12:47 a.m. ET, March 21, 2019
Why John Hickenlooper took his mom to see an X-rated movie
John Hickenlooper, the Democratic former governor of Colorado, went into great detail on Wednesday evening explaining the time he took his mother to see an X-rated movie at a theater in the 70s.
The awkward moment started with a question from CNN's Dana Bash. She brought his memoir in which he talked about seeing an X-rated movie with his mother. Bash then let him have the floor.
The movie, Hickenlooper said, was "Deep Throat" —the X-rated film that turned into a pop culture phenomenon after its release in 1972.
Hickenlooper said he had left for college and had returned home to visit his mother for Thanksgiving.
"And I got home for Thanksgiving and we thought it was a little naughty but we didn't think it was that bad. You've got to understand I was 18 years old," he said.
She had this huge dinner laid out, he explained. And so he promised:
"Jed we'd go to the movie theater and see this new movie, you want to come? And it's an x-movie, and I was sure she wouldn't say no, and I made a mistake. And she said I'd love to go because she didn't want to be left alone in the house again. So I took my mother to see 'Deep Throat.'"
He admitted his mother was "mortified" at the first scene, and so he told her they should leave, but she said no -- she paid for a ticket.
"I said repeatedly, 'I think we should leave, I think we would should go.' And my mother was someone who rarely went to a movie. She thought almost every movie would get on TV, obviously not this one. When she paid, she was going to stay. And at the end she knew I was humiliated. And as we drove home and you know how the dashboard in the old cars had a kind of green light, and I asked her, I said, 'That was some experience,'" Hickenlooper said.
"And she goes, 'I thought the lighting was very good in the movie.' I thought I saw a little grin in that green light," he added.
See the moment: