The Megyn Kelly Show - Growing Up in Hollywood, the Brutal Media Business, and Her Exit From Fox News, with Melissa Francis

00:00:00.580 Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations.

00:00:11.740 Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show and happy Friday.

00:00:16.780 My guest today is my dear, dear friend, Melissa Francis. I've been wanting to do this for a long

00:00:23.160 time. She's been on the show before, but we, you know, we talk news usually. She called in one time,

00:00:28.240 we talked to Dr. Laura about something in Melissa's personal life, and I've never done a full feature

00:00:34.320 on Melissa, and it's overdue because her life is fascinating. It's fascinating. And she doesn't

00:00:42.160 love talking about herself. She did write a memoir, but she's really, you know, she's one of those

00:00:47.700 people you try to talk to where she turns it around on you. She wants to hear about you, but I got her

00:00:51.880 today. I was like, she's got to talk about herself because she's coming on to do that. You may know

00:00:57.020 her more recently for her work on Fox News, Fox Business, but Melissa's, well, one of her first

00:01:02.080 jobs came when she was just a baby. The very first one was when she was just six months old,

00:01:07.860 when she was the star of a Johnson and Johnson baby shampoo commercial. She had the big eyes and

00:01:16.200 the perfect face and the best attitude. And they saw, even at that age, this woman belongs on camera.

00:01:23.320 Well, she worked as a very successful young actress through the years.

00:01:27.020 Landing her best known role as Cassandra Cooper Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie,

00:01:34.080 right alongside Jason Bateman, who played her brother. And of course, Michael Landon,

00:01:39.340 who was the creative star behind the camera and in front of it on that show.

00:01:44.740 She left Hollywood behind eventually and attended Harvard University. She got in pretty much everywhere

00:01:50.400 and earned herself a degree in economics, which I just love because a lot of people think she's,

00:01:54.680 you know, just like, whatever. You just went to Fox News. Like, oh, yo, I have an economics degree

00:01:59.800 from Harvard. So suck it. That's me. She doesn't say that. Then she embarked on a successful career

00:02:06.740 in journalism as an anchor and host for CNBC and the NBC properties and eventually for Fox.

00:02:14.280 Now she's got an amazing husband. His name is Ray, W-R-A-Y. Here he is in a picture for the YouTube

00:02:20.860 audience, along with their three beautiful children. They're very happy family, but her feelings about

00:02:25.900 her husband and her happy marriage are an example to us all. Like these two have one of the happiest

00:02:31.880 marriages I've ever witnessed in real life. And I've actually talked to Melissa a little bit about

00:02:36.780 it. One time I asked her, you're like, what is it? And she said, there's just nobody I'd rather be

00:02:41.360 with. I just look at him and I think there's nobody I'd rather be with. Nobody whose company I enjoy

00:02:45.680 more. How do you keep that alive? After all these years, they got married in 1997. They went to college

00:02:50.060 together. How does that, how do you do it? So Melissa is going to talk about all of it, but she's

00:02:54.360 also going to talk about how the picture perfect life that she had on the prairie was not reflected

00:03:00.060 in her real life back at home. We'll get into her story. We'll also be making some news today as

00:03:07.320 Melissa speaks on camera for the first time about her departure from Fox News, which has been all over

00:03:15.120 the papers. Lots of speculation and write-ups about it, about what really happened. Was she in an

00:03:21.500 arbitration with them? Did they pay her as the Washington Post and others have reported $15 million

00:03:27.340 for something they allegedly did to her? Or didn't they? Melissa's here to discuss.

00:03:38.580 Melissa, yay! So great to have you here. Thanks for coming on, my friend.

00:03:42.120 Thank you so much for having me. And wow, I don't know how I can live up to that introduction. I'm

00:03:45.880 going to do my very best. I think you, I got you. I think we're good. You know, it's so fun. Like

00:03:51.000 knowing that you were coming on, I went back through and I was reading Diary of a Stage Mother's

00:03:54.740 Daughter. That's Melissa's memoir. It's so good. But I said to Doug who read it as well when it first

00:04:00.140 came out, it's so clear you wrote it. Like your humor is, it jumps off at me from every page. And

00:04:07.440 it's indicative of who you are because you can laugh about anything that's happened in your life. Good,

00:04:12.380 bad, ugly, traumatic, physically, emotionally, doesn't matter. You always find a way of sort of,

00:04:18.100 I don't know, finding a way to laugh about it. And that's, I know, one of your life's beliefs that

00:04:21.100 you can't take yourself too seriously, something I share with you. So let's start back to the little

00:04:26.920 Missy Francis. Little Missy Francis was a California girl. You were a Valley girl growing up.

00:04:34.340 Absolutely. I had the accent. You had to get rid of it on auditions the rest of the time,

00:04:38.560 but I could like totally flip into it whenever I wanted to. I mean, come on, gag me with a spoon.

00:04:44.100 So I can't really do it anymore, but you get the idea. We said totally and like in between

00:04:48.640 every word and it drove my dad bananas. He's like, that's not an actual way to speak,

00:04:54.580 but we were hardcore Valley girls. And at that time we knew it was a joke and people were making

00:05:00.420 fun of us and we loved it. Of course. So you're a California girl. You have an older sister named

00:05:05.760 Tiffany. Back in the day, she's three and a half years older than you were. And you're living with

00:05:12.040 your mom and dad in what, what's the actual name of the Valley? What's the town?

00:05:16.960 San Fernando Valley. The town that we lived in was North Ridge. It was the North Ridge

00:05:21.700 of the Valley. It was one of those tracked home developments that was just picture perfect. You

00:05:27.680 know, we lived over a golf course, all the houses, like every fifth house was the same as the one five

00:05:33.420 before it. You know how those suburbs are built out. And it's the kind of place where you go out

00:05:38.920 and you ride your bike. We lived on a cul-de-sac. I don't even know if those exist anymore.

00:05:42.300 I'm picturing the neighborhood in Poltergeist. Yes. They did actually shoot that in our

00:05:48.700 neighborhood. Poltergeist and E.T. One or the other, both of them. I know it was a lot of the

00:05:53.760 shots came from our neighborhood. I mean, obviously it was like a suburb of Hollywood,

00:05:57.660 so it was pretty easy to do. I'm surprised your mother wasn't pulling you down there being like,

00:06:01.980 cast Melissa. Melissa needs to be in Poltergeist. She could replace Carol Ann. She could play

00:06:06.380 Carol Ann. All right. So you're there, you're growing up. Your mom first becomes interested in

00:06:11.860 your sister being on camera because as I understand it from the memoir, some guys saw

00:06:17.040 them at a carnival and just thought Tiffany was really cute. Well, I mean, you have to understand

00:06:21.420 that this is LA. So, you know, everybody in town, if you're a hairdresser, you do hair on a set. If

00:06:28.220 you're a painter, you paint movie sets. Everybody is involved one way or the other in the industry,

00:06:33.540 you know, and they kind of call it, it's like a one industry town. It's sort of like living near

00:06:38.380 a Ford factory or something one way or the other, you get involved. So it's not totally off the radar

00:06:44.340 that most of the people I knew in some way, someone had a job or someone went on auditions.

00:06:52.140 So yes, I mean, as the way I certainly wasn't there, I wasn't even born yet, but the way the

00:06:56.320 story was always told to me was that my mother was online at carnival, a guy in front of her said,

00:07:01.000 your daughter is so beautiful. She should be a model. This is my sister.

00:07:05.020 My mom said, she said, go away, creep, you know, was sure this was whatever. He gave her a card and

00:07:10.780 it turned out he was in fact a really big kids agent. She didn't go with him. Instead, she actually

00:07:16.220 pulled a trick that I learned from her that I use to this day, where she looked at who's the kid

00:07:21.640 that's most successful, whose career you would want to emulate. That time it was a guy named Rodney

00:07:26.480 Allen Rippey, who I guess had, he had some sort of fast food commercial. I don't remember what it

00:07:32.740 was, but he was, he was very famous. This was again, was before I was born. So she just figured

00:07:37.680 out who his agent was and sent my sister's picture to that person. And boom, you know,

00:07:43.100 it was just off to the races from there. When I came along again, the way I'm told the story is that

00:07:48.220 my sister was the one that was actually cast for the Johnson and Johnson baby shampoo commercial.

00:07:53.420 And my mom was there with me as a baby, as a six month old, there was nobody else to watch us.

00:08:00.460 And they said, why don't you put her in next to her sister? And boom, I had my SAG card and I was

00:08:07.380 off to the races. So that's in any case, I have no way of verifying that, but it passed muster with

00:08:12.740 the book authors because enough people have heard the story. That's, that's how it got started.

00:08:17.340 Is it weird for you to see a, you know, a commercial of yourself as a baby, you know,

00:08:22.500 like, I don't know. Is that, is that bizarre?

00:08:25.220 You know, it's, it's funny. It's so that one, I don't know if you found it and played it. I

00:08:30.160 haven't seen that one. I've seen a lot of the ones from shortly afterwards. And what's surreal to me

00:08:36.860 about it is that when I watch it, I can remember that day instantly.

00:08:41.180 No, no, you know, and it's strange. Yeah. Cause I, it's like things that like, there's this one

00:08:45.560 that people send me all the time on, on Twitter and everywhere else. It's like OJ cereal, orange

00:08:51.580 juice. I mean, obviously they changed the name much later, but OJ cereal. And I remember doing

00:08:57.820 the commercial cause one of the, I did a lot of cereal commercials and I really liked the cereal.

00:09:01.720 So you were supposed to eat it and then, you know, spit it out into a bucket so that you didn't get sick

00:09:06.960 and you didn't, you know, like throw up eventually. I never wanted to spit it out cause I really liked

00:09:11.640 it. And OJ cereal was no different, but it was like, I was like wearing a cowboy hat and, you know,

00:09:16.840 there was animation. So I had to pretend to do things with the animation around, but, um, you know,

00:09:21.900 I, whenever I hear people say they were forced to be a child actor and they hated it, I, I always,

00:09:28.360 you know, like my antenna goes up because it really takes a lot of cooperation to do that. And I loved it.

00:09:36.960 I really did love it every time I did it. And I have three kids now cooperating is not really

00:09:43.840 something that a three, four, five, six, seven year old likes to do. So, um, you know, I don't

00:09:50.780 know. I just, when you look, a lot of these things exist on YouTube, my kids find them, their friends

00:09:56.540 find them. We do have one. We found one, not the OJ cereal, but it is a cereal commercial. You're big

00:10:02.200 in the cereal world. I love cereal. Pleasure of our audience. Stand by.

00:10:07.800 Raisin lovers. It's time for a change from Raisin Bran. It's time for the tasty square

00:10:14.620 things of Wheat and Raisin Chex cereal, but I like Raisin Bran. You'll like Wheat and Raisin

00:10:19.680 Chex even better. It's delicious because it's got lots of juicy raisins and the toasted wheat

00:10:24.960 squares stay crispier than bran flakes. So they taste better. Wheat and Raisin Chex is better.

00:10:30.680 I love the wheat squares. It's about time the American family got a square deal. Wheat and Raisin

00:10:36.580 Chex. A better way to get your raisins. First of all, I'm so relieved that wasn't you,

00:10:42.960 that first kid. I was like, it's a boy. Is that Melissa? She looks so different. Thank

00:10:49.740 God. She looks so different now. No. But then when you saw me, you knew right away because

00:10:52.740 it looked exactly like my daughter, Gemma. A hundred percent. That's what I thought you,

00:10:56.260 I mean, exactly like Gemma. Exactly. It's crazy. I mean, genes are very strong things, but that

00:11:02.140 commercial you saw, I don't know if you kept track of how many bites I took, but it was quite

00:11:06.240 a few cereal. I did, you know, like eight or nine Barbie commercials. I think maybe 10 McDonald's

00:11:12.940 commercials, although I didn't like McDonald's, but that was really fun to do because they had

00:11:17.400 this fake McDonald's in Hollywood that was behind, you know, that green tarp that looks

00:11:22.680 like you're at a tennis court. And it was a whole fake McDonald's that was only for shooting

00:11:27.660 commercials. So you would go in there and go hog wild. It was so fun. And you have to think

00:11:33.740 to, you know, if you're doing something with kids and you want them to cooperate, you need

00:11:38.780 them to be happy. So they would do anything to make us smile and have fun the whole time

00:11:45.040 we're doing this thing. So, I mean, there was one time I was doing a Kmart commercial and

00:11:49.400 I was older by then. I think it was in maybe eighth grade and they let me bring my best friend

00:11:53.380 from school. And we just walked around the store and played with stuff in between takes,

00:11:57.840 like just having free run of what is this? What is this? How does this work? So it was

00:12:02.660 very, very magical. I have to say, I know I've never been a child actor, but I do. I can relate

00:12:09.280 to what you're saying only because as a news anchor, when I was at NBC, they sent me to do a

00:12:13.600 segment on Sesame street and they let me bring my kids and they were young enough that it was still

00:12:20.340 like, Oh my God, there's Oscar, you know, is such celeb sightings for them. And they could see

00:12:26.540 Oscars garbage can and, you know, where big bird hangs out. So I get it. Yeah. Like being on the

00:12:32.080 set of someplace like a McDonald's, whatever. So the, the guiding force behind all of this though

00:12:37.420 was your mom. That's why the book is called diary of a stage mother's daughter. And I don't like

00:12:43.660 part of me asked myself when I was reading the book, you know, there's like a fine line or maybe

00:12:50.000 it's not so fine between the tiger mom who drives her children, sets the bar high is like,

00:12:56.300 you can do it. Get up. You're doing it. Do it right. I know you can. And the abusive mom who

00:13:03.060 goes too far and causes real damage. Right. And your mom did not find, she did not find the correct

00:13:10.220 landing spot. So I guess, you know, having been in the experience when I hear, cause it's so common

00:13:16.040 for kids that were child actors to come out and say, you know, they had, they actually had this

00:13:19.680 terrible childhood. Um, and so sort of the, the bar that I use is, is kind of how bad did it get? How did it

00:13:26.300 end? And, you know, for me, it wasn't until I was an adult in the dynamic was sort of like, you know,

00:13:34.180 she took my sister to do things. My sister was very shy. She wasn't like me where she naturally

00:13:40.980 wanted to do these things and wanted to perform like a trained seal. So she was not as successful.

00:13:46.960 And that was very shaming to her. And over time, you know, my mom paid attention to me and celebrated

00:13:52.780 me and took me and then basically forgot that she had another child. And, um, you know, many years

00:13:58.700 later, shortly, right after I was married, um, you know, my sister had had a very, very difficult time.

00:14:04.560 She became an alcoholic. Um, she went to law school, um, had to move back in with my parents,

00:14:11.300 you know, really went into rehab many different times and did a lot of damage to her body along the way.

00:14:16.980 And there was a point at which she went into the hospital because she had really destroyed her

00:14:22.580 pancreas. And at that moment, um, my mom cleaned out everybody in the family's bank accounts and ran.

00:14:32.180 And it's not about the money at all. What it's about is one of my very last memories of my sister

00:14:41.240 was she was laying in bed and she was in so much pain. Um, she had been sober, but it was too late

00:14:49.920 and her body was in pain and her heart was in pain. And I'm going to try and say this without crying.

00:14:55.660 Um, she said, wouldn't it be so nice to have a mother?

00:15:03.260 And I had been asking her, you know, what could I do? Um, cause it was clear,

00:15:08.280 you know, that this wasn't going to end well. And all she wanted was, you know, when you're sick or

00:15:15.700 your child's sick and they just want that comforting from that one person. And to think

00:15:21.700 that that person had instead taken all her resources, you know, that might help not that

00:15:29.300 she didn't get the care she needed, but that that would be your response and fled.

00:15:36.260 Take advantage of her to take advantage of her.

00:15:38.200 It's just not human. You know, it's not something that a human being would do. Um, I'm a mother,

00:15:44.260 your mother, you would, I mean, that's, I think probably the furthest thing from your mind that

00:15:51.080 you would do. And, and it's different from, you know, people will say sometimes there's somebody

00:15:54.920 that you can't help any longer. No, she, she was sober at this point and her body was damaged and

00:16:01.460 she was in pain and she needed empathy and comfort. And my dad was there and stayed by her side and,

00:16:08.640 you know, God bless Ray. We, you know, we, we did what we could and we're there, but

00:16:14.200 that to me was just, um, you know, I believe she's a sociopath and, um, I can't really explain

00:16:24.400 the things she did and the response to us any other way. Um, and so to me, it's to stop having

00:16:33.140 a relationship shortly before that time. And I'm, I'm ruining the book for anyone who hasn't read it.

00:16:37.840 It's been out for a while. Shortly before that time. Yeah. I'm not, I'm not doing great on book sales

00:16:42.120 here, but, um, you know, originally when this happened, when, when my sister went into the

00:16:47.500 hospital and my mom cleaned everything out, I reached out to her and I said, um, you know,

00:16:52.920 this Mishigas has to end and I will forgive everything in the past. We can have a relationship

00:16:59.780 going forward, but we can't go on with this behavior and these lies. Like you need help.

00:17:06.320 And we need to have an adult, normal human relationship. And by the way, you need to

00:17:12.500 return half the money. And she hung up on me and never called me again. And, um, after that is when

00:17:20.020 I sat with my sister and she said, I, you know, it would be so nice to have a mom. And then my sister

00:17:24.980 died. And at that point the door was just closed forever. Um, and so it, it, it takes a lot to get

00:17:36.480 to that point where I'm not going to ever have any contact or any relationship with this person

00:17:41.360 anymore. I don't want listeners or viewers to think that that is something that I would do lightly,

00:17:46.560 or it's something that's right for almost anyone. Our situation was so extreme, um, that that was,

00:17:53.540 that was the only way for me to, I could see as I had found this wonderful person you've met. My,

00:17:59.140 my husband is, I think the nicest person I've ever met to the point where I remember in the beginning,

00:18:06.880 people would say to my, my family would say, this can't be real. This can't be real. I mean,

00:18:10.520 he's just so genuine. I can see why people thought that he is a special guy, genuinely.

00:18:15.100 And he's fun and he's funny. I mean, the, the moment we got together, it just felt right and perfect.

00:18:22.340 And we never wanted to be, and, and perfect's the wrong word. It felt like it fit. It felt like

00:18:27.600 I could be myself. I could relax. I could let my guard down in a way. So surprising. If you think

00:18:34.160 about the damage that your mom inflicted and they will have to read the book to hear all those

00:18:37.720 examples, but she was physically abusive and she was emotionally abusive. And so usually a woman coming

00:18:43.820 out of that, you know, mother daughter relationship would not be in a great position to find a great

00:18:48.500 partner. Right. It's just like, you're kind of effed up without a shit ton of therapy. It's just

00:18:53.400 hard, right. To find someone who's healthy to get married to. So how, how did you do that? Like,

00:19:00.280 how did that happen? Cause you're, I've known you a long time, you know, like anybody, you've got your

00:19:03.960 aches and pains mentally and otherwise, but you're well adjusted. You're healthy. You are well. So how,

00:19:10.140 what happened there? I think I got lucky. I don't know. I mean, I, I, somebody told me recently that

00:19:16.300 99% of people who are raised by a sociopath have a relationship with a sociopath. And I, I never had

00:19:24.220 that kind of, I never had an abusive or negative relationship with anyone after my mother. I mean,

00:19:30.000 a friend or a boyfriend or, or anything like that. Um, I think that I got really lucky and I knew

00:19:37.780 what I didn't want. I knew what felt bad. I knew that what felt right. Like once I went to college

00:19:46.140 and I had the opportunity to be on my own and create some space, I realized that the most important

00:19:52.340 thing was to be authentic, to just be yourself and let other people take it or leave it. And if you

00:20:01.140 could just be present in your own body in the current time and just be okay with it,

00:20:09.500 it's an incredible freedom. You're not worried about, I mean, I remember joking with you, Megan.

00:20:15.420 I said, I don't lie to people because that would be such a compliment to them.

00:20:19.060 It cares so much about what they think that I'm willing to pretend to be or do or say something that

00:20:26.480 I'm not, you're so fantastic that I'm going to lie. No, you know, I'm me take it or leave it.

00:20:32.880 And, and I think once I got some space and I got off to college where, you know, I was lucky enough

00:20:38.340 to go to school with a lot of people who were, had very cool things and were also very quirky

00:20:44.060 and, you know, were, were pretty authentic because they were pretty nerdy. And, you know,

00:20:49.420 you just kind of were who you were. And of course there were people who were ridiculous,

00:20:53.500 but you could see through that as well. So that's instructive as well. And I started to

00:20:58.780 get the idea that if also, if you, if you are honest and you're vulnerable, people like you

00:21:06.600 better because they realize, Oh, it's okay. You know, it's okay that I have these faults. It's

00:21:11.780 okay that I'm also not perfect and they get comfortable and you like them and they like you

00:21:16.880 and life is just so much easier. And I think it was that contrast all of a sudden I was like,

00:21:22.300 wait a second, it's not hard to make friends. It's not hard to have an honest relationship.

00:21:26.980 It's not hard to not feud with people all over the place. And from there, it just sort of

00:21:32.440 snowballed. So maybe it was the contrast that sort of highlighted for me what I was looking for. And

00:21:39.120 it was never more true than with my husband. I mean, I remember I thought I've got to hang on to

00:21:44.440 this guy because I've never met someone who is genuine and no drama, but it's also really fun and

00:21:52.300 exciting. Like that's a combination. I'll never see it. He always had plans, always had fun things

00:21:57.060 to do, always had friends. You know, we were always going to do something great, but he was

00:22:02.660 super authentic and kind. And that's so fun. It's not a combination. He's a fun guy to spend

00:22:08.400 time with. He's brilliant, but he's one of those people at the dinner table who wants to know about

00:22:13.060 everybody else. He never wants to make it about himself. And I like you, um, he's very much like,

00:22:19.080 no, tell me about you. And how can I, how can I help you? What problem can I help you solve? Or

00:22:22.580 what's going on in your life? Let's talk about it. Let's laugh about it. So he's very giving in that

00:22:26.800 way. But something you said made me, made me want to ask you this question. So when you,

00:22:30.960 when you recognize that your mother, this is not like an aunt, it's not a sister. It's not

00:22:35.520 your mother is a sociopath. There's gotta be a period where you ask yourself, Oh my God,

00:22:41.500 am I a sociopath? Is that? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I think that period just ended about a month ago.

00:22:47.400 No, I mean, it really, I'm not even kidding. I mean, it really was like deep down in there. I mean,

00:22:54.860 I think part of the thinking was like, so if I was the person that was strong enough to finally stand up

00:22:59.820 to her because, you know, my dad didn't and my sister didn't, no one else in her life did,

00:23:04.840 then I must be at least as bad, you know? And I didn't even realize I was sort of harboring that

00:23:09.640 inside that idea that this must be in me. Um, and I have had a massive amount of therapy with an

00:23:18.400 incredibly talented therapist whose name I'm not giving you because he already doesn't have any

00:23:23.240 appointments. So I'm not sharing. Don't share that on the air. I never share the name of my therapist

00:23:27.760 on the air because I don't want anybody's trying to like hack him or like try to get,

00:23:32.140 I don't know what records he's got in there. You know, it's just like, see, that's you.

00:23:35.240 I'm so selfish. I don't want to share it. That's perfect.

00:23:39.300 Same reason not to give out your OBGYN. Like there's certain records. It's none of anybody's

00:23:44.320 business. Yeah. Right. There you go. Um, anyway, so it has taken, it took a lot of work to realize

00:23:49.940 that that's, you know, to face that that's what I'm afraid of. And then once I got there,

00:23:54.860 I realized it's not even the right question. It doesn't even really matter if I'm the same or

00:23:59.760 different. Cause I'm not going to interact with the world in the same way. You know, I already

00:24:03.620 have an, I'm living a life that's completely different. You know, even if you're not a

00:24:09.420 sociopath, you're like, I've seen you with your children. I mean, truly you could never be as

00:24:13.220 loving with your children as you are and be a sociopath. And your mom was not very loving with

00:24:18.360 you. So it's not like you have a history to look back on and say, well, she was like this.

00:24:22.160 And yet it turned out she was a mass murderer, right? Like that's not your scenario.

00:24:26.100 It's pretty obvious. Yeah. Yeah. Very obvious. So yeah. And then you wonder, I mean, I have to

00:24:31.640 imagine you wonder, well, does it skip a generation? Do any one of my children seem totally without

00:24:36.460 empathy toward others? And no, the answer there is no as well. But I imagine, I don't know if your mom

00:24:42.580 suffered from mental illness officially or how you'd put it, but like, there's always the fear if it's in

00:24:47.720 your family. And I've talked to other friends who have it in their family, that it's going to repeat,

00:24:51.820 it's going to pop up again. I, well, see, I have a completely different perspective on that because

00:24:57.380 I think that we all have challenges big and small and everybody out there in the audience,

00:25:05.580 everyone in my family, myself, everybody, we all have our challenges. And the only thing that matters

00:25:12.500 is the openness and the willingness to talk about it and get help and look at yourself and the desire

00:25:21.160 to feel better, the desire to live a better life, to be more relaxed and free in yourself.

00:25:30.680 And I am not afraid at all about anything that I used to be definitely. But, you know, now that I've

00:25:38.240 sort of, um, now that I understand my own evolution so much better, I'm not the least bit afraid of

00:25:46.380 anything that might face my kids, because I know that the tools exist in the world to deal with

00:25:54.380 anything, any mental illness. And it's just about going out and seeking that help and wanting it.

00:26:03.920 So I try to raise them in a way where they can talk about their feelings very openly. I think

00:26:10.200 that's step one. So if they're angry, frustrated, whatever it is, rather than channeling it in

00:26:16.660 another direction, they know what it is and where it's coming from. All of a sudden, just being aware

00:26:21.500 of that feeling and giving it a little space, it's not so big and it starts to dissipate.

00:26:26.760 This is, this is reminding me of Nancy Armstrong, who came on the program not long ago,

00:26:30.300 my friend and she's a filmmaker. And her film was called the disruptors. And it was about kids with

00:26:35.060 ADHD and also adults with ADHD and how, and her own kids have ADHD and how she helped them.

00:26:41.100 And she identified it with the help of doctors. And, and now the kids are like, yeah, ADHD. I was on

00:26:46.560 this med. I kind of titrated it down. I'm good now. I no longer need it. Or yes, no, I'm still on mine.

00:26:51.640 And I know exactly when I need to take it and how like, they're totally fine discussing this and

00:26:56.300 they've identified it. So you're right. The more we cloak it and treat these things as a secret and

00:27:02.140 how like, we're different and we're the only ones, the more of a burden it is. Let me switch gears on

00:27:08.360 one point. Cause you said, you know, people like you, if you're, if you put it out there,

00:27:12.640 if you're vulnerable, if you talk about this stuff, it occurs to me, you had this mom who did not set

00:27:19.680 you up for success in the friendship department. And I don't mean just making a star out of you

00:27:24.020 like that. That's kind of cool. But you write about how she would walk you in. She would

00:27:29.680 intentionally swing you by school before you had to go on an audition or you're going off to do

00:27:34.380 little house on the Prairie. And she's like, Melissa won't be here for the next two months

00:27:39.580 because she's the star in the new number one show. And you know, she, she too in demand. Now she's

00:27:45.940 like, she, now that she's six, I can't stop the bookings. So you better just prepare to get all.

00:27:50.820 And meanwhile, I'm sure these little girls are like, F Melissa would like to kill her.

00:27:55.200 Yes. We're going to throw a brick at her. The next time you drop her off here,

00:27:58.360 she better wear a helmet. Yes. It's not good modeling. Right. So it's like,

00:28:02.180 you probably grew up not, not feeling all that connected to little young girlfriends.

00:28:08.960 I definitely true. I mean, you know, you're, it's both the best thing and the worst thing when

00:28:13.780 I'm doing a show. So, you know, I had my Brownie troop and I wasn't getting any badges

00:28:18.520 because I wasn't there. So my mom took everyone on a field trip to the little house in the Prairie

00:28:23.140 set. So on one hand, they think you're totally magical. On the other hand, they want to kill

00:28:28.020 you, but what you are is definitely other and it can be good other. And then it just becomes detached

00:28:34.840 other. But my answer is really similar to the other things where I think I became a single trial

00:28:42.500 learner where I would see what didn't work sort of be able to process and analyze that. And

00:28:49.600 people don't like that. Yeah. No, I mean, it was quick for me to see that bragging and looking

00:28:55.580 perfect is not something that people like. They get very, you know, kids would say to me,

00:29:02.360 you think you're so perfect. And I would think to myself, no, I definitely don't think I'm so

00:29:07.220 perfect. I don't think I'm perfect at all, but I could tell that was the impression that they all

00:29:11.580 thought I thought I was so perfect. And I'm like, well, let's experiment, you know? And if you start

00:29:18.100 sharing your faults, which is something, you know, I have to say, I don't want to fast forward too far,

00:29:23.640 but you know, that was one of the fun things about Fox was that you were, you were allowed to be

00:29:27.480 yourself. And, you know, I was sort of the voice of reason and would call BS on whoever and was very

00:29:34.520 much myself. When Twitter first came out, I started tweeting things that were in my own voice,

00:29:39.680 which was very different from the news voice that we all used to use on television. And Ray said to

00:29:45.320 me at the time, you are fun and funny when we're out to dinner, you are not like that on television.

00:29:50.980 Have you thought about showing your real personality? And of course, it's crazy talk.

00:29:57.140 Yeah, that's crazy talk. That wasn't something we did in news at the time, but it matched with

00:30:01.640 everything else in my life that had been successful. When I showed my real self, when I showed my real

00:30:06.420 personality, when I showed my flaws, I mean, one time at CNBC, we were doing these promotional videos

00:30:10.840 and you were supposed to say, I am this, I am that. And somebody would say, you know,

00:30:14.760 I am an opera singer. I am a this and you're bragging it. And then you say, I am CNBC at the end.

00:30:21.020 And so I wrote in mine, you will never see my feet. They're the ugliest thing in the world.

00:30:26.780 And they were like, you can't do that. And to their credit, they let me say something like that.

00:30:30.600 And the reaction was both fantastic and horrible. You know, there were people that thought that was

00:30:35.660 hilarious and were like, I can't believe you would say you would be so self-deprecating.

00:30:41.100 But to me, the lesson I learned was when you put on this false front, that you are this perfect,

00:30:49.400 fantastic person. No one likes that. And not for nothing, it's also not true. It's not true.

00:30:57.060 Well, you lived in the most unfair of circumstances because you were not the one

00:31:00.440 putting that messaging out there. You had a very strong authority figure over you who entered

00:31:05.720 the room first, like, and ta-da, here comes Missy Francis, the greatest thing since sliced bread.

00:31:12.380 And the little girls are like, kill, kill. All right. Stand by, because I do want to switch to

00:31:17.840 our years at Fox and before the controversy and all that, the experiences that we both had there.

00:31:23.820 And when we come back, I've got to play the greatest Little House on the Prairie clip

00:31:27.300 of all time. So stand by. That's right after this two minute break. More with Melissa Francis in two

00:31:32.080 minutes.

00:31:38.860 So, Melissa, you hit the motherlode. Little House on the Prairie was the biggest show in America.

00:31:44.960 It was prime time. I watched it religiously. And the original Ingalls children had aged out.

00:31:51.840 It was no longer interesting to look at Mary and Laura and Carrie. They needed

00:31:56.080 fresh blood. And that is where you landed the role of a lifetime. And you landed it in addition to your

00:32:05.280 many other skills for for one particular reason. You could do something that virtually no other

00:32:11.040 seven, eight, you were eight when you got the role your old child could do on cue. I'm not going to have

00:32:16.960 you say that. I'm just going to show them the actual scene that aired when you got the part

00:32:21.360 of the night that the first episode and people can figure out what it was you did. Here it is.

00:32:27.440 It's her parents going down the hill in a wagon dying.

00:32:32.400 Wow, that looks painful.

00:32:43.400 There goes Pa Ingalls to help check on the people. And Melissa, like a pro, what'd you do?

00:32:49.720 I remember that like it was yesterday. I mean, it was incredible because they they rolled this

00:32:55.640 wagon off the side of the hill and shot it. And we watched it. Of course, the horses weren't attached

00:33:00.480 to it. And then they just did this tight shot of us over and over again. And we had to cry. And it

00:33:06.060 was the audition. Like you go in and they're like, okay, cry. And you just bring it out like no warm up

00:33:12.680 or anything. I don't know what it says about me that I could do that.

00:33:15.920 You could do it. I would picture like all of my pets dying. I mean, I wasn't a method actress

00:33:21.200 at the time. So it was like, rather than being in the character, what I was picturing was the

00:33:26.020 wagon was going down, like with my horse and my cat, my goldfish. And they were all just being

00:33:32.160 flown to smithereens. But I remember watching that at home and kind of hiding behind the couch. And my

00:33:37.560 sister was like, you look like a frog doing that. Do you see her face? You should be so embarrassed.

00:33:42.660 And I was not like, but I do wonder, like, you know, I have this thing when I'm going to cry,

00:33:47.280 like for real in my life, I can't imitate it on camera, but like, I get this huge frown,

00:33:52.740 like these two, the ends of my mouth pulled down like to the bottom of my jaw. Oh, it's crazy. You

00:33:58.780 can't stop it. And it's like my brother, my brother, my, my husband, Doug is always like,

00:34:02.840 oh boy. And so now my Thatcher has it too. He's got it. I don't know if it's hereditary,

00:34:08.360 but with you, you have like, um, I can't quite do it, but it's like, there's the lower jaw goes

00:34:14.320 down. And like the lower lip is like, I try not to do that. It pulls down. It's so sweet on TV so

00:34:20.240 many times. And my, my sister was relentless. Uh, when she saw me cry like that. So I was,

00:34:25.660 I would always try to stop that, but no, it is funny because, you know, then my kids came along

00:34:30.580 and my oldest one, you know, was little and he was like supposed to do whatever, you know,

00:34:34.800 do whatever he's a brush his teeth, eat a piece of fruit, whatever it was. And he throws himself

00:34:39.320 on the ground crying and he's got the face and the redness and the whole thing. And I walk over

00:34:45.820 to him and I was like, yeah, that's not very convincing. I mean, what you're doing here is

00:34:54.000 not great. There's no water coming out. Like one of the big things is the liquid has to act and they

00:34:59.340 don't cut away and give you some visine. Like you have to make it happen. Like I got paid to do this

00:35:04.380 as a child and this is not a good performance. And he was like, what you got paid to do this.

00:35:09.280 I'm like, well, not this. I mean, what you're doing, no one would pay you for it. But what I

00:35:14.720 did. And so he was fascinated. Meanwhile, as you know, this is my favorite story. And then,

00:35:18.440 and you looked at him and you were like, I can't even believe we're related.

00:35:21.400 Yeah. I mean, I'm ashamed of this performance that you just, my daughter.

00:35:24.880 Don't come back to me with this again.

00:35:26.660 Right. She busts out with these huge tears and Ray says, Oh my gosh, look at that real tears.

00:35:32.000 She just boom. Like she can do it off the old block. Oh yes. Yeah. Melissa's heart is like

00:35:37.120 beaming. She's beaming. Her heart's pumping. Yeah, that's good. This actually could make you

00:35:41.620 some money. That's what Thompson was interested in. He's like, wait, go on. What are you saying?

00:35:44.720 If I can actually produce tears, there could be money in it for me. So you do two years on

00:35:48.780 little house in the Prairie and it's Michael Landon. You know, we had, um, you know, we had Caroline

00:35:55.540 Grassley on the show. She was amazing when she wrote her memoir. When I was NBC, I did Melissa

00:35:59.380 Gilbert, Alison Arngrim, who's, you know, that's Laura Ingalls and Nellie. I'm obsessed.

00:36:05.020 This is one of the things that first drew us together when you got to Fox news and people

00:36:08.180 were like, my God, it's Melissa Francis, Melissa Francis. I'm like, and, and somebody's

00:36:11.880 like, she was on, I'm like, I know what she was, please stop it with your pedestrian Prairie

00:36:18.100 knowledge. I am an aficionado. I know exactly what she was on. I know when she was on, she

00:36:22.180 was with Jason Bateman. She stole all the scenes. She was second round of English,

00:36:25.440 English, English children. And then Maureen, our friend and makeup artist was like, don't

00:36:30.480 ask her about it. Cause I hear she doesn't like to talk about it. I'm like, shit. All

00:36:34.540 right. So I didn't ask for the longest time. My God, it took forever before we finally had

00:36:40.960 the conversation. It turns out you were fine talking about it. Um, but it was like a massive

00:36:45.760 chapter in your life and you had instant fame. And so that's one of my questions is how was

00:36:51.900 that when you went from normal eight-year-old who sometimes did commercials to everyone knows who

00:36:58.880 you are? You know, it was, it was a totally different time. And I remember I heard your

00:37:03.920 interview with Justine Bateman, who is tremendous actress. And of course, Jason Bateman's older

00:37:08.720 sister. And she was talking about when she was on family ties and that it's impossible to

00:37:13.440 understand now what that was like, because there were 13 channels, you know, not even really,

00:37:19.060 um, it's like 40 million people, but there were probably like eight channels cause there

00:37:22.580 were like blank spots. And so if you were on prime time at eight o'clock on one of the big

00:37:29.480 week nights, it was so many more viewers than anything out today gets just because of the

00:37:35.880 limited things that you could watch and people weren't reading very many books. They were happy

00:37:40.360 to turn on the television. So overnight I walked into the Northridge mall and would get

00:37:46.840 mopped, you know, and I was small. So to just not even be able to move. And then my mom loved

00:37:53.960 it. So we went to the mall a lot and, um, it was put you in your prairie outfit. It was

00:38:00.800 very overwhelming. I remember that I went to cheerleading camp in the summer, like not too

00:38:05.540 long after that. And there were kids came outside the door and they were sliding things under the

00:38:09.840 door and I wouldn't come out, you know, cause it was just, I was at this thing alone where we were

00:38:13.560 supposed to be doing, you know, it's like a sleepaway camp. Um, and so it was, it was very

00:38:19.500 overwhelming and probably that's where the, I don't like to talk about it comes from. And that's

00:38:22.780 not really true. Um, although it is true that the whole reason why I wrote a memoir was so that I

00:38:27.420 could direct people to the book instead of talking about it. Um, but you know, it, you don't mean like

00:38:33.940 right now, do you, or is it, is it, is it what do you, do you mean like right now? Oh,

00:38:38.500 should I be? Yeah, no, no, it's, well, it's different because it's you, but, um, no, but I

00:38:44.320 would, um, I would say what was harder about it was, so that was very difficult and then it wanes.

00:38:51.320 So I still did, you know, I had two more series after that, but how could anything be as successful

00:38:56.620 as little house? I did three feature films. I did more than a hundred commercials. I won all kinds of

00:39:01.880 awards. You know, I kept acting pretty steadily into my teenage years. And then when I was about

00:39:08.100 15, you know, you hit the age, maybe 14, where everything you do feels awkward. Like it doesn't

00:39:15.360 matter what it is. You just are suddenly super self-conscious. And I didn't really want to do

00:39:21.520 it as much anymore. And that's the kiss of death because as I said before, I don't believe any child

00:39:27.480 actor who says they hated it because you really have to bring it every time to get any role.

00:39:33.560 And I just wasn't bringing it anymore because I was kind of too self-conscious, not sure I really

00:39:38.460 wanted to do it. And then once it starts to slip away, then I want to get it back, but it's too late.

00:39:43.740 So I sort of went through that midlife crisis, career crisis that some people go through at 50 or

00:39:50.540 whatever at like 17. And that was at least as hard as the sudden influx of attention that then the

00:40:00.440 didn't you used to be. No, I still am. That's definitely what Justine was talking about. That

00:40:06.560 was what she wrote in a book about it. What about Jason Bateman? How was he? Let's talk turkey. Was he a

00:40:12.920 good guy? Was he douchey? Oh my God, I had such a crush on him. I mean, he could have done anything and I

00:40:18.520 would have thought it was wonderful. I mean, those red bangs cut straight across. I just, the freckles,

00:40:25.200 I mean, I was smitten with him and would follow him around like a puppy dog. And he liked to hang

00:40:31.820 out with Melissa Gilbert, obviously. She was very cool. And so he did want to ditch me most of the

00:40:38.720 time and didn't have a lot of luck doing it. So that was sad. But luckily, you know, Rachel and

00:40:45.880 Robin Greenbush were the twins that played Carrie and they were a lot of fun and they were exactly my

00:40:52.460 age, I think pretty much. And so we had a lot of fun hanging out and Michael made it really, really

00:40:58.120 fun. You know, I mean, again, you need kids to be happy in order for them to perform. And we had a

00:41:04.660 blast. I mean, it was very serious when it came work time. You know, we would have fun until he wanted

00:41:09.740 to use the least amount of film possible because it costs money. So you had to hit it on the first take.

00:41:15.880 And move on. That's what he liked. That's how you were one take Missy.

00:41:18.540 I was one take Missy, but when I wasn't, you know, he would give you that look and you were

00:41:22.940 like, oh my God, you know, so it was enough about Michael back to Jason Bateman. Did you,

00:41:28.880 did you ever hook up with Jason Bateman? Did you maintain a relationship with Jason?

00:41:33.600 I wish. No, no. I mean, I saw him a couple of times afterwards. Um, I'm a huge fan. I mean,

00:41:39.100 I think Ozark is probably one of my very favorite shows. I have so much respect for him. You know,

00:41:43.620 he is one of the few of us who transitioned into not only a phenomenal acting career,

00:41:50.320 but he is, you know, hardcore creator, writer, director, producer. He did the thing that,

00:41:58.180 you know, you get to a certain point and, you know, I talk about feeling awkward. What I,

00:42:01.640 what I didn't like about acting when I got into high school, the phrase that I remember hearing was,

00:42:06.540 I don't like saying someone else's words. I don't mind pretending to be in character and doing

00:42:11.100 something else, but the dialogue to me, I'm a big dialogue person. The dialogue was not authentic.

00:42:16.360 And I didn't like that anymore. When I went away to college, I, we had the career services office and

00:42:22.600 you went in and, you know, everybody at Harvard was going to be a lawyer, a doctor, or a consultant,

00:42:27.920 you know, basically are going to wall street. I was like, I don't want to do any of those things.

00:42:31.200 And I saw a journalism internship. And of course, everyone assumed that I had been on television

00:42:37.540 and I wanted another way back on television. And I understand why you would think that,

00:42:41.700 but I realized later what appealed to me was the storytelling. My favorite thing about local news,

00:42:49.480 I love to go out to the tiny town that had three people and the one person who was having the bizarre

00:42:56.380 experience or the really cool thing. And you sat with them and you went into their life and

00:43:01.180 you walked around their house and you saw everything about them. And then you told their

00:43:05.100 story to the world. And to me, it was, it was the storytelling. And it was so much more satisfying

00:43:10.440 than entertainment because in entertainment, it takes you three months or a year or whatever to

00:43:15.180 do a story with local news. You just turned it in a day. And I didn't have anyone telling me what it

00:43:22.160 had to be or no, you don't like that line. Like you went out there and you were with a photographer.

00:43:26.600 It was kind of like being cops. It was the two of you. You went out to a town. I had this one

00:43:30.660 photographer in Connecticut. He used to say, well, they better not, you know, rob a bank on a slow

00:43:34.900 news day. Cause we'll come and find you. You know, we would dig in on a story and you're like, Hey,

00:43:39.060 I know what we could do. Why don't we go to this place and see if we can track down this guy.

00:43:42.480 And you had a fixed amount of time. You had to be on the air by six. So it was like a mystery or

00:43:47.680 whatever, you know, a choose your own adventure that you had to finish by the end of the day. And it was

00:43:54.060 very similar in the sense that it was a visual and creative art where you were writing a script and

00:43:59.140 there was, you know, the sound and all the different elements that you weave together,

00:44:02.000 like a quote, I mean, like a quilt. But what I loved about it was that it was so much more

00:44:07.300 immediate and I had total control. And, you know, once I got into news and became an indoor cat,

00:44:13.120 I became an anchor because I had kids and that was fun. But the creative itch wasn't being scratched

00:44:19.620 anymore. That's what led me to write my very first book, which was lessons from the prairie. And I

00:44:24.200 actually wrote that in three months, I would wake up at two o'clock in the morning, naturally without

00:44:28.980 an alarm clock, and would write for two hours and go back to sleep. And it was just that was my

00:44:33.680 process. I would go to sleep thinking about what was the next story I was going to tell what was the

00:44:38.380 next chapter. I didn't have just like set the character, you know, set myself free because I

00:44:42.820 was talking about, okay, here's what we need. What's a story from this time period, I wake up,

00:44:46.700 it would be there, I would write it down. I did it really fast. I loved it. I wrote my second book,

00:44:52.300 and I was kind of out the book thing wasn't feeling as authentic anymore. And I decided I

00:44:58.020 wanted to write comedy. And I started writing scripts. And that was the next step was sort of

00:45:05.440 the invention of characters. What would they do? What would they say that would be authentic? I want

00:45:10.180 a comedy competition, a script competition. That was amazing. And she wrote this great script,

00:45:15.700 but based in part on the news biz. I mean, based all right, no place specifically,

00:45:20.580 it wasn't based on any place. No, no, no, no, no, no. News in general doesn't rhyme with Vox or

00:45:25.980 Knox. Um, and, uh, she won the whole thing. Like these are people submitting their screenplays and

00:45:32.000 their, their, their drafts from all over the country. And she won. And so like the, a light

00:45:36.940 bulb went off. I'm like, you know, maybe there's something more I can do. Maybe I can tap back into

00:45:40.880 these creative genes that I haven't been using for so long. That's one of the frustrations of

00:45:46.440 things in particular cable news. This job lets you stretch a lot of muscles, but cable news is

00:45:51.960 like, you're a one trick pony. You do this one thing, you do it for one hour. You have, you know,

00:45:55.620 46 minutes of content, you get up and down in the story and you got to move the hell on and not a lot

00:46:00.180 of stretching in the muscles. All right. Let me stand you by, uh, because I said we were going to

00:46:03.540 get into Fox, but we didn't quite get there, but we will. I want to talk before we talk about your,

00:46:06.840 the controversy and the way you left, we got to talk about our years there and Roger and the news biz.

00:46:12.360 So we're going to do that, uh, right after this quick break, Melissa stays with us. We talk about

00:46:16.480 Fox, her lawyers here, if that tells you where this is going. And, uh, remember you can find the

00:46:22.580 Megan Kelly show live on Sirius XM triumph channel one 11 every weekday at noon East the full video

00:46:28.820 show and clips by subscribing to our YouTube channel, youtube.com slash Megan Kelly. If you prefer an audio

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00:46:39.840 your podcast for free. And by the way, today's Friday, which means we'll be sending out our

00:46:44.700 American news minute. That's my Friday email to you. If you want all the week's biggest headlines

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00:47:00.900 All right, sign up and, uh, you'll see if you like it. I know you will.

00:47:04.300 So you wind up after a stint in local news working for CNBC, the glorious, welcoming,

00:47:14.780 lovely house of NBC. And, um, and I remember after things quickly fell apart from me there,

00:47:21.580 you were like, I tried to warn you. It's like, come on. Um, we pulled a little clip of you with

00:47:28.360 Contessa Brewer on a show you did, uh, back in the day. It was called it's the economy. This one

00:47:34.860 was on MSNBC. So funny to think of you there, but here you are discussing college students.

00:47:40.080 Well, you'll see. I never had a roommate in college. I mean, not one who actually shared my

00:47:44.820 bedroom. So this wasn't a problem for me, but I know for you, perhaps it was, you wish there was a

00:47:50.420 rule governing whether your roommate could engage in sexual activity when you were there.

00:47:56.220 And you're saying that the having sex in a room while someone else is there,

00:47:59.920 this was a problem for me. And which side of the equation are you applying that I'm on there?

00:48:03.640 I'm just saying, what is she trying to say?

00:48:06.700 Oh my God. I don't even remember that. I remember the things as a kid. I would bow that never

00:48:11.260 happened. I don't even remember that. That's so funny.

00:48:13.300 So cute. I love the, your look there, like young, wholesome, new, fresh-faced.

00:48:17.860 Yeah, where is she going with this? Contessa, where are you going with this? Yeah.

00:48:20.600 I was just going to say, no, but just in terms of your look, that's before you got foxified,

00:48:24.080 right? When you get to fox, they foxify you. They put the lashes on. I've told the story before,

00:48:28.940 but I remember I was like, I'm not putting on false eyelashes. I'm doing news. And Julie Banderas

00:48:33.520 goes, get the fucking lashes. She wasn't wrong. They do make a nice difference. In any event,

00:48:41.580 you wind up after CNBC at Fox. And despite how it ended, like, how would you characterize your eight,

00:48:50.800 how many years were you there? Eight? Um, I think it was there nine. Um, I, you know,

00:48:58.160 I, so what was magical to me about Fox was when Roger Ailes originally recruited me,

00:49:03.960 I was in a contract negotiation with CNBC and I actually had no intention of, of leaving NBC.

00:49:09.180 I frankly was just going to use the Fox thing as leverage. And he had a very clever way of describing

00:49:16.040 what went on over at Fox where he said, you know, I let people be themselves, like bring your true

00:49:23.840 authentic self, be as big as you want. Um, I don't tell people what to say. In fact, we have various

00:49:30.940 seats that are filled. There's the brainy lawn. There's the brunette vixen. Um, there's the leading

00:49:38.340 man conservative. There's the likable liberal. Like he very much cast it like a television show. And he said,

00:49:45.980 um, you know, I know how to let people get out there and really experiment and be themselves,

00:49:51.860 which was very different from NBC where it was very much in a box, like the way you delivered

00:50:00.180 the news, the note show your personality. But ironically, it was at NBC where I had challenged

00:50:08.640 somebody on Obamacare, you know, saying that there was no way people's prices were going to go down.

00:50:12.980 Cause if you could do math, that didn't make any sense. And they told me I was disrespecting the

00:50:16.760 office of the president by criticizing Obamacare. So they actually, well, well, they acted like

00:50:22.000 they, there's a lot of mind control and voice control over there where at Fox, there was all

00:50:26.540 this freedom, um, to just kind of do at least at my level to do and say, and go big. So I did really

00:50:33.640 enjoy that and was able to, I think, develop what for me was a very authentic voice. You know,

00:50:38.820 I am not a Republican. I'm, I am, you know, independent little eye. I don't believe the

00:50:45.380 government has a lot of very good ideas. I think almost everything they touch turns to shit. So I

00:50:49.620 would like them to stay as far away from me as possible. And I want to make decisions for myself

00:50:54.260 and my family, but I respect everybody else's freedom. You do you baby, whatever it is you want

00:50:58.840 to do over there. As long as you're not hurting someone else, you go for it. So, you know,

00:51:03.140 unless you're that Canadian shop teacher in which you, you should, you should not do you,

00:51:07.160 you could do you behind the privacy of your own bedroom door. Stay away from my kid. I'm sorry.

00:51:11.320 I'm on a tear. Yes. Um, so, I mean, as you, you know, that was, that's a, that's a seat over there.

00:51:17.340 There are a lot of people who are that sort of quirky libertarian area. So, you know, I could kind

00:51:22.380 of, and I also felt like it is so much more honest to tell people upfront where you're coming from.

00:51:27.080 You know, I'm very forthright that I think, I think that the, the best things are the best

00:51:32.860 thing for the entire economy, for the whole country are the lowest taxes possible because we all spend

00:51:38.100 and give and use our money more efficiently than the government who is, let's be honest, a bunch of

00:51:42.340 crooks. So, you know, and I put that out there. And then when I report on the story, you know,

00:51:48.380 where I'm coming from, as opposed to me pretending like I'm not engaged, I'm not invested and I don't

00:51:53.380 care. If I don't have an opinion on tax policy, why the hell am I a financial reporter? Like I

00:51:59.400 don't care about the economy. That's what people are trying to get you to believe when they say

00:52:04.280 they're non-biased. Of course, if you don't have an opinion, you're either brain dead or totally

00:52:09.380 disengaged. So just be honest about where you're coming from. And I felt like I could do that at Fox.

00:52:14.480 Yeah. You, um, got hired during the Roger era as did I, of course. And, um, of course he went,

00:52:22.120 he was brought down in 2016 by the me too movement. And there was discussion at the time

00:52:28.360 about you and I were very close friends, but we did not discuss this. And even when shit was going

00:52:32.800 down with, you know, is people questioning whether I was going to speak out or what, why I hadn't said

00:52:37.740 anything about him. You and I never talked about it privately. It was like something we did not

00:52:41.760 discuss. It was just people have to understand. He was like a cult leader and you didn't discuss the

00:52:46.620 cult leader. And so even though we were close, it was like, you don't discuss the cult leader. Like that shit is

00:52:52.120 plutonium. And, um, so anyway, it all came, came out and he gets escorted out. And the question is

00:53:00.640 whether like what that brought up for you in terms of your experiences with him.

00:53:05.540 You know, um, it was to me, uh, so not, you know, he, nothing ever happened in retrospect.

00:53:14.700 Then you look at conversations and you realize where he was kind of testing, you know, and I'm

00:53:20.680 what's like, you know, there was a point in time where he said, um, I just don't think you want it

00:53:24.580 enough. I don't, there are other people that are willing to do anything. And I was like, what do you

00:53:28.500 mean? I'll work on the weekends. I'll come on holidays. I'll take her anytime you want, you know,

00:53:32.120 like I didn't get it. Um, so I think that there were a couple of meetings where when I, and I,

00:53:37.700 you know, gave the language at the time to my agent. And then when I look back, I feel kind of

00:53:42.560 like an idiot because it was clear sort of what was going on, but I, I didn't really, it was more

00:53:48.640 afterwards when you look around and you kind of see what has been going on, you're sort of seething

00:53:54.540 as someone who I was like, Oh, I didn't have that in my toolbox. You know, other people are kind of

00:53:58.820 either using this to get ahead or being really hurt, which is devastating. And I think maybe

00:54:04.980 another reason why I'm not, wasn't preyed upon is I wasn't a vulnerable person. You know, I have a

00:54:11.060 husband who works and I don't care if I'm on television or not. So I don't have a lot of

00:54:16.040 weaknesses that could be exploited. Um, but it really did. Um, you know, it, it, it destroyed a lot.

00:54:26.180 Um, and which was, which was the right thing, but it was, it was never the same after that,

00:54:33.300 but I can't say it also got any better. Yeah. What do you mean in terms of the environment

00:54:38.480 there and elsewhere in terms of that? I mean, specifically what happened to me, you know,

00:54:45.660 the idea that, um, you know, after he left, they promoted all women within the building. You know,

00:54:52.520 there was a woman running every department. It was a woman CEO was a woman lead counsel. It was a

00:54:57.100 woman who was working on the contracts. And, you know, the point in time came when I was wanting to

00:55:04.680 negotiate my own contracts. I felt like I had been promoted to the host about number, which was doing

00:55:10.020 better than ever. We were, and, and, you know, the marker is you're doing better than the show that

00:55:13.960 comes before you and better than the show that comes after you. So you're, you know, a peak,

00:55:17.980 not a valley, not a hammock in the time slots. And I had that show. I had my show at four o'clock,

00:55:23.400 which was also doing incredibly well. And every night I was on either Hannity or I was on, um,

00:55:28.660 Tucker. So I was, I was thinking, Oh, I'm, I'm in for a good pay bump this time, uh, around. They

00:55:34.460 said no. Um, so I said to my agent, thank you. Anyway, I'm going to do this negotiation myself.

00:55:39.820 I did a lot of research and I'm a nerd. Um, you know, as you said before, I, I studied economics,

00:55:46.700 but I also reported on finance and I know how these different models work. So I sat down and I

00:55:53.340 compared, I tried to figure out like, what is the common denominator? Okay. You figure, yes,

00:55:58.280 people make more if your name is on the show versus if it's an ensemble time of day matters

00:56:03.220 because there's more revenue in the morning and the evening than there is in the middle of the day.

00:56:06.800 Like years of service should matter. It doesn't matter as much, but it's definitely one of the

00:56:11.120 factors. How long have you been there? You've gotten a number of pay bumps, all those kinds of

00:56:14.900 things. And so I held steady for every different variable. And after a year, almost of collecting

00:56:21.100 data. And by doing that, I asked everyone, what do you make? What do you know what this one makes?

00:56:27.260 And the thing that people don't realize is that the agents go out to try and get new clients.

00:56:32.640 They whisper to you what they got for this one and this one, and this one, this one used to be my

00:56:37.900 client. When she was my client, I got her this. So they spread all these numbers about, and they do

00:56:43.600 that as a way of attracting talent. Now, of course I have no way of knowing if those numbers are true,

00:56:47.920 but when I heard something two or three times, I would put it into my spreadsheet and kind of just

00:56:54.720 see what the pattern was. I didn't know what it would be. And I'm going through and I'm looking

00:56:59.480 and all of a sudden it dawns on me in every scenario. If you sort by time of day, if you

00:57:06.520 sort by ratings, if you sort by years of service, anything, it comes up. The woman on the screen

00:57:12.720 at that second is making a tiny fraction of what the man sitting right next to her is making all day

00:57:21.660 long. I watched the channel and I thought, oh my goodness, this is really crazy. And I'm not talking

00:57:28.840 about like 20% more. It's like double, triple, even more times what the person next to them was

00:57:35.260 making. Again, these were numbers that were given to me by other people in the building who frankly,

00:57:41.380 they would say, we'll fire you if you talk about your salary. So these were deep, quiet conversations,

00:57:47.360 or these are from the blabbing agents who tell everyone everything. And so I prepared to go in and

00:57:55.580 negotiate on that basis and say, look, but in my heart of hearts, like this is really the crazy

00:58:00.180 part where I say you would think it would have gotten so much better after Roger left. I honestly

00:58:05.640 thought that the disparity was left over from Roger's days and that maybe based on his whole

00:58:14.700 persona. And he said to a lot of us, I mean, he said to me, I think he said to you at some point,

00:58:18.600 this person's supporting a family, so they need more money. I mean, it's common for people of a certain

00:58:24.080 age to think that way. And, you know, women will take less, we agree to less. So I thought it was

00:58:29.580 just a holdover from then. And we were also at the same time on the business channel doing a ton

00:58:34.440 of stories about companies who went out and hired a consulting firm to do company to come in and do a

00:58:40.780 full review of everyone in the company and make sure that they weren't open to lawsuits like this

00:58:48.080 from people who say that they're not paying fairly based on gender or race. Hold on, sorry.

00:58:52.820 Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I was, I was, I thought they would

00:58:58.160 silly me, be receptive to this feedback and want to fix it. Um, but that's not what happened at all.

00:59:05.540 All right. That's a good place to bring in your lawyer. Let me do an ad. Let me do an ad. We'll

00:59:10.980 bring Kevin in next and we'll get into something Melissa's never discussed publicly before, uh,

00:59:16.400 how it actually ended and how it came to be that on October 7th, 2020, in the midst of hosting two

00:59:21.620 successful shows. She got a message in the teleprompter telling her you are canceled.

00:59:31.860 Melissa Francis is with me today, along with now her attorney, Kevin Mincer. Um, all right. Hi,

00:59:37.940 Kevin. Welcome. So Melissa decides that Fox might be, they might be interested in hiring maybe an outside

00:59:45.620 consultant to figure out whether the women are being paid less than men on a company-wide basis.

00:59:50.000 And silly Melissa thinks that might be something that the company would want to do. I don't,

00:59:55.560 I don't know how many companies would want to do it, but it doesn't sound like there was much of an

00:59:58.500 appetite at Fox. And you had a conversation you allege with Diane Brandy, who was for many years,

01:00:05.620 the general counsel at Fox, and now still plays some sort of counsel role as we understand it,

01:00:09.640 at least at this point did. And what happened in that conversation, Melissa?

01:00:13.600 Well, you have to understand at the time that on my desk, there were two screeners from the Screen

01:00:18.580 Actors Guild that had a bombshell and the loudest voice, and they had actors playing Diane Brandy

01:00:24.760 behaving illegally towards women in the Roger Ailes situation. I, at the time, assumed that she

01:00:30.760 no longer worked at the company, like many other people assumed. She did not work there any longer.

01:00:35.900 When I said that I wanted to do my own negotiation, they sent me an email back saying,

01:00:40.340 you'll be meeting one-on-one with Diane Brandy. I was shocked because I thought, wow,

01:00:47.600 you're going to put her in a room alone with the woman, uh, you know, to negotiate something. I,

01:00:52.620 I wasn't even aware that she's still here. Uh, we ended up having a, uh, you know, a, uh,

01:00:59.180 voice conversation. I had actually scripted out exactly what I wanted to say because my math and

01:01:06.600 my points, I felt like I wanted to be crystal clear. I didn't want to misspeak any portion of

01:01:12.100 it at all. Um, we started, you know, small talk. She's very nice. How are your kids? What's going

01:01:17.060 on? Then she segued right into, um, you know, are you going to hand this off to someone else? It's

01:01:21.900 not common for talent to do this for themselves. No, I'm good. Um, and I, I said, you know, look,

01:01:27.660 I, I think there's this disparity and I basically laid it out. Um, she said, well, you know, I want

01:01:33.060 to stop you there. Um, you know, this is not the way you want to do this. You don't want to compare

01:01:38.380 yourself to other people. And I said, no, no, I'm not comparing myself to other people. I'm saying

01:01:43.540 that I've collected this data and I explained just like I basically how I explained it to you. I went

01:01:48.100 through how I did the comparisons and what I came up with. And finally she broke in and, and she said,

01:01:54.320 and I wrote it down verbatim. That's how the world works. Women make less than men. That's just a

01:02:01.740 fact. And at that point, I basically fell off my chair onto the ground. I mean, luckily we were on

01:02:07.000 a speakerphone. So I, I just, I couldn't believe that she would say something like this, uh, being a

01:02:14.720 woman, being where we had been in Fox being through everything we'd been through being a lawyer. Um, and

01:02:21.080 when, when I were caught being a lawyer, when, when I kind of recovered myself, I said, um, well,

01:02:27.220 you know, the gender pay gap around the country is 70 cents on the dollar. My back of the envelope

01:02:32.460 figures seem like we're running at, you know, 200, 300, a thousand percent. In some cases,

01:02:39.740 I would think we would want to be doing better, not worse given where we came from. And she said,

01:02:45.180 you know, you really, you don't know how to, this isn't how you want to do this. Um, I want to help

01:02:50.180 you. Why don't you go back and think about what your counteroff would be. And, you know, the compensation

01:02:55.040 committee meets in a couple of weeks and, you know, we can talk again before then. Um, and I got off the

01:03:01.700 phone. Of course they had scheduled this meeting about, you know, half an hour before my show. And I was

01:03:06.920 just floored that someone, not only would you say that, but you would feel so insulated from any sort

01:03:16.760 of pushback or any sort of punishment and that you would feel free to just say that what's funny is

01:03:24.000 I can't tell you how many people since reading that comment in print have reached out to me and said,

01:03:30.840 it's so funny. Cause that was my exact experience with her. And, um, that rang so true that part.

01:03:38.200 And, and there were many stories of, of different negotiations and things where she had said

01:03:42.700 something similarly outrageous. I think it's a, I don't know. I don't want to speculate. It's just

01:03:47.600 an approach in negotiation or something, but it was, uh, astonishing to me. Um, I, yeah,

01:03:53.880 was it an, was it a tactic? Because it does seem impossible that a lawyer, any lawyer would say such a,

01:04:00.060 such a reckless thing. She, I should tell the audience, the spokesperson for Fox news says,

01:04:05.480 quote, Melissa Francis's version of that conversation is untrue and patently absurd.

01:04:10.740 So they deny it. I agree with that. It is totally absurd that she would say that.

01:04:14.740 I a hundred percent agree with the fact it was absurd. And that's how I felt at the time.

01:04:20.280 So, but there was a second step, as I understand it, involving somebody in human resources. So it was

01:04:25.880 your, it wasn't a one-stop deal for you. No, I mean, when that happened, I was stunned and then

01:04:33.400 I was really mad because I felt like I had really given so much time and effort and I loved my job.

01:04:41.820 I loved being there. I loved my shows. And that's how I actually started the conversation was I'm

01:04:46.740 grateful. I love this place. I love everything I have. I love the shows that I'm on. I'm grateful

01:04:51.320 for the opportunity. You know, I think that I deserve a raise. This is a normal way to have

01:04:56.260 a conversation. You know, I felt that way. So then I felt, and you hadn't gotten a raise,

01:04:59.760 you hadn't gotten anything much of a raise at all in like eight years or something. It had been,

01:05:03.800 that was one of your very incremental. Yeah. Very incremental. But now I had gone over from,

01:05:08.440 I'd been made a full-time host on outnumbered, which had millions of viewers before that I was a

01:05:14.500 host on Fox business, which has many, many fewer viewers. So it makes sense that somebody on Fox

01:05:20.120 business makes a fraction of what somebody on Fox news channel makes. I had been named

01:05:24.940 the new co-host publicly of outnumbered. So all of a sudden I had a job on the channel that makes all

01:05:32.920 the money and they pay the people. So the agents have always told me and the lawyers and everyone

01:05:38.120 else, they pay the people on the channel that makes all the money, more of the money than the

01:05:43.580 people on the channel that makes less money. Uh, so it seemed like my expectation was reasonable.

01:05:48.780 Again, all we wanted was to be paid. What was fair, not a penny more or a penny less. I felt like there

01:05:55.760 was something discriminatory going on. And I was asking the question, is there, I was shut down

01:06:02.220 so definitively. And that conversation with her, I went to HR within the next day or two. I can't

01:06:08.280 remember. Kevin could tell you exactly how long it was, but I marched in there and I sat down with HR

01:06:14.120 in the past had dealt with me very fairly on other issues. Again, naive me. I thought that I was going

01:06:20.440 to have a conversation and they were going to fix things. And I said, first of all, um, here are two

01:06:26.780 screeners with Diane Brandy and she's not sued these people who she's a private citizen. She has people

01:06:32.760 portraying her here doing illegal things and she's not sued them for defamation. So that, I don't know,

01:06:37.860 she's a lawyer. You would think if this was inaccurate, somebody would have done something.

01:06:40.940 Why would you put me in a room with her? Why is she negotiating with me? And they said,

01:06:45.420 well, she works in New Jersey. What differently there. That was, that was his answer. She's in

01:06:52.640 New Jersey. I said, what? And he said, well, I can guarantee you, you'll never have to speak to her

01:06:56.600 again. And I was like, okay, well, and I went through, I said, I'm going to read you a transcript

01:07:01.480 of everything that happened. And I explained, I wrote down my parts, read it verbatim. I wrote down

01:07:06.740 what she said afterwards, as we were speaking, I took notes and I filled in exactly afterwards.

01:07:10.560 I read the whole thing and he and another woman in HR sat there, stony faced, never said anything.

01:07:17.480 And when it was over, I said, so what do you think? And he said, well, I don't, I don't know

01:07:23.600 that we have a gender pay problem here. And I said, I demand an investigation, first of all,

01:07:29.540 into Diane Brandy, second of all, into the gender pay discrimination that I very much believe is going

01:07:36.220 on in this company. And I don't care. I don't need to be on television. I've been on television

01:07:43.080 since I was six months old. I am lucky enough to be in a position where I don't support my family.

01:07:48.140 So I will die on this motherfucking mountain before I will let this go because I am really mad.

01:07:55.100 And they're just looking at me like I'm a crazy person, which I can understand at the end, but

01:07:59.100 no reaction, no response, no. And this is somebody I dealt with in HR who had actually solved problems

01:08:05.460 in the past very thoughtfully. And I'm starting to get the message that this isn't no one, no one,

01:08:12.640 no one wants to work on this. Like this isn't to go there. No, no. And I just stood up and I walked

01:08:18.600 out. And, and once again, I was floored that they didn't deny it. No one remember to this point,

01:08:25.600 there's no one that said you're wrong. Diane Brandy said, you're right. And F you live with

01:08:33.760 it. All right. The HR said, we don't know this is a problem, but we're not interested in checking it

01:08:40.540 out. So now, all right. So let me go to Kevin on this one, because normally having worked at Fox

01:08:46.680 News for many years, I can say everyone there, especially talent has an arbitration clause in

01:08:52.200 their contract. And that means if you find yourself in a dispute with your employer,

01:08:55.980 you've got to arbitrate. This is Gretchen Carlson's whole thing. Remember, she was very angry that,

01:08:59.720 you know, everything had to go to arbitration and you couldn't put it out in the public.

01:09:04.100 But in any event, in a hypothetical scenario, a person in Melissa's position, angry about this

01:09:10.420 and thinking there's this kind of a problem would have no choice other than to commence an arbitration.

01:09:15.500 You cannot go into federal court, file litigation. It's not on the table for you. And also you would be

01:09:22.200 you would be prohibited from discussing the fact that you had done that thing. You can't even talk

01:09:29.300 about the fact that you filed an arbitration. I know this from having signed my own Fox deals.

01:09:35.280 So far, do you agree with my framing of the general scenario, Kevin?

01:09:39.420 In my experience, Megan, that's the way it works.

01:09:43.160 So just having understood that, let me just ask you for just for the record.

01:09:47.120 Um, did Melissa file an arbitration against Fox?

01:09:51.140 We're not able to talk about that.

01:09:53.440 Okay. Um, so did everything wrap up amicably where then somebody called you and said,

01:09:59.000 we've seen the light and here's a huge raise to make things better?

01:10:05.720 Who wants to take?

01:10:06.720 Oh, you asking me or Kevin?

01:10:07.800 Well, whoever can take it. You take it, Melissa. Kevin will jump in if you say something you shouldn't

01:10:12.160 say. Um, yeah, no, that's, that's unfortunately not what happened. Um, I pursued the path that I am

01:10:20.720 supposed to follow. Um, as I pursued this in the meantime, you have to remember it was COVID. They

01:10:26.400 built a studio in my home. Um, I was doing the noon show and the four o'clock show from home. I was on

01:10:32.480 every night. Um, you know, it things, it, life was continuing as normal, you know, for a long time

01:10:39.120 contract at this point at this conversation. Um, I was working without a contract. That sounds,

01:10:46.640 I think that's true. Kevin, you can correct me if I'm wrong. I think you had a contract that

01:10:50.640 continued. You didn't have a new contract, right? You had one that just carried over.

01:10:55.600 Okay. So you're doing a show on Fox business and you're doing outnumbered from your home.

01:10:59.580 Cause it's COVID every day, like clockwork. Yeah. And, and it's all, it's all going along.

01:11:04.740 Great ratings are through the roof. Um, and then one day, um, they called out of the blue,

01:11:12.480 um, called Kevin and let him know that I, my on-air services. I should pause. Why did they call

01:11:20.280 Kevin? Because you, you did hire a lawyer that we know. Yes. Yeah. Okay. And Kevin, you can say

01:11:26.360 that you were in touch with Fox news. Yes. There you go. We were in punch and there was a process that

01:11:31.920 we were following. That was something that was, we were allowed to do. And in the course of that

01:11:37.120 process, I had had communications with their lawyers as you'd expect. And so I got a call

01:11:42.840 about, I don't know, uh, 10 minutes before they did what, um, Melissa is about to describe what they

01:11:48.440 did. Yeah. So he got a call and he said that my services were no longer needed on the air. Um,

01:11:55.720 and I said, well, they, they can't mean the show in 10 minutes because we all know you can't get an

01:12:03.440 anchor in the chair that quickly. You know, I, I'm going to just go over and sit in my living room

01:12:08.660 for my second show. And then if they want me not on tomorrow, whatever it is, that's fine.

01:12:13.460 10 minutes to air at this point. That's right. So, so the lights go on. I, I have a, um, robotic

01:12:19.480 camera. Um, so I don't have the power to turn any of it on and off that's done from the studio. So

01:12:24.420 the lights come on, the teleprompter comes on. You know, it's funny. My kids used to joke that

01:12:28.480 everybody knew when I was about to do television because the living room electrified and everything

01:12:32.820 just started buzzing and worrying. Um, so it was all on, I went over, I sat down, I clipped on my

01:12:37.940 mic, I checked in, we talked to the producers, we did the whole thing. They're in the countdown.

01:12:42.280 You know, I was at the closing bell, you know, so there's five, four, and you're listening,

01:12:45.980 ding, ding, ding, ding, ding on wall street. And I'm about to go and it comes up in the prompter.

01:12:50.960 You've been canceled. And I said, what, what's going on? And all of a sudden, everything went

01:12:57.040 dead in my living room, just lights out everything dead. And I was like, wow. Okay. This is, this is

01:13:06.760 how we're doing this. Huh? Wow. Nobody. I mean, I, I talked to the show staff afterwards and they were

01:13:12.380 like, we had, we weren't told anything. We have no idea what happened. And they were left scrambling.

01:13:17.940 I mean, all of a sudden this poor show team had no idea. And they just yanked the electricity

01:13:23.520 on their anchor. Um, they had Connell McShane and, and he doesn't know what's going on. I mean,

01:13:29.600 nobody knows what's going on and they just can't even, they don't know if there was, you know,

01:13:35.060 a bomb blew up my apartment, who knows what happened. Um, but that, that was that.

01:13:39.200 Well, and you got, you've been canceled is such a loaded phrase. It could mean anything,

01:13:45.520 you know, it's like, what does it mean? Does it mean what I think it means or is it something

01:13:50.820 less bad than that? I could, cause I was, you know, the bells ringing, everything was going

01:13:55.540 and it's just like the prompter changed to that. And I, to this day, I have no idea who wrote that

01:14:02.000 from where or what, but that's what came up. And yeah, I tried to get my camera out quickly enough

01:14:07.840 to take a picture, but it was so, and then the electricity's all gone. Um, so yeah, so I went

01:14:13.160 back and I was like, well, so apparently they did not need me to do that show after all.

01:14:19.100 Right. So you call Kevin or like anybody would like, Holy shit. And then what can Kevin,

01:14:26.320 you tell me what, what happened? You say what happened after this.

01:14:29.080 Well, what I could say, Megan is, is that, so we, we continued on the process, but of course,

01:14:35.180 at that point, it wasn't just the original claims of equal pay discrimination that Melissa had raised.

01:14:41.820 Um, there were also retaliation, um, concerns that were expressed in the process. And, um,

01:14:48.840 Can you just explain the law on that? Explain the law on that.

01:14:51.800 Well, so, so generally speaking, if you make a complaint of, um, discrimination based on gender,

01:14:58.180 race, other protected categories, or if you make a complaint of discriminatory pay,

01:15:03.200 that's the kind of complaint that under the law is protected from retaliation. So you should be able

01:15:08.780 to make a complaint like that and not be fired, not be demoted.

01:15:12.180 So even if your complaint turns out to be totally baseless, you can't be fired for making the

01:15:18.340 complaint. Correct. The, the law is, is as long as the employee is making the complaint in good faith,

01:15:25.380 doesn't have to be right in the end. It just has to be something that's there. They,

01:15:29.500 they sincerely believe genuinely believed it's not contrived. Right. Um, obviously Melissa had a very

01:15:36.800 good, uh, faith belief, um, about what she was alleging. Um, and, um, so those, those, those claims

01:15:44.720 in my view, um, 100% led to her being taken off the air. And that's a rather dramatic example of

01:15:53.960 retaliation in my career about as dramatic as, uh, I've seen doing this for about 30 years.

01:15:58.840 Wow. So you're, you're saying she was canceled, taken off the air of those two shows because she

01:16:05.680 was pursuing a gender pay claim or a making an allegation against Fox news.

01:16:10.440 Yeah. Because of the, the, the complaint, internal complaint that she made and, and what she did to

01:16:16.020 pursue that without question. Which would be, if that is true, a hundred percent illegal.

01:16:22.640 Correct. And that's why the New York, um, department of labor is now currently investigating

01:16:28.660 exactly that. And we expect them to have a finding and, you know, we'll have more details on that and

01:16:34.820 can talk in, in more detail on that particular fact, but I, you know, it was, it was enough for

01:16:40.320 that type of investigation. So. Correct. And they're looking specifically make it at the retaliation

01:16:45.480 aspects of this because, um, the, based on what we described, it was so outrageous and so clear

01:16:52.280 that it warrants, uh, government looking at it, which they are. And I think, um, the results of that

01:16:57.680 will, will speak for themselves eventually. And now I want to say this, cause this, um, there was a

01:17:01.720 comprehensive story in the Washington post on June 19th, where they reached out to Fox on this

01:17:06.120 allegation and said, Fox said, quote, we parted ways with Melissa Francis over a year and a half

01:17:11.040 ago, and her allegations are entirely without merit. We have also fully cooperated with the New York

01:17:16.460 state department of labor's investigation and look forward to the completion of this matter.

01:17:22.100 Then they also said with respect to the cancellation, which would result in a few months later of you

01:17:28.340 leaving Fox altogether, quote, Fox news media regularly considers programming changes,

01:17:34.040 including to its daytime lineup and will launch new formats as appropriate after the election,

01:17:39.440 quoting a network spokesperson. And they continue, these changes are being made independent of any

01:17:45.060 other ongoing matter. So clearly Kevin, what they're trying to say is it had nothing to do with

01:17:50.300 her allegations against them. It's a normal programming change that they make in the regular course.

01:17:56.580 Right. And, and, and that of course is utter nonsense. Um, there was no ongoing program

01:18:02.280 change in the normal course. Melissa was the only person whose programming situation within that

01:18:07.640 period of time changed. Um, I think this is something again, the department of labor is looking at and

01:18:12.940 you don't not going to have to take my word for it from Melissa's word for it. We'll see what the

01:18:16.260 results of that. Um, and that will be public. So Melissa, did they, did the department of labor

01:18:20.900 ask you to go testify or, you know, give evidence in front of them? Can you speak to that?

01:18:27.460 Can I give it? Yeah. He's shaking his head. Yes. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, they, they, they

01:18:34.020 definitely wanted to, you know, pursue the details and try and, and figure out what happened because

01:18:38.340 frankly, of the circumstance that I described, I mean, you would think we were living in the seventies,

01:18:43.340 you know, it was like flashback to, you know, things that you would not think happened any longer.

01:18:49.380 And, you know, it was, was pretty startling and jarring. Um, you know, it, it, it was, I thought,

01:18:57.780 wow, it must be that they are canceling outnumbered. We're never going to see outnumbered again.

01:19:03.640 Um, you know, the, the programming, there's some massive programming change coming by the end of

01:19:09.640 the week that will fully explain why I am the only person who has suddenly disappeared, even though,

01:19:16.560 you know, my ratings were higher than the, as I said, before the show before and after me,

01:19:23.340 we use as our marker, all those kinds of things, you know, the, the, on the weeks leading up to it.

01:19:28.100 Um, you know, I was in very high demand. I was on three times a day, every single day from my

01:19:34.180 living room. They went to the expense of building a whole home studio here and getting a camera.

01:19:40.340 You know, they didn't do that for every anchor, much less the whole building.

01:19:44.020 You're hosting two shows. I mean, it doesn't sound like they didn't like you. Um, again,

01:19:49.940 for the record, there are certain things I know in these situations you can say, and you can't say,

01:19:53.460 but I'll ask you for the record, Kevin, that, um, both the LA times and the Washington post

01:19:59.160 reported. This is the headline from the Washington post June 19th piece. Fox news paid $15 million

01:20:04.360 to Melissa Francis who filed a pay disparity claim. They're claiming that the arbitration ended

01:20:10.740 in Fox paying $15 million to Melissa. Um, just my back of the envelope math would suggest if Melissa,

01:20:19.880 as they are alleging here was making around a million dollars a year, she's not quite 50.

01:20:27.440 Um, you kind of figure out what the actual damages are going to be in a situation like this. This is,

01:20:31.960 again, I'm speaking hypothetically. She's let's say, you know, women, we all get kicked out of TV when

01:20:37.340 we're 65 because we're women. So, um, that's 15 years from about 50 to 65. And that would be about

01:20:45.720 $15 million. And can you confirm that Melissa was paid $15 million by Fox? So, so Megan, I have to

01:20:52.260 respectfully say that, um, we can't comment in any way about the Washington post reporting on that

01:20:58.680 subject. And we had nothing to do with, um, that element of the story. Yeah. And I haven't run this

01:21:05.060 by Fox, but of course, you know, they, they haven't commented on the dollar figure in this piece or

01:21:09.940 elsewhere. Um, but I will say if, if it's true, the Washington post is correct. It's an enormous

01:21:15.720 number. And you could argue very, very strongly that it's an admission that something happened

01:21:21.780 that they just wanted to get rid of you and they didn't give a damn how much it took to, to do it,

01:21:28.320 given what you had done. So it's disturbing. And I can just say as your friend, I know it was

01:21:34.900 disturbing because I remember when this happened to you and it was not that long before that

01:21:39.780 moment, Melissa, that you and Ray and me and Doug, um, that the four of us all went out to our

01:21:47.120 favorite place, Elio's, and we drowned our sorrows and enormous martinis after NBC stuck the knife in

01:21:54.940 me and turned it. And we went out there and we talked about how fucked up the media businesses and

01:22:00.760 how nasty it is. And when you got this message on your camera in just the most heartless way,

01:22:09.560 after being at the company for nine years, we did it again. You know, we did it again. It's like

01:22:15.500 the, the media business. I realized there are a lot of businesses that are toxic,

01:22:20.140 but this one is in a special place, a special place.

01:22:26.520 Well, I don't know that there are a lot of industries still where you would see,

01:22:29.520 you know, this type of response and retaliation. Um, maybe it still exists in a lot of places.

01:22:35.220 I was frankly, I was frankly, just really, really shocked by that piece, especially I can say that

01:22:41.720 I have not seen anything to dissuade me from my original belief on my original math that I presented

01:22:49.680 before. And I don't know that anything has changed since I left. Um, it, it just, it's shocking. And in

01:22:59.280 this day and age, um, that, you know, companies might continue to operate in this way. And I can see

01:23:08.980 that there is such a danger to standing up and speaking out. And for me, ostensibly, you know,

01:23:18.000 people at box have said to me unsolicited, you lost your whole career standing up for women. And

01:23:27.220 you know, it, it, it is one of those things where I do, I'm started a production company. I have

01:23:36.120 projects in development. I don't think that another network would take on someone who had

01:23:44.120 gotten in an entanglement of this type potentially, or had this PR. So they do have the power to do

01:23:53.940 that for me. I doesn't bother me if I'm not on TV again, you know, that was very sincere. I took a

01:24:00.820 big financial risk. Um, there was another woman at the company who said to me, yeah. Yeah. I was just

01:24:08.200 gonna say, you weren't looking to end your career like that. That was not, you were not looking to do

01:24:12.300 that. So it's, of course you can handle it. You're a mature grownup. You're well-educated. You got a

01:24:16.420 great husband, a great living, but that does, that's beside the point. You were not looking to

01:24:21.140 end your career. And the media industry is so tight and it's such a little network, the people

01:24:27.660 who are in control that you're right. If you get a reputation as somebody who's like not going to

01:24:32.580 toe the line, you're, you're done, your career's done. So, and, and by the way, things may or may not

01:24:39.700 have changed. Right. So it's like, well, it's, it's so aggravating. Cause it's like, well,

01:24:43.920 what, what for, right. What did I do this for? That's the chilling effect. I mean, that's what,

01:24:49.120 that's where you get your bang for the buck, so to speak. If you are the person who is,

01:24:53.880 who, if you're the company that's doing this, because, you know, no matter what comes out afterwards,

01:24:59.000 people inside may believe that it was true or not, but they all saw and commented on the fact

01:25:05.280 that I disappeared from the air and they don't want to be disappeared. So even if they believe

01:25:10.900 anything that's going on inside is true, that's what retaliation, that's why there is,

01:25:15.880 you know, a group within the department of labor that's specifically out there looking for retaliation

01:25:20.560 because it's not about what happened to me. It's about all the people still inside who are thinking

01:25:28.140 about it and are like, I think she was right, but wouldn't dare raise their hand in this new company

01:25:35.260 that's run by women and wouldn't dare raise their hand because they're like, I saw someone else get

01:25:41.880 disappeared and they know that I was cooperative, well-liked, had good ratings. You know, there's,

01:25:49.060 there's nothing you can come up with to say why. I mean, Lord knows if there was something in my file,

01:25:54.380 they would have already put it out there. I would have read about it in the papers for sure.

01:25:59.600 Can I ask you a question in Fox's defense? Let me ask you a question in Fox's defense since

01:26:02.520 they're not, they don't, they're not here. And this is based on my own personal experience. As you

01:26:07.460 know, you know, I was a female in the primetime lineup of Fox and before that in the midday lineup

01:26:12.700 and before that in the morning lineup. And I will say my own personal experience was they were always

01:26:18.180 very generous. And this is during the Roger era. And my final contract was offered to me by the

01:26:22.660 Murdochs, not Roger. But it was always very generous. And I actually know for a fact that I was making more

01:26:29.140 than most of my male colleagues. And that my last contract that was offered to me was definitely

01:26:33.980 bigger even than O'Reilly's because as soon as I left, he went and begged them for it and they gave

01:26:39.080 it to him and he wouldn't last much longer. But it, my experience with them was my being a woman was in

01:26:46.200 no way an impediment to them paying me very, very well. Um, I, I mean, I think you mentioned at one

01:26:52.780 point you told me that, you know, something similar had been said to you about, you know, why men would make

01:26:58.400 more within the building, but obviously, right. You, you proved them wrong. I mean, as usual,

01:27:02.660 you're a superstar. Roger once said something about somebody having a family to support and

01:27:07.680 that's why they were getting more. But I think Megan, you're you, I mean, to your credit. And,

01:27:12.420 and also, you know, I got the idea of talking for myself because that was something you had always

01:27:17.220 done as well and not had the agent in between you. I think as usual, you're a superstar and you're

01:27:22.140 an outlier. I mean, I'm sure it's serious. You make more than I don't want to stir up any trouble,

01:27:26.080 but you know, it's, it's just, um, all I can say is that I looked up and down the dial

01:27:34.000 from before the sun rose to all the guys at night and compared everybody up and down.

01:27:44.480 And no matter how I did it, there was no scenario at the time based on the knowledge that I had,

01:27:50.360 where it was, there was no scenario as a lawyer, as a lawyer. I mean, I've done these cases too,

01:27:56.140 and I know you're an employment lawyer. So this is not unusual to have one earner, like

01:28:00.780 exceptions to a problematic trend. Exactly. Megan. So, um, it is totally common in these kinds of

01:28:08.880 cases for an employer to be able to point to one or two, um, specific cases where, um, you know,

01:28:15.300 that if it's a, uh, gender based, um, claimed or women have been treated well, or if it's a race

01:28:20.180 based claim where, um, um, black employees have been treated well in terms of salary, what have

01:28:25.500 you. Um, but that's not the standard, right? Everyone is entitled to equal treatment. Everyone's

01:28:30.400 entitled to equal pay. So it's not an answer under the law to say that, Oh, well, we have a couple of

01:28:35.700 examples of people who are treated in a non-discriminatory way. It has to be across the board.

01:28:39.780 Yeah. Oh my gosh. It's like, I, I was thinking about this, Melissa, cause I was thinking a lot

01:28:45.880 of the people in this audience are going to be Fox fans and they may not be big on gender pay.

01:28:50.880 You know what I mean? Like the general instinct is like, ah, shut up. You know, well, you know what

01:28:55.900 I'm saying? Right. So, but I do have to talk about it. We have to be able to talk about it.

01:29:00.820 I do. I mean, the thing for me was, um, I just wanted to be paid what was fair,

01:29:06.020 not a dollar more or not a dollar less, you know, with any public company,

01:29:09.880 when it's time for them to do the press release about earnings. Oh my gosh, we're doing so great.

01:29:16.120 We have so many new customers, blah, blah, blah, blah. Then when it comes time for the union to

01:29:20.540 renegotiate for the talent, for who had the labor, um, they say, Oh my gosh, we're turning out the

01:29:26.060 couch cushions on outnumbered to collect change, to pay the lighting bill. So it's very normal for a

01:29:31.520 company to try not to pay. I was trying to come up with for myself, being an economics person,

01:29:37.800 proof, like a logical reason why I should get a raise. I was trying to find the math

01:29:43.120 of why this didn't make sense to me. I presented to them without emotion,

01:29:48.240 the math of the situation with men and women. And I even said, I don't know that this is true.

01:29:55.080 Again, I'm getting this right. It's a gossipy agents and lawyers and they keep this secret for a

01:30:01.320 reason. Yeah. And so I said, um, I just, you know, and, and, you know, a couple of times where

01:30:06.900 someone said, what is it that you really want? And I'm what's fair, not a penny more, not a penny

01:30:13.880 less. You know, I, I, I just want parody with the people who I anchored to show on both channels.

01:30:22.720 That's an unusual talent because on the financial channel, you have to have a lot of background and

01:30:27.440 knowledge on that specific thing. They don't just, I know it's just like Fox news channel.

01:30:31.020 Once you go down that path, like the, I feel like the overall stats are what's persuasive.

01:30:35.040 Cause if you start to be like, I make less than this guy, it's like, well, yeah, the audience

01:30:38.860 responds better to him or like, you know, he's funnier or whatever, you know? So it's like TV

01:30:43.240 is such an, I don't know. It's like, no, I agree. Like Roger used to go by his gut. Right. So you can't

01:30:49.200 argue with that. But if you look at the stats of all the women against all the men and the case

01:30:54.000 law shows this, that's an okay way of doing the analysis. Um, and it comes up vastly disparate.

01:30:59.680 That's a problem for the company. Let me ask you this. Cause we're running in time. How are you

01:31:04.340 now? Like you have other projects going, how are you feeling? And was it worth it?

01:31:11.940 Um, that's a tough question. It caused a lot of, um, it was really, it was hard on my family.

01:31:22.100 Um, and it was really hard on my kids. They didn't know what happened. And, um, so I, it was

01:31:32.180 it's, I loved my job. You know, I didn't, I did not want to leave. I never thought that that was

01:31:41.320 where we were headed. I guess I was naive. Um, I did, I have a friend who's a major executive at

01:31:48.420 another broadcast company and she's has done the three 60 review with the consultant to make sure

01:31:55.420 they aren't open to lawsuits. I, I really did not think it was going to blow up. I was not

01:32:01.280 negotiating. I was trying to figure it out and get what was fair. I didn't feel like what I was getting

01:32:09.060 was fair. And I didn't think that was an outrageous thing. I didn't think I was starting

01:32:13.320 a crazy, huge blowout by just asking for what was fair and being willing to accept. Like if she had

01:32:21.200 said you're wrong, your numbers are wrong. No, you're already making, no, who are you talking

01:32:26.940 about? She just confirmed, you know, when I said this one, this one, she just confirmed everything

01:32:32.220 that I had, Diane Brandy. She confirmed it over and over again. And at that point, when somebody says

01:32:37.360 to you, I'm doing something to you, that's illegal and fuck you, you're going to like it. That's it's

01:32:43.740 like a whole, you're like, what? You know what I mean? That's what my whole life changed in that one

01:32:49.140 conversation, her response, that one conversation, my whole entire life changed forever because I'm not

01:32:57.940 the kind of person that can just sit there and, and let that go on across the company. I wasn't going to

01:33:06.680 do it. Whether I lost everything or not, I wasn't going to do it. And you didn't. And now they'll

01:33:13.320 deal with the department of labor and that will be a public finding. And we'll, we'll hear what

01:33:18.260 their response is when, when we finally have a conclusion there. Melissa, great to talk to you,

01:33:24.300 my friend, Kevin, thanks for coming on too and keeping her safe and, uh, to be continued, right lady,

01:33:30.040 come back on the next time. We'll talk about the news. Love to. All right. I want to tell you,

01:33:34.540 um, I think I told you earlier, if you go to megankelly.com, you can sign up for my Friday

01:33:39.160 email to you. It's from me to you week's news stories and some highlights from the show. And

01:33:43.800 you can also email me there. Um, it's Megan, M E G Y N at megankelly.com. We've gotten so much

01:33:52.060 feedback about our piece on Blake Barklage, which we aired on Monday, the 17 year old son of my friends

01:33:57.640 who died suddenly of, of myocarditis last October. We're coming up on the one year anniversary.

01:34:04.600 And I just want to give you a sample. Laura emails in Megan. I bike commute to school every day

01:34:10.680 and I rarely have to pull over while listening to your podcast today. I did. I literally felt like

01:34:16.300 you were speaking directly to me, helping me in my own grief. I'm attaching my own son's obituary

01:34:21.420 from last month. I'm a very private person. I've never emailed a host of a show before,

01:34:25.500 but I needed to share it with you. Now I stand here by my bike crying feeling for the family

01:34:31.200 you highlighted on the show. Thank you for helping me get to know that I need to let others help and

01:34:37.260 hug those kids of yours. Laura, thank you for that email. And thanks to all of you for participating in

01:34:42.780 this show online. And otherwise, don't forget to tune in next week. It's our two year anniversary

01:34:47.780 week. We have some really great shows with you, Ben Shapiro and others. Have a great weekend.

The Megyn Kelly Show - September 23, 2022

Growing Up in Hollywood, the Brutal Media Business, and Her Exit From Fox News, with Melissa Francis ｜ Ep. 397

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