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Adam Friedland won’t shut up. A standup comic at heart who earned a cult following as a host of the brilliantly juvenile podcast Cum Town, he has since reinvented himself with The Adam Friedland Show. It’s a Dick Cavett-style talk show, and he’s emerged as one of the most compelling and unpredictable interviewers of his generation. Whether he’s talking to Sarah Jessica Parker or Zohran Mamdani, Friedland approaches each conversation with equal parts genuine curiosity and gleeful chaos. He’s just as likely to troll his guests as he is to ask them something devastatingly on point. When we asked him who he’d like to speak to for this story, his only direction was it had to be a talk show legend. So we introduced him to Maury Povich.
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TUESDAY 3 PM FEB. 17, 2026 NYC
MAURY POVICH: Hi, Adam. How are you?
ADAM FRIEDLAND: I’m very well. How are you sir?
POVICH: I’m okay.
FRIEDLAND: Where am I speaking to you from?
POVICH: I’m in Palm Beach, Florida.
FRIEDLAND: Phenomenal. You’re at old Mar-a-Lago.
POVICH: Thankfully I’m a little north of that.
FRIEDLAND: Are you a snowbird?
POVICH: I guess. I go back and forth to New York when I do my podcast and things like that. And then we spend a good four and a half months in Montana, where we’ve been for almost 30 years.
FRIEDLAND: Do you have a nice spread out there? You’re like a Yellowstone-style guy.
POVICH: Well, there are a lot of wealthy people who live in places like Yellowstone Club and these high-end gated communities. I don’t understand why you would want to go to Montana and then live in a gated community.
FRIEDLAND: So you live in a McMansion?
POVICH: No, we live near Glacier National Park, about 40 miles from Canada. We kind of live on our own mountain, which I love.
FRIEDLAND: Oh my god. You have the best life ever.
POVICH: Only because I married Connie Chung.
FRIEDLAND: You’re a gold digger, Maury.
POVICH: Absolutely. My wife was making 10 times what I was making when we got married. How’s that?
FRIEDLAND: You’re like the model of the ideal Jew. You have the respect of urban people who love you from the show, and you have a gorgeous Asian wife. You’re the ideal for all of us.
POVICH: I’d like to think so.
FRIEDLAND: My friend Joe, he’s a little bit older than me, he’s a television writer. He’s won a bunch of Emmys. His first job was as an intern on your show.
POVICH: Oh, wow.
FRIEDLAND: He said he used to answer the phone for people to call in and the person on the other end would be like, “Hello Maury,” because they didn’t realize you didn’t pick up the phone.
POVICH: Yeah, I didn’t pick up the 1-800 number. [Laughs] I’m glad there were some successful people that came out of the internships. This is before your time. I did a very popular show called A Current Affair on Fox.
FRIEDLAND: I’m well aware.
POVICH: I interviewed Don Lemon the other day and he told me he was an intern there!
FRIEDLAND: Don Lemon was recently a guest on my talk show.
POVICH: Is that right? He was on my podcast, too.
FRIEDLAND: And he was also recently a guest at a federal penitentiary.
POVICH: Correct.
FRIEDLAND: It’s a small world! Growing up, when I was sick and stayed home from school, I’d watch The Price Is Right, and then I’d watch you and Jerry [Springer]. It was the most entertaining stuff in the entire world, and I thought you and Jerry were the coolest guys, genuinely. The way you could command chaos swirling around you, it made a huge impression on me. Now I’m doing a talk show, but it’s not like that. There’s no studio audience. It’s more of an interview show, like Cavett.
POVICH: Jerry and I, we go back.
FRIEDLAND: Did you have a relationship with Jerry?
POVICH: Didn’t see each other a lot, but we were very friendly. For the last 15 years, we both taped our shows in the same studio in Connecticut, but Jerry and I started the national talk shows in the same year, in 1991. Jerry described our shows this way, and I thank him for it: “Maury, your show is the real deal and my show is wrestling.”
FRIEDLAND: Jerry’s backstory was fascinating.
POVICH: Absolutely.
FRIEDLAND: He was mayor of Cincinnati, and he paid for a hooker with a check.
POVICH: Correct.
FRIEDLAND: And he was so beloved that he won a write-in campaign.
POVICH: And then he got into the news business in Cincinnati. We were both doing newscasts. Nobody realizes I was doing news 25, 30 years before I was ever a talk show host. It prepared me, that’s for sure.
FRIEDLAND: It’s like getting your 10,000 hours, I suppose. You’re talking into a camera.
POVICH: Exactly.
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FRIEDLAND: I did podcasting for nine years, so I’m doing a different format.
POVICH: I’m now following you. I’m doing what you used to do.
FRIEDLAND: We were doing a comedy podcast, but I got sick of it. We were three 30-year-old men behaving like 11-year olds at a sleepover. It was really funny, but creatively it got pretty stale. My current show requires a tremendous amount of research and prep. I’m attempting to do something that’s produced like a television show, but on the internet. I was working two hours a week, getting a pretty great salary for doing this stupid comedy podcast. So from a business standpoint, I’m an idiot to be doing way more work.
POVICH: And making less money.
FRIEDLAND: I don’t really know. Money stresses me out.
POVICH: Why would money stress you out?
FRIEDLAND: My parents experienced financial difficulty when I was growing up, so my big worry is my business manager will call me and tell me I ran out. I’m doing well, but knowing the numbers is a source of anxiety.
POVICH: You’re so different than I am. We never had a lot of money. My father, by the way, was a columnist for The Washington Post for 75 years. But as you know, you don’t make a lot of money working in print. He always said, “Money makes you less nervous.”
FRIEDLAND: He’s insane, this guy!
POVICH: He also said money gives you a sixth sense in order to enjoy the other five.
FRIEDLAND: I have no idea what that means. One thing I do know is that money doesn’t necessarily buy happiness, but I also know from being a struggling comedian and then eventually doing well, that you can’t be happy without it. When you don’t have it and you’re constantly stressed about it, it consumes your life.
POVICH: That confirms what I said.
FRIEDLAND: Yeah. I threw a tantrum with my business manager when they wanted me to do an IRA. They’re like, “You get it back when you’re 65.” I was like, “The 65-year-old me? That guy’s a loser.” They’re like, “You’re an idiot, Adam. It reduces your tax burden.”
POVICH: Exactly.
FRIEDLAND: And I was like, “I don’t care about that 65-year-old. He’s a doofus. Tell him to make his own money.”
POVICH: You’ll get there, Adam. And you’ll call this guy up and say, “So when can I start taking the money out of my IRA?”
FRIEDLAND: I had to accept that I’m a comedian and I’m not predisposed to understanding any of that stuff, so I have a wealth manager that handles it. I used to lay in bed at night stressed out about the fact that I needed to file my taxes. They say you’re a book Jew or you’re a money Jew.
POVICH: Oh wow. I don’t know if I’m either one.
FRIEDLAND: I’m neither. I’m illiterate and I hate money.
POVICH: Look, I was in TV news for 25 years. I wasn’t walking around Wall Street with a lot of money, that’s for sure. By the way, since you’re a comic, what standups do you like?
FRIEDLAND: I think standup stinks.
POVICH: It stinks?
FRIEDLAND: Yeah.
POVICH: I just interviewed a standup.
FRIEDLAND: Which one?
POVICH: He’s the closest thing to George Carlin. His name is Josh Johnson.
FRIEDLAND: I don’t know him.
POVICH: You never heard of him?
FRIEDLAND: Now I’m feeling competitive.
POVICH: He’s 35 years old and you don’t know him?
FRIEDLAND: I’m 38.
POVICH: Come on, Adam.
FRIEDLAND: He’s probably jealous of me that I’m older than him.
POVICH: He’s not jealous of you because he’s doing fine.
FRIEDLAND: Maybe I know Josh. I’ll look him up. When I was growing up, I was obsessed with stand-up, but once you’ve heard every joke and do it for your career, you don’t view it in the same way. I’m a sports fan because I can’t do any of that shit. But watching another person doing standup makes me genuinely anxious because I’m like, “I know exactly what that guy is going through in his head on that stage.”
POVICH: Look up Josh Johnson. I’m telling you right now, you’ll appreciate it.
FRIEDLAND: Oh my god, you’re obsessed with this guy, Maury. What about me?
POVICH: This guy can go two and a half, three minutes without a laugh as he builds a story. It’s terrific.
FRIEDLAND: Oh, I know this guy. Yeah, he is funny.
POVICH: You know how I found out about him?
FRIEDLAND: He’s a correspondent on The Daily Show, right?
POVICH: Yeah. He’s an anchor there, too.
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FRIEDLAND: So are you going to come to a show of mine?
POVICH: I thought you gave up comedy.
FRIEDLAND: No, I didn’t give up comedy. I’m in Philly this weekend.
POVICH: It’s too far. Do you know Philadelphia? It’s a tough town.
FRIEDLAND: They’re real dumb.
POVICH: It’s the greatest. Are you kidding?
FRIEDLAND: I agree with you. It’s wild. There’s real energy. I lived in DC for a long time. You grew up there?
POVICH: I lived there until I was 37.
FRIEDLAND: It’s an entirely different place.
POVICH: DC is made up now of a lot of people who never came from DC.
FRIEDLAND: Exactly. And they’re so ugly, too. The talent there is nothing to write home about.
POVICH: You know what we thought about that town? That the President of the United States was the mayor and Congress was the city council. That’s how we grew up.
FRIEDLAND: I went to GW [George Washington University] and then I started standup in DC. I was supposed to go to law school, but I had to come out of the closet as a clown to my parents.
POVICH: That must have gone over well.
FRIEDLAND: They were like, “Get a normal job, you psycho.” It’s a ridiculous thing to tell your parents. To be honest with you, I’m tremendously lucky. It’s a terrible industry to go into. It’s not a meritocracy, we’ll put it that way.
POVICH: Did you used to go to clubs and wait to go on last when nobody would be around?
FRIEDLAND: In DC, I was the opener for touring acts in a small comedy scene. I was the nebbish Jew. I remember my parents were like, “We don’t know anyone in show business.” I was like, “You don’t understand comedy. You have to be the best.” And then I moved here and there were 10,000 guys literally named Adam Friedland, who probably had the same argument with their parents.
POVICH: Adam, now you’re turning on your own name.
FRIEDLAND: What I’m saying is, in the small scene in DC where I started, I was the nebbishy, Jewish, self-deprecating guy. Then I moved up to New York and there was nothing special about me. It was a very humbling experience.
POVICH: [Laughs] You ever make it to Carolines?
FRIEDLAND: Of course I’ve done Carolines.
POVICH: She’s still around, isn’t she?
FRIEDLAND: She is. The club on Broadway isn’t open anymore.
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POVICH: When I used to do the news in New York, she used to come on a lot to promote her stuff.
FRIEDLAND: Yeah, I had Richard Kind on the show, and he was a singing waiter at one of her places in the Hamptons or something.
POVICH: [Laughs] You’re kidding.
FRIEDLAND: That was one of my favorite episodes. Have you seen the talk show?
POVICH: Which talk show?
FRIEDLAND: My show. The Adam Friedland Show.
POVICH: No, I haven’t. Are you any good?
FRIEDLAND: I’m alright. I do it my way. I’ve had some big guests. I had Mamdani.
POVICH: I heard. How’d you do with him?
FRIEDLAND: Great.
POVICH: He didn’t overwhelm you? Pretty smart guy.
FRIEDLAND: No, no, no. We’re the same kind of guy.
POVICH: I see.
FRIEDLAND: We’re both guys that are, like, from the same tree.
POVICH: I didn’t vote for him.
FRIEDLAND: You voted for Sliwa?
POVICH: No. I voted for Mamdani in the general. I didn’t vote for him in the primary.
FRIEDLAND: I thought you were a Curtis Sliwa guy.
POVICH: No, but I go way back with him. [Laughs] I knew him when he had his original beret.
FRIEDLAND: It’s not a good look for America. We don’t like berets.
POVICH: Well, it was a red beret.
FRIEDLAND: Yeah. But for us, we’re like, “What are you, a mime? Are you in France?” But what I got from Mamdani was the sense that—my parents are baby boomers, and I remember in ‘92 they were so excited about Clinton. And I guess it dawned on me when I was talking to Mamdani, it was like, “Oh, this is the first leader from my generation.” We’re both millennials.
POVICH: You didn’t get excited about Obama?
FRIEDLAND: Obama’s not a millennial.
POVICH: I understand that, but you’re old enough. You said you’re 38 years old.
FRIEDLAND: I was excited about Obama. I’m saying this is the first time it felt like, “This guy’s genuinely our generation.”
POVICH: I got you.
FRIEDLAND: And Mayor Pete doesn’t count.
POVICH: Kind of like the way we were—
FRIEDLAND: About Clinton.
POVICH: Well, I’ve got to go back to Kennedy.
FRIEDLAND: I thought you’re Millard Fillmore’s generation.
POVICH: Close.
FRIEDLAND: I guess Mayor Pete is also a millennial, but he just seems like he’s a suck-up, like he’s asking the teacher if he could have more homework over the weekend.
POVICH: I’ve never paid much attention to Buttigieg.
FRIEDLAND: I’m just saying as a guy, if I was in class with Mamdani, we’d probably be friends. We’re both into soccer and hip-hop and movies.
POVICH: So did you ask him about Israel or not?
FRIEDLAND: I didn’t ask him about Israel. What the fuck does the mayor of New York have to do with Israel? That’s driven me insane, to be honest with you.
POVICH: Well, he ran on that kind of—
FRIEDLAND: No, he didn’t run on Israel. Cuomo was hitting him on Israel because he had quotes from the past. But honestly, that really upset me as a Jewish person, that they were making it all about Israel when there are homeless people in New York. It just made it seem like we’re more important than everyone. That didn’t feel good. But beyond that, he was being painted as radical in a way that he’s fundamentally not. He’s from the Upper West Side, he’s practically Jewish. And a lot of my friends I grew up with who were like, “This guy is radical,” called me after he came on the show and said, “While I still don’t agree with his politics, he seems like a pretty decent guy.”
POVICH: As long as he gets along with [Police Commissioner] Jessica Tisch, I can handle him.
FRIEDLAND: Well, it seems like people in the city are very happy with him right now. He got the universal pre-K done quickly. It does feel like an Obama moment. I remember the excitement when Obama was elected and the disappointment of how McConnell and the people who understood the game made his two terms in office hell. They weren’t able to translate a popular grassroots movement into legislative success. I think Zohran has this mix of policy people who are young and driven and experienced, and people who understand the messiness of municipal politics. He has like a 75-year-old in his inner circle. You need people who know the game and you need people who have the vision.
POVICH: This is very interesting, Adam. You talk a lot.
FRIEDLAND: Is that bad or good?
POVICH: I don’t know [Laughs]. You invited me to talk to you.
FRIEDLAND: I invited you?
POVICH: Oh, sorry. I invited you?
FRIEDLAND: I don’t know. They just told me you were going to be on this and I was so excited. I thought you were interviewing me. Am I interviewing you?
POVICH: I think we’re just talking to or above each other.
FRIEDLAND: Can someone from the magazine tell us? Because if I was meant to interview you, I sincerely apologize.
EMILY SANDSTROM: Maury is technically supposed to be interviewing Adam, but I think this is very much a conversation. This has been fun to listen to.
POVICH: I had no idea! I thought I was being interviewed and now I’m interviewing you! Well, good!
FRIEDLAND: This is so funny. We both thought we were being interviewed.
POVICH: [Laughs]
FRIEDLAND: Maury, this is unbelievable. So you’re like, “This freak won’t shut the fuck up.” I’m never going to forget this for the rest of my life.
POVICH: [Laughs] You’re not the first person to run over my answers.
FRIEDLAND: You must have been so offended, this entire time I was blabbing about Mamdani to you.
POVICH: [Laughs] I didn’t know what I was doing.
FRIEDLAND: This is one of the funniest things that’s ever happened.
POVICH: It’s the story of my life.
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FRIEDLAND: I can interview you if you want.
POVICH: No. I’ve been interviewed so much, I have nothing to say.
FRIEDLAND: Maybe I’ll ask you questions you’ve never been asked.
POVICH: I think we’re in good shape.
FRIEDLAND: Did your dad know Tony Kornheiser?
POVICH: Of course. He hired Tony Kornheiser.
FRIEDLAND: Unbelievable. He’s the funniest guy ever. He’s like Larry David.
POVICH: He is the sports version of Larry David. I just spent a weekend playing golf with him in Florida.
FRIEDLAND: So my friend Pablo, who does a podcast as well—
POVICH: Pablo and I are best friends. Pablo Torre?
FRIEDLAND: Yeah.
POVICH: You’re buddies with Pablo too?
FRIEDLAND: I was on his show last week. I’m good friends with him.
POVICH: So was I!
FRIEDLAND: I constantly beg him to introduce me to Tony. I love you and Tony and Jerry. Let’s link this to the beginning of our conversation. My parents came to this country, so I kind of had to learn American Jew. A lot of people when they meet me think I’m from New York, but it’s only because I’m wearing glasses and I’m obnoxious and I don’t shut up. But in reality, it was people like you and Kornheiser and George Costanza or Seinfeld or Bob Dylan that educated me on what an American Jew was.
POVICH: You didn’t learn through Dylan, that’s for sure.
FRIEDLAND: Of course I learned from Dylan!
POVICH: Not about Judaism.
FRIEDLAND: It’s not about Judaism, it’s about what an American Jew is. It’s not like you talked about Judaism on “You Are Not the Father,” but you were a Jewish guy. I’m a fraud, Maury. I’ve constructed my entire being off of movies where there’s a schmuck and it’s the Upper West Side and there’s a precocious blonde girl he’s trying to impress.
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POVICH: [Laughs] I think we got a lot of stuff going on here.
FRIEDLAND: Wait, I have one question for you.
POVICH: What?
FRIEDLAND: Are we going to hang out when you’re back in the city?
POVICH: Yeah, we can hang out. I’ll be back in the city in April and May, if you’re playing anywhere. Do you play in New York, or don’t they allow you?
FRIEDLAND: I do weekends on the road and then I’m working on my talk show. Actually, I’d love for you to come on the show. How about that?
POVICH: Okay. Maybe I’ll have you on my show.
FRIEDLAND: He sounds excited to come on my show.
POVICH: Look, I’ll tell you what happened to me. I never realized what kind of impact I had. And since I retired— I was on a show the other day and I was walking down the hall and this guy comes and gives me this big hug and he says, “You’re my man.” And I look at him and it’s 50 Cent, and I go, “Holy shit. Maybe I did have an impact.”
FRIEDLAND: You’re a legend, sir.
POVICH: I’ll be up in April and May, we’ll have fun.
FRIEDLAND: You better do my show. You swear? This is going in print.
POVICH: Depending on whether I do your show and how that goes as to whether you’ll do my show.
FRIEDLAND: Okay. Fun.
POVICH: Alright, good enough.
FRIEDLAND: Bye, Maury.
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Photography Assistants: Nate Jerome and Eve Alpert
Fashion Assistants: Abby McDade and Claudia Sanchez
Production Direction: Alexandra Weiss
Photography Production: Georgia Ford
Post-production: Nikita Shaletin
Location: Shio Studios