Piers Morgan has announced his “Uncensored” show is moving from TalkTV to YouTube, citing the “unnecessary straitjacket” of TV schedules.
In an interview with The Times, Morgan said he will now focus on growing the “Uncensored” YouTube channel, which has over 2.3 million subscribers. “Uncensored” has aired in the 8 p.m. slot on TalkTV for the past two years.
“It’s clear there’s a huge global demand for the content we’re making, but the commitment to a daily show at a fixed schedule, with all the editing and time sensitivities that involves, has been an increasingly unnecessary straitjacket,” Morgan told The Times.
He cited controversial podcast host Joe Rogan, who posts his full interviews to YouTube, as an inspiration for making the move.
“People are watching the content on YouTube rather than conventional television and I have no problem with that. You can’t defy audiences or tell them how they should be consuming,” Morgan said, adding that the change allows him to conduct longer-form interviews.
“I could happily interview Elon Musk for three or four hours tomorrow and the audience would lap it up,” Morgan told The Times. “But the nightly restriction of having to go into a studio at 8 p.m. when sometimes there is nothing happening and literally fill time? Nobody wants that. The question becomes, why do it?”
Leaving traditional TV formats has become something of a trend among conservative hosts, with Tucker Carlson launching his own show via X, formerly known as Twitter, before starting digital platform the Tucker Carlson Network. On Thursday night, Carlson released a two-hour interview with Russian president Vladimir Putin.
Morgan is known for courting controversy with his outspoken comments, including those about Meghan Markle. In March 2021, his criticism of Oprah’s interview with Markle and Prince Harry on “Good Morning Britain” led him to quit the program. Ofcom received over 57,000 complaints regarding Morgan’s comments, though he was eventually cleared of wrongdoing.
Morgan’s most recent interview to stir up debate is with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, in which he appeared to accept a £1,000 bet that his deportation flights to Rwanda would take off before the next general election. Sunak later told BBC Radio 5 Live that he is “not a betting person” and “was taken totally by surprise in that interview.”
