Comedian and former late-night talk show host Craig Ferguson is reflecting on his much-buzzed-about decision to refrain from making jokes about Britney Spears some 19 years ago, noting he believed his job may have been on the line as a result.
Appearing on the Daily Beast’s “Obsessed” podcast over the weekend, Ferguson was asked about his Feb. 19, 2007, monologue on “The Late Late Show,” in which he urged viewers to find comedy in “attacking the powerful,” including members of Donald Trump’s family, rather than “vulnerable” individuals like Spears, who appeared to be in the throes of a mental health crisis.
“What surprises me about that monologue is that I thought I would get fired … but I didn’t care,” he said. “My late-night show is much bigger now than it was when I was doing it. And when I did that, I thought, ‘They’re going to shit-can—they’ll never renew my contract after this.’ But I thought, ‘Fuck it, I just don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t want to do it this way.’ And I didn’t.”
As for his name-dropping of Trump, who was still years away from entering the political sphere, Ferguson recalled, “He was someone who was in a position of power, who could handle that kind of attack.”
Watch Ferguson’s Feb. 19, 2007, monologue below.
“I was using him as an example of someone who was powerful, as opposed to Britney, who was clearly someone who was powerless at the time, and obviously the distinction between the two,” he said. “So I don’t think it was a particularly an attack on Trump. What it was was using him as an example.”
Ferguson’s monologue has been rediscovered in recent years by legions of Spears’ fans, many of whom may not have understood the implications of his words when the show originally aired, as the discourse surrounding her personal and professional woes has evolved. He now says his decision to exclude jokes about the pop icon coincided with his own 15-year sobriety anniversary.
“You can make jokes about anything you want. I can’t make jokes about this,” he said. “I don’t want to do that … I didn’t want to just run blindly after every subject, every joke, everything.”
“The Late Late Show” ended its 10-season run in December 2014, just short of two years before Trump was first elected president. These days, Ferguson can be seen as the host of the celebrity.land series “American on Purpose,” on which he explores modern American identity with Tiffany Haddish and Jay Leno, among other guests.
Elsewhere in his “Obsessed” chat, Ferguson said he was grateful he doesn’t have to be concerned with being targeted by Trump as Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel have.
“I like to think I would somehow have managed to navigate through it,” he said, “but I’m not sure I would have.”
Watch Ferguson’s “Obsessed” interview below. His comments on Spears can be found around the 17:52 mark.
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