50 Fun Facts About The Morning Show

Which movement erupted as The Morning Show's first script arrived, forcing the story to be reworked?

MeToo. NBC fired Today's Matt Lauer in late 2017, just as the first script came in, and the producers brought in a new showrunner to work the scandal into the plot.

Which real 2017 tragedy do Alex and Mitch cover in a season one flashback to his fiftieth birthday?

The Las Vegas shooting. It is on that reporting trip that Mitch assaults Hannah, a junior member of the team, and the network's president later buys her silence with a promotion.

The Morning Show was inspired by which 2013 book?

Top of the Morning. Its subtitle promised 'the cutthroat world of morning TV'; the series borrowed that backdrop and invented its own network, anchors and scandal.

How does Mitch Kessler die in season two of The Morning Show?

In a car crash. Dazzled by headlights on a dark mountain road, he drifts towards a cliff edge and lifts his hands off the wheel instead of swerving.

Under what title is The Morning Show streamed in Australia?

Morning Wars. Australian television already had a real morning talk show called The Morning Show, so the drama took a new name there.

Which Morning Show star won a SAG Award in 2020?

Jennifer Aniston. Two of her castmates were nominated the same night and both lost to Game of Thrones' Peter Dinklage, leaving hers as the show's one win.

What did Bradley Jackson do before co-anchoring?

Local TV reporter. A video of her shouting down a protester goes viral, the show has her on as a guest, and Alex names her co-anchor on impulse at an awards ceremony.

Billy Crudup plays which character?

Cory Ellison. He starts as head of the news division and schemes his way up to run the whole network, using Bradley's arrival to unsettle everyone above him.

Which Office star plays The Morning Show's Mitch Kessler?

Steve Carell. It was his first TV series role since The Office, and he signed for a single season before agreeing to come back for a second.

Mark Duplass plays which executive producer of The Morning Show's show-within-a-show?

Chip Black. Fired once Alex trades away his job, he presses on with a plan to smuggle the disgraced Mitch back into the studio.

Which fictional network broadcasts The Morning Show's show-within-a-show?

UBA. In season four it merges with its rival NBN, and the combined company goes on air as UBN.

Set in Manhattan, The Morning Show's first season was mostly filmed where?

Los Angeles. Downtown streets there stood in for Midtown, and the crew reached New York itself only for the last few days of seven months of filming.

What job does Gugu Mbatha-Raw's Hannah Shoenfeld hold?

Talent booker. The casting notice called Hannah 'whip-smart and charming'; what Mitch did to her, and how the network bought her silence, becomes the heart of the first season.

What job does Néstor Carbonell's character, Yanko Flores, hold on The Morning Show?

Weatherman. Announced as a charmer who 'thinks meteorology is poetry', Yanko falls for Claire, a production assistant, and the two hide it until HR calls them in.

Karen Pittman plays which producer?

Mia Jordan. She asks to be Bradley's producer and then announces the job to the room before her boss has agreed to give it to her.

In the season one finale of The Morning Show, what do Alex and Bradley do live on air?

Expose the network's cover-up. They tell viewers that the man at the top knew about the misconduct and protected it, and the broadcast is cut off mid-sentence.

Jack Davenport plays Jason Craig, who is Alex's what?

Ex-husband. The two keep up the look of a marriage for the sake of her image until he insists on a real divorce, and they have to tell their daughter.

Which actor plays Stella Bak, the network's news president, on The Morning Show?

Greta Lee. Her Stella arrives from an online media company to run the network's news, and in season three the billionaire buying the network secretly offers her her own boss's job.

Julianna Margulies plays which character on The Morning Show?

Laura Peterson. Announced simply as a news anchor at the network, she turns out to be Bradley's love interest, a romance that runs across two seasons.

Which actor joined season three of The Morning Show as tech billionaire Paul Marks?

Jon Hamm. He arrived fresh from Top Gun: Maverick to play a corporate titan who pulls the network's biggest names into his orbit, and Alex into a romance.

Which French Oscar winner joined season four of The Morning Show as Celine Dumont?

Marion Cotillard. Her Celine Dumont, billed as 'a savvy operator from a storied European family', joins the merged network's leadership and ends the season forcing Alex to resign on air.

On The Morning Show, Nicole Beharie's new co-host Christine Hunter is a former what?

Olympian. A track star once pictured on cereal boxes, she learns that a leaked email from one of her new bosses sneered at exactly that, and confronts her about it live on air.

Jeremy Irons joined season four of The Morning Show as Martin Levy, who is Alex's what?

Father. Martin Levy is a university law professor long estranged from Alex, and she turns up at his door only when she needs his advice.

Which comedy star guests as the rival morning anchor Audra?

Mindy Kaling. Her Audra fronts the rival network's morning programme and spends the first season trying to lure the weekend host Daniel over to her show.

Which Oscar winner plays the journalist Maggie Brener?

Marcia Gay Harden. Her Maggie comes back in season two with a tell-all book that turns on Alex, and the part twice brought Harden an Emmy nomination as a guest actress.

On The Morning Show, Martin Short guest-stars as a disgraced what?

Movie director. He plays an unrepentant old friend of Mitch's, and a single episode's work was enough to earn Short an Emmy nomination.

On The Morning Show, Holland Taylor's Cybil Reynolds holds which position at the network?

Board member. As its chair she stands in the way of a sale until a leaked email of hers, sneering at a new anchor, costs her the post in a vote of no confidence.

Which comedian joined The Morning Show as Bradley's co-host, Eric?

Hasan Minhaj. Fresh from his Netflix show Patriot Act, he plays a rising star who shares the desk with Bradley for months, then leaves her for the evening news.

Which British actor and broadcaster joins season three of The Morning Show as board chairman Leonard Cromwell?

Stephen Fry. His Leonard takes the chair after a vote of no confidence removes his predecessor, and makes it plain he has no patience for the chief executive's patter.

Boyd Holbrook's Brodie 'Bro' Hartman is a provocative what?

His co-host Sunny Stuber is played by Violett Beane.

In which country does The Morning Show's Mitch Kessler hide away?

Italy. He holes up beside Lake Como, where a documentary-maker befriends him and Alex flies in to confront him just as the country locks down.

In The Morning Show's season three premiere, Bradley takes Alex's seat on what?

A rocket to space. Alex goes missing on launch morning, so a barely prepared Bradley is strapped in beside her boss and the billionaire who owns the ship.

Which space-race drama launched on Apple TV+ on the same day as The Morning Show in 2019?

For All Mankind. The service opened with only a handful of originals, and The Morning Show was the one its backers were counting on to sell it.

In season four of The Morning Show, Alex insists that a recording used against her is what?

A deepfake. The network confirms the recording was tampered with, and the season, set in the spring of 2024, turns on who made it and why.

In a Morning Show flashback, Bradley films her own brother taking part in which real event?

The January 6 Capitol riot. She deletes the video that shows him attacking a police officer, and the secret, shared with her boss, hangs over her for the rest of the season.

Kerry Ehrin, who took over The Morning Show, had run which earlier series?

Bates Motel. She replaced the show's first writer months before filming began, and after a Writers Guild ruling the credits call her its developer and him its creator.

Which director is an executive producer of The Morning Show?

Mimi Leder, who made Deep Impact, directed the first and last episodes of season one herself, and the finale earned her an Emmy nomination.

Roughly how much did Apple reportedly commit to The Morning Show's first two seasons?

$300 million. The order was placed in 2017 without a pilot, two years before the company had a streaming service to show it on.

Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon were each reported to earn $2 million per what?

Episode. With twenty ordered at the outset, that came to about $40 million apiece before their producing fees and ownership stakes.

Which company of Reese Witherspoon's co-produces The Morning Show?

Hello Sunshine. Aniston produces through her own company, Echo Films, so the two leads are also two of the bosses of the show they star in.

The Morning Show's first writer had produced which Netflix drama?

House of Cards. A former political aide, he wrote The Morning Show's first script and was replaced as showrunner before a single scene had been filmed.

What knocks the network off the air early in season three of The Morning Show?

A cyberattack. The hackers demand $50 million within 48 hours, the network refuses to pay, and the staff's private messages spill out and set colleagues against one another.

Why was filming of The Morning Show's second season halted after only a few weeks?

The COVID-19 pandemic. Filming stopped for seven months, and the writers used the break to rework the season so that the outbreak became part of its story.

Which Morning Show actor won supporting-actor Emmys in 2020 and 2024?

Billy Crudup. In 2024 two of the other nominees in his category were his own castmates, and he beat them both.

In TVision's 2021 figures, which series was Apple TV+'s most watched, ahead of The Morning Show?

Ted Lasso. In 2023, after its third season, Apple's own figures made The Morning Show the service's record-holding drama series.

Which character, the network's president, buys Hannah's silence with a promotion in The Morning Show?

Fred Micklen. He cuts her off before she can report what Mitch did and hands her a bigger job instead, a bargain she accepts in shock.

Which actor was cast in 2026 as a billionaire investor in The Morning Show's fifth and final season?

Jeff Daniels. He won an Emmy as the news anchor Will McAvoy in The Newsroom; this time he is cast as a self-made billionaire, far from the anchor's desk.

Which 2022 news story breaks during season three of The Morning Show?

The leaked Roe v Wade draft. The season had opened with Bradley's bosses blocking an abortion-access story she had dug up, and with Bradley going off to cover it without their leave.

Which stand-up comedian plays Paul Marks's chief of staff?

Tig Notaro. Her Amanda Robinson is the billionaire's right hand, and in season four she goes behind his back to sink a secret deal he has struck with Alex.

Which disaster sends the whole Morning Show team to California in season one?

Wildfires. Alex agrees to go only to put off a painful talk with her daughter, and ends up in tears on air while interviewing a man who rescued dogs from the flames.