The Today show must go on, despite another one of its top personalities going into self isolation. Savannah Guthrie revealed Wednesday that she was working from home after coming down with a sore throat.
“Welcome to Today. Thank you so much for joining us on this Wednesday morning,” Hoda Kotb said at the start of the show, revealing she was anchoring solo from the NBC morning show’s studio. “Things look a little different. I feel a little lonely here. I miss my partner in crime. She’s usually six feet away here but Miss Guthrie, where are you?”
“Well, now we’re really socially distancing aren’t we, Hoda?” Guthrie responded before letting viewers know that she was broadcasting from the basement of her New York home. “Here’s what happened: I wasn’t feeling my usual best; a little sore throat and some sniffles. I wouldn’t have thought anything of it but we are in different times, aren’t we?”
She continued, “So in an abundance of caution and also to really model the vigilance the CDC is asking of all of us right now -- we followed the advice of NBC’s medical team -- and so here I am. I’m working from home as we speak. And we’re still together and we’re going to get the show on the air.”
Despite being in isolation, she put on a positive face and the co-anchors continued the show as normally as possible.
Guthrie is now the third member of the on-air team to be put into quarantine after 3rd Hour Today co-hosts Al Roker and Craig Melvin were asked to stay home earlier this week when a staff member tested positive for coronavirus. On Tuesday, Roker used his iPad to give the weather report from his kitchen while Melvin later video conferenced into the show to give an update on him and his family as he attempts to home school his two children.
Meanwhile, Today gave no indication that the broadcast would be interrupted by all the changes in the studio.
“This show’s been around a long time -- 60-something years -- but never has this happened before. We got Hoda in the studio. Al and I are working at home. Craig is from home as well -- we’re actually going to talk to him a little bit later this morning,” Guthrie said later in the broadcast. “I will say Hoda, this was the shortest commute in the history of the world.”
“This is a little Brady Bunch-esque,” Kotb joked about the screen being split into three to show her, Guthrie and Roker all broadcasting from different locations. “It’s a little funky looking at this three-box, but I’m happy to be sitting in between you guys.”
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