Real Time with Bill Maher guests - Friday, April 16, 2021

[Rhiannon12866]

Real Time with Bill Maher continues its 19th season Friday, April 16 (10:00-11:00 p.m. live ET/tape-delayed PT), with a replay at 12:05 a.m., exclusively on HBO.

This week features a one-on-one, in-studio interview with Sharon Osbourne, television personality and former co-host on CBS' The Talk.

This week's in-studio panel discussion will include Ian Bremmer, president of geopolitical risk firm Eurasia Group and GZERO Media and host of GZERO World on PBS; and Rosa Brooks, law and policy professor at Georgetown School of Law and founder of the Transition Integrity Project. She is the author of Tangled Up In Blue: Policing the American City and How Everything Became War and the Military Became Everything.

[Rhiannon12866]

1. Here's what the Sharon Osbourne interview is about:

Sharon Osbourne to Speak with Bill Maher in First Interview Since Exiting The Talk After Scandal

Sharon Osbourne is readying to give her first interview following the controversy that led to her departure from The Talk.

Osbourne, 68, will go one-on-one with Bill Maher on Friday's episode of Real Time with Bill Maher, HBO announced Wednesday.

[snip]

Following an 11-year run on The Talk beginning in 2010, CBS announced at the end of March that Osbourne would no longer be a part of the popular daytime series. Osbourne's exit follows her heated exchange with co-host Sheryl Underwood on the show's March 10 episode, during which she defended the controversial comments her pal Piers Morgan made about Meghan Markle and her March 7 tell-all with Oprah Winfrey.

Morgan, 56, left his role at ITV's Good Morning Britain after declaring he didn't believe the allegations Markle, 38, made regarding the mental health struggles and experiences of racism she endured while serving as a senior member of the royal family. Underwood argued that the former America's Got Talent judge's defense of Morgan seemingly "gave validation" to his controversial comments about Markle, but Osbourne disagreed.

"I feel like I'm about to be put in the electric chair because I have a friend who many people think is racist, so that makes me a racist," Osbourne said, to which Underwood responded by noting that she didn't believe that her colleague is racist.


More: https://people.com/tv/sharon-osbourne-to-speak-with-bill-maher-in-first-interview-since-exiting-the-talk-after-scandal/

[question everything]

2. Thanks, again, for posting. PBS is having Beethoven in Beijing, so will have to see

[Rhiannon12866]

3. Well, the show is also repeated numerous times

[nolabear]

4. I seldom watch The Talk but happened to see that episode. It was jaw-dropping for daytime TV.

I admit I've had a soft spot for the Osbornes. They're one of those weird TV families that have made me laugh more than once while wincing. I'm not much of a canceller so am curious as to what will follow a blow-up like they had on The Talk.

Unfortunately they missed a very good opportunity for the people who'd had the actual argument--and it was a doozy for typically homogeneous daytime TV--to come back together and talk about what had happened, how they had reacted, what the thought was behind each side and Sharon's reaction to being challenged. She seemed to panic and attack, in my opinion uncovering some bias she had been, and apparently needed to be, in denial of. She said some things that Sheryl struggled to contain as she went further off the rails.

Then they were done, the hour was up, and they all panicked (producers, etc.), went off the air, she either quit or was fired and allowed to say she quit, everyone went off and talked to others about it, and about her apparent past objectionable statements, and they just couldn't do the incredibly difficult work of trying to use a godawful situation as a way to create dialogue. Who knows whether any of them were willing. It's hard to say "I've been so privileged I got away with saying things that I thought I could get away with but I'm willing to learn." Perhaps she's not. And that's too bad.

Now Maher. This sounds dreadful. He's become such an extraordinary asshole that I cannot imagine why she would dig that hole deeper, but then fame is a liar in so many ways. It'll tell you you're right when you're being an idiot or an ass, and when you believe that, you're in huge trouble.

Ick. But I'll likely watch, and in the end that seems to be the only real goal.

[Boomerproud]

5. It will be all about "political correctness " and "cancel culture".

I'll pass.