In April of 2016, Willie Geist sat down with Leslie Odom Jr. to talk about the actor’s breakout role in the Tony-winning Broadway hit, “Hamilton,” marking the first Sunday Sitdown, the centerpiece of Sunday TODAY with Willie Geist.
Now, hundreds of conversations later, Willie tells TODAY.com, “It doesn’t feel like it’s been 10 years at all.”
“In fact, it took this anniversary for me to stop and think of how far we’ve come,” he says. “Because it just feels every week like, ‘OK, what’s the next show? What’s the next show?’
“This gives us an occasion to sit and think about having interviewed 400 different people over the course of all these Sunday Sitdowns,” he adds.
The list of guests reads like a who’s who of stage, screen, TV, music, sports, books, politics and pop culture, including luminaries like Billy Joel, Tom Hanks, Dolly Parton, Shaquille O’Neal, Steve Martin, Kerry Washington, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Bad Bunny, Hillary Clinton and a host of others.
While each conversation is memorable in its own way, Willie says there are a handful that stand out, including his 2020 interview with Al Pacino.
Known for rarely giving interviews, Willie met up with the screen legend in Hollywood.
“We tucked into a red leather booth at his favorite Italian place in Beverly Hills and then, we had rented – not exactly but close to –the car that Tony Montana drove in ‘Scarface,’” Willie recalls.
Thinking he and Pacino might take a quick spin around the block in the classic convertible, Willie says he was shocked when he ended up driving Pacino around Beverly Hills for more than 45 minutes while “The Godfather” actor pointed out notable landmarks and told stories.
“It was truly, truly out-of-body, surreal to pull up to a red light in Beverly Hills and look over and Al Pacino is riding shotgun and you just say, ‘How did this happen?’” he says.
Better yet, Willie recalls pulling up to a stoplight with his famous passenger and hearing someone yell from another car, to which Pacino yelled back, “We’re filming a new movie! It’s called ‘Willie and Al.’”
“And he starts cracking himself up,” Willie says. “And I’m like, ‘Oh my God, the fact that Al Pacino even knows who I am, let alone, he’s making jokes with my name, it’s just incredible.’”
Was he nervous chauffeuring the Oscar-winner around the streets of Hollywood?
“I was like, ‘If something happens in this rickety car to Al Pacino, it’s on me. I’m in the headlines.’ I got to be real careful,” Willie says of the ride.
“So, I was 10-and-2, right lane, overly signaling, head on a swivel, while he’s like, ‘Over there, Brenda and I used to hang out in that joint!’” Willie says with a laugh. “He survived, so I considered my job well done that day.”
Another of Willie’s standout moments was meeting with talk-show legend David Letterman to go flying fishing in 2019.
“We sat in these two Adirondack chairs, right on the edge of the river, and had an hour-long conversation,” Willie says.
The first question Willie had for Letterman, who’d stopped shaving after retiring from “Late Night,” was to ask what “the deal was” with his newly-grown beard.
“There was not a second between my question, and his answer is, ‘Well, you tell me what’s the deal with your toupee.’ And I was like, ‘Oh my God. This is it. I can retire.’ David Letterman just roasted me in a way I’ve seen him do to a thousand other people over the years,” he says.
It’s moments like those that still leave him starstruck, Willie says.
“It’s people who, when I was growing up, were heroes, but lived on a different planet somewhere because they were so iconic and famous,” he explains. “Then to visit their planet and have them know me a little and spend some time with them, it’s still hard for me to understand how I’ve gotten to this spot.”
Now, with nearly 400 interviews in the bank, is there anyone left he’d still like to talk to?
“Actually, there are a lot of people out there,” he says, citing Jay Z, Taylor Swift and Timothée Chalamet among his bucket list. “You feel like, ‘Well, we’ve really done it (all).’ And then you go, ‘Wow, there’s actually a long list.’”
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