Katie Couric Says Bryant Gumbel Had an “Incredibly Sexist Attitude” About Her ‘Today’ Maternity Leave

Katie Couric said that her first maternity leave from NBC’s Today show in 1991 was met with an “incredibly sexist attitude” from co-anchor Bryant Gumbel.

“He got mad at me because I was doing something on maternity leave,” Couric recalled with some laughter on Sunday’s Club Random podcast with Bill Maher. “And he was giving me endless shit for taking like a month or two off. I was having my first baby.”

Couric recalled Gumbel telling her, “Why don’t you just drop it in the field and come back to work right away or something?” She acknowledged “he was goofing on me” but still said his comments were “emblematic of sort of an incredibly sexist attitude.”

Couric’s recollection of the incidents was prompted earlier in the episode when Maher brought up Gumbel, referring to him as a “guy’s guy” and saying the two are “friends.”

“He’s a guy’s guy, you got that right,” Couric responded. “He was prickly, but, what a talent. He’s such a seamless broadcaster, eloquent. When that countdown would happen — five, four, three, two, one — he would just hit it perfect.” She added: “Complicated guy, though, I think — really talented guy, incredibly smart.”

Representatives for Today did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Gumbel first began work on Today in 1982; Couric joined him in 1991, and they co-anchored together until Gumbel’s departure in 1997. Couric stayed until 2006. On Sunday, Maher noted that Matt Lauer was also part of the Today team at the same time as Couric and Gumbel’s overlap.

“Obviously, there was a tradition of an old boys’ network,” Maher said. Lauer was fired in 2017 amid multiple allegations of sexual misconduct.

“It was a very different environment, very different,” Couric added. “Lots of fraternization, a polite way of saying inner-office schtupping.”

In response, Maher said, “Women had to put up with more. They just did. I mean, you know, not to get all fuzzy and Lifetime Channel about it, but people like you and Barbara Walters — or just like women comedians of a certain age — you have to really tip your hat to them because it was harder.”

Couric agreed with the podcast host, adding, “I don’t want to use the word microaggressions, but if you think of the true definition of the word, it was replete with microaggressions.”