Kathy Lee Gifford asks Martin Short about his deceased wife by accident (VIDEO)

Kathy Lee Gifford had a major slip-up while interviewing Martin Short, who appeared on the Today Show Wednesday to promote his new movie "Madagascar 3," Time Magazine reported.

Gifford, making small talk with Short about his family, asked about his wife Nancy Dolman…obviously unaware that she had passed away of ovarian cancer in 2010, the Los Angeles Times reported. 

"And he and Nancy have one of the greatest marriages of anybody in show business. How many years now for you guys?" asked Gifford, who co-hosts the morning talk show with Hoda Kotb.

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"Um … we've been married 36 years," Short responded, without pointing out the gaff.

Gifford went on to ask if the couple was still in love, and Short continued to answer without correcting Gifford. 

At a break in the interview, Short let Gifford know that she had tripped up, and she apologized on-air, The Celebrity Cafe reported. 

"I feel so badly," she said. "So, my apologies to him and his family for not, um, realizing that."

This is not Gifford's first on-camera faux-pas, however. 

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The talk-show host made a similar cringe-inducing mistake when interviewing James Taylor on her old show with Regis Philbin in 1997, Entertainment Weekly reported.

She asked the musician about his brother Alex, to which Taylor replied “I wish I could say he was doing well. Alex died about four years ago.”