How the hell are we going to top Oprah?’ I asked.

  TUESDAY, 18 JANUARY 2011

  The reviews were a mixed bag, but ratings were fantastic – three times the average figure for the 9 p.m. slot on CNN in the last year. But I’m well aware it’s a marathon, not a sprint, and many people will have tuned in to take a look then disappear just as fast.

  It’s where the figures are in six months that matters.

  THURSDAY, 20 JANUARY 2011

  Tonight, I made my first appearance on David Letterman’s Late Show and he gave me some advice.

  ‘What you need is to have somebody punch you on the show or, even better, you punch a guest,’ he instructed, to loud cheers.

  ‘Would it work if it was Larry King?’

  Letterman laughed loudly.

  ‘I’d like to see you punch a seventy-eight-year-old man!’

  SATURDAY, 22 JANUARY 2011

  The ratings for my show predictably came down from the heights of the hugely promoted opening night with Oprah, but still ended the week some 45 per cent higher than the average for the 9 p.m. CNN slot over the past six months.

  As for the media, there’s been an unbelievable amount of coverage.

  Christa Robinson, head of PR for CNN, sent around an email today congratulating Meghan on securing me more press in the last two weeks than any show had achieved in the last year.

  And it’s true; she’s done an absolutely incredible job.

  My instinct, which was to go young and hungry with a publicist, rather than old and experienced as many recommended, has paid off.

  The bigger test, though, will come if we have to handle a crisis.

  And, judging by the previous twenty-five years of my career, there’s bound to be one before too long …

  TUESDAY, 25 JANUARY 2011

  I was invited to take part in CNN’s coverage of President Obama’s State of the Union address tonight.

  ‘What’s it like being part of the best political team on television?’ asked Wolf Blitzer.

  And the truth is that it feels great. I’ve only realised how much I missed being immersed in hard news since I started working for CNN. There’s really nothing like it to get the juices flowing.

  On Twitter, those who haven’t seen my new show and only know me as a judge on America’s Got Talent were incredulous.

  ‘Is this some sort of joke?’ tweeted one viewer. ‘What’s that idiot Morgan doing on a serious news show – waiting to give Obama a big red X?’

  FRIDAY, 28 JANUARY 2011

  At midday, I was on a plane with Jonathan to Los Angeles for an interview with Janet Jackson, due to air next week. But by the time we landed, all hell had broken loose in Egypt.

  Fuelled by recent internet-driven uprisings in Tunisia and Yemen, hundreds of thousands of protestors were swarming the streets of Cairo, Alexandria and Suez.

  The focal point for their fury quickly became Tahrir Square in Cairo, where a huge crowd gathered, demanding the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak, who has dissolved his government.

  We were supposed to be airing the taped King’s Speech show, but this was clearly no longer an option.

  ‘OK, we’re going live,’ said Jonathan. ‘Let’s go to the bureau.’

  As our car sped to CNN, my heart began to pound.


  ‘I turned to Jonathan and said as calmly as I could: ‘Is this a good time to tell you I’ve never anchored a second of breaking news on TV in my life?’

  He stared at me.

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘Seriously. I’ve done lots of live TV, and of course I led a huge newsroom on many big news nights at the Daily Mirror. But I’ve never actually combined the two experiences into anchoring any live TV news. Which may seem odd given I’ve joined CNN, but it remains a fact.’

  Jonathan laughed.

  ‘Wow. OK. Well fortunately for you, I’ve produced lots of it. So we’ll be just fine.’

  We arrived at the bureau around 4 p.m. to find scenes of controlled chaos.

  Jonathan and I set ourselves up in makeshift offices, and a constant stream of information began pouring into our email in-boxes.

  He was like a machine – barking orders, discussing bookings, shouting at production people. I suddenly felt less panicky.

  I could tell this was a guy who’d done a LOT of breaking news on TV.

  At 5.45 p.m. I walked into the studio down on the ground floor and took my seat.

  It was Larry King’s seat in his old studio. He’d handle a night like this with consummate ease. I felt so nervous I could feel my bones rattle.

  The crew was eerily silent. Almost as if they were contemplating disaster too.

  I put my earpiece in, linking me to Jonathan in the control room.

  ‘You OK?’ he asked.

  ‘I think so,’ I replied.

  If I screwed this up, I’d be a laughing stock at CNN, and it would simply confirm what many of them feared – I was an ex-tabloid, talent-judging lightweight who should never be let near serious news.

  Conversely, if I did well, I would allay those fears in an instant.

  The clock turned to 5.57 p.m. and I began reading the prompter. It was changing all the time, and much of the information seemed to be wrong.

  ‘Jonathan, this doesn’t make sense,’ I said.

  ‘Wait, WAIT!’ he shouted back. ‘I’m sorting it out. Just read what’s there at 6 p.m., OK?’

  ‘OK.’

  I had to trust him; there was nothing else I could do.

  My hands were clammy, my neck stiff, my head fit to burst with hideous doomsday-scenario thoughts.

  It was just like my first ‘live’ day as editor at the News of the World back in 1994. I was twenty-eight, one of the youngest members of my own staff, yet still the boss. Everyone looked at me that day, expecting me to fail. It was terrifying, yet exhilarating.

  But I kept calm that day. And I didn’t fail.

  As 6 p.m. arrived, Jonathan’s voice was supremely cool and collected.

  ‘OK, buckle up.’

  I began reading the prompter, which had now miraculously morphed into perfect journalistic breaking news TV prose.

  ‘Tonight, one of America’s strongest allies in the Middle East is in turmoil. The winds of revolution are fanned by the power of the internet sweeping across the Arab world – from Tunisia to Yemen.

  ‘Now the fury is spreading to Egypt, and the nation some say is the key to peace in the Middle East is on the verge of total chaos.

  ‘President Hosni Mubarak has dissolved the government. Protestors are tonight swarming the streets in Cairo, Alexandria and Suez.

  ‘What’s really going on right now? Is anybody in charge in Egypt? What does it all mean for peace, for oil, for the United States and the rest of the world? This is a special edition of Piers Morgan Tonight!’

  For the next hour, Jonathan skilfully guided me through a procession of CNN reporters around the world – from Ben Wedeman in Cairo, to Nic Robertson in Alexandria and Wolf Blitzer in Washington.

  It was fast, furious and – to my amazement – virtually flawless.

  No lines went down, no guests failed to turn up, I didn’t get any names wrong.

  At 7 p.m., I handed over to Anderson Cooper, and exhaled.

  ‘Great job,’ said Jonathan, more out of relief, I suspect, than anything else.

  ‘Thank you,’ I replied. And never have I meant it more.

  TUESDAY, 1 FEBRUARY 2011

  Hosting live CNN breaking news shows on Egypt has taken me mentally right back to the Daily Mirror newsroom.

  Anchoring live TV news is actually a very similar discipline to editing it for a newspaper. Teams of reporters bring you the information, teams of production staff make it come to life visually and you, as anchor/editor, have to navigate the viewer/reader through it in as simple and engaging a manner as possible.

  Today that nostalgic feeling was cemented even further when I persuaded Tony Blair to give me an exclusive interview.

  I knew him very well in our previous incarnations. In fact, I once worked out that I had fifty-six one-to-one meetings with him when he was prime minister.

  But we fell out rather spectacularly over the Iraq War (the Daily Mirror opposed it before, during and after) and have had nothing much to do with each other ever since. To my surprise, he agreed to come on the show tonight and talk about the events in Cairo, in his capacity as Middle East peace envoy.

  ‘Mr Blair,’ I started, ‘how are you?’

  ‘Very well, Piers, how are you doing?’

  ‘It’s been a while.’

  He laughed. ‘It has indeed!’

  The interview itself was informative and valuable.

  Blair, for all his catastrophic faults over Saddam Hussein and missing WMDs, knows the region better than most politicians (as one friend cynically put it, ‘he ought to; he’s bombed much of it’), and his comments that Egyptian President Mubarak’s days as a leader are over, despite him being ‘immensely courageous and a force for good’, made headlines all over the world.

  Interesting how we view these Middle Eastern dictators though, isn’t it?

  Mubarak, who’s been in power for thirty years, has been accused of fleecing and repressing his people while lining his pockets.

  Yet he’s ‘a force for good’, while Saddam was so evil we had to go to war with him.

  I thanked Blair afterwards for giving me what had been a genuine scoop.

  ‘I enjoyed it,’ he replied. ‘Well, almost.’

  WEDNESDAY, 2 FEBRUARY 2011

  Egypt is descending into total anarchy, and becoming very dangerous for journalists.

  Anderson Cooper was punched in the head today as he tried to film in Tahrir Square, and there was astonishing footage late in the afternoon of a pro-Mubarak mob on camels attacking protestors with sticks.

  It was like something out of medieval times.

  THURSDAY, 3 FEBRUARY 2011

  Barbara Walters threw a dinner party in my honour at her Manhattan home tonight, but I was unavoidably detained with another live Egypt show until 10 p.m.

  I dashed straight there as soon as I finished, only to find that she’d invited the very cream of New York society, including New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, Nora Ephron, British-born editor Sir Harry Evans, and Woody Allen and his wife, Soon-Yi.

  I exchanged some small-talk with Woody, and then he started murmuring about going home, so I seized my chance.

  ‘Mr Allen, would it be completely inappropriate for me to use this opportunity to invite you on to my TV show?’

  There was a deathly silence for a few seconds, then Barbara shouted, ‘Yes! It absolutely would be inappropriate!’

  At which point, everyone laughed at the irony of this interjection. She is of course famously the most relentless, ferocious, fearless and shameless booker in the history of television.

  Woody politely declined.

  As he has done to even his good friend Barbara for her entire career.

  FRIDAY, 4 FEBRUARY 2011

  I’ll do a lot of difficult interviews in my career at CNN, but few surely to match the one today with the new prime minister of Tunisia, Mohamed Ghannouchi.

  ‘He’s going to be speaking through an interpreter, in French, with a three-second delay,’ said Jonathan, t
rying not to laugh. ‘But we’re taping it, so we’ll tidy things up in the edit. It’s just a five-minute hit for tonight’s show.’

  I asked my first question: ‘You’ve been in charge of your country for twenty-two days, Prime Minister. Have you managed to achieve stability?’

  And Mr Ghannouchi then spoke, without pausing, for ten minutes, all of which had to be translated and communicated back to me from French to English, with their voices constantly overlapping from the delay.

  This was the TV anchor’s equivalent of being water-boarded.

  When we finally finished, more than forty minutes later, Jonathan was laughing so hard I thought he’d have a hernia.

  THURSDAY, 10 FEBRUARY 2011

  Hosni Mubarak was expected to resign today, but didn’t. So I hosted a rather deflated show in New York, recording this non-moment-in-history. Then I raced to catch the last flight back to London at 11.40 p.m., in the expectation of having a relaxing weekend with the family for the first time since we launched.

  I nearly missed the plane, as the check-in desk had closed when I got to JFK airport.

  But the woman from American Airlines smiled: ‘I saw you with Oprah, and she likes you, so I’d better let you through or she will be mad at me.’

  FRIDAY, 11 FEBRUARY 2011

  I landed to discover Mubarak’s quitting after all, which means I’m doing a live show at 2 a.m. from CNN’s London bureau.

  When I arrived in the studio at 10 p.m. my time, the team in New York had lined up an impressive array of people for me to interview for the show, including CNN reporters right inside Cairo’s Tahrir Square, the Egyptian finance minister and President Bush’s former defence official Paul Wolfowitz.

  The ecstatic scenes, as Egyptians celebrated the world’s fastest revolution – all over in just eighteen days – were incredibly moving.

  And the keen influence of social networking and modern technology is striking. This ‘Arab Spring’, as the uprisings in Tunisia, Yemen and Egypt have now been collectively dubbed, is the first revolution built on Twitter and Facebook – young people using their mobile phones to communicate as they plot the overthrow of their despotic leaders.

  As I was mulling over how to round off this momentous show, someone sent me a tweet saying today was, by coincidence, the twenty-first anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s release from prison. I’d found my ending.