Kathie Lee Gifford appeared in the Today He showed up on Monday to remember his special friendship with his television co-host Regis Philbin, who died of natural causes on Friday at the age of 88.
Gifford co-organized Live! With Regis and Kathie Lee from 1988 to 2000. An emotional Gifford recalled his most recent and final visit with Philbin and his wife Joy during a visit to the East Coast from their home in Tennessee.
“I was in Tennessee, where I live most of the time, and of course the first call I always make is to Regis and Joy,” Gifford said in the Monday episode. Today show. “I said, ‘Can we get together, can we have lunch?’ So they came about two weeks ago. “
Gifford, who like the Philbins also has a home in Connecticut, said: “We just had the best time.” But after the Philbins left, “I thought to myself, ‘Sir, is this the last time I go to see my friend?’ Because he was failing, I realized.
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“I was so thankful that the Lord gave me that last time,” added Gifford. “And it was so valuable because when I spoke to Joy the day I found out just after he passed away, she said, ‘Kathie, she hadn’t laughed in a long, long time.’ She said, ‘I was so worried about him.'”
Gifford added: “And she said, ‘The day we came to lunch with you was the last time I heard him laugh.’ That will forever be a precious gift that the Lord gave me, that I had to laugh again with one of my best friends in all my life. “
Gifford thought of her late husband Frank, who died in 2014 at age 84, and said Philbin seemed aware that his life was coming to an end: “I think he was like Frank. I was ready, you know?
She also recalled her and Philbin’s unscripted and spontaneous conversations about Live!
“When we started, we had no idea what we had, but we knew what we didn’t want,” said Gifford. “We didn’t want writers, we didn’t want a million producers, we didn’t want it to be overproduced. We just wanted to sit there and have fun together. “
She added: “We never spoke before the show. We didn’t have what they call ‘elements’ in our business. She would hold the newspaper, and we go to the races. Or i would say [my son] Cody threw up and we went to the races. We never planned it. “
“He was an artist in his guts, and so was I, and when we got together, even though we didn’t have a friendship yet, we had mutual respect for what we had already accomplished in our careers,” said Gifford. “And we had the same sense of humor, and he wasn’t afraid of him, and he was sure he wasn’t afraid of me, and we just took off like a rocket.”
He added about his working relationship with Philbin: “We always respect the opinions of others so highly. You know, in all the years we were together, we never had a word crossed. “
You can watch the video of Gifford’s appearance at Today above.
