It was “a mistake” to tell CNBC in an interview last year that linear TV assets “may not be core” to the company, Disney CEO Bob Iger said in a new podcast interview.

“I wasn’t wrong in my observation, but I didn’t need to say those words publicly because it caused an incredible amount of fear,” Iger said during an interview on Let’s Talk Off Camera With Kelly Ripa. “I should have been more sensitive to how those words would not only be interpreted, but how they would be felt by people who are really important to me, who are even Disney Legends.”

Iger explained his thought process as he approached his July 2023 appearance on CNBC, which came as the company was in the midst of major cost-cutting, restructuring and strategic planning. “I wanted to give Wall Street in general an open mind about our business going forward, and I wanted them to know — this was after I came back to Disney — that my head was not in the sand,” he said, echoing reflections he shared last fall at the New York Times DealBook conference. To show he was “a realist” and “not in denial,” Iger recalled, he decided to say that “everything is on the table. … That was a mistake, as it turned out.”

The podcast interview was largely a synergistic, lifestyle-oriented conversation, held at ABC headquarters in New York, where Ripa tapes the daily morning talk show Live with Kelly and Mark. The conversation touched on topics like Iger’s favorite cheese (mozzarella), artists on his personal music list (country singer Zach Bryan is among them) and whether his physical appearance at 73 is in any way “medically induced,” in Ripa’s words. (“No medically induced” procedures, Iger responded, aside from two hips and a knee that had to be replaced. “A lot of it is genes and a lot of it is taking care of myself.”) Iger also touched on familiar ground, such as his brief consideration of a presidential run in the 2020 race and the state of the current succession process, which he called “a huge priority.”