Bad interviews happen.
Sometimes celebs are just having an off day,
or they grow tired of the same questions — or
even spill info they shouldn't be sharing.
Whatever the case may be, these stars all
opened their mouths and inserted their feet
during interviews — and it cost them big,
in terms of their careers.
Megan Fox
In 2009, Megan Fox told Wonderland Magazine
of her Transformers director Michael Bay,
"[Bay] is like Napoleon and he wants to create
this insane, infamous mad-man reputation.
He wants to be like Hitler on his sets, and
he is."
Calling him "a nightmare to work for," she
continued,
"He has no social skills at all.
He's vulnerable and fragile in real life and
then on set he's a tyrant."
"Sam?"
"Michaela!"
"Is that your girlfriend?"
"Ex."
As a result of her flippant remark, Fox was
fired from Transformers: Dark Side Of The
Moon, and was exiled to cameos and small roles
in Friends With Kids and This Is 40.
It wasn't until she apologized to Bay that
she was allowed to star in his Teenage Mutant
Ninja Turtles franchise.
Bay later told GQ that it was actually Steven
Spielberg who demanded that Fox be fired,
but he added that she may not have been the
most professional actress on set, alleging,
"She was in a different world, on her BlackBerry.
You gotta stay focused.
And you know, the Hitler thing.
[...] I wasn't hurt, because [...] Megan loves
to get a response.
And she does it in kind of the wrong way."
He then added,
"I'm sorry, Megan.
I'm sorry I made you work twelve hours.
I'm sorry that I'm making you show up on time.
Movies are not always warm and fuzzy."
Katherine Heigl
Knocked Up put Katherine Heigl on the map,
and the movie was well-received…by everyone
but Heigl, it seemed.
In January 2008's Vanity Fair, Heigl griped
that the movie was "a little sexist."
She said,
"It paints the women as shrews, as humorless
and uptight, and it paints the men as lovable,
goofy, fun-loving guys.
It exaggerated the characters, and I had a
hard time with it [...] I'm playing such a
b---h; why is she being such a killjoy?
Why is this how you're portraying women?"
That comment, combined with her remarks about
the writing in Grey's Anatomy, as well as
her reputation for being difficult to work
with, led the actress to bit parts and a cat
litter commercial before the failed State
Of Affairs and Doubt.
Heigl later lamented to Howard Stern that
Vanity Fair published only a portion of her
Knocked Up remarks, saying,
"That can be the nature of broad comedy.
They're exaggerating stereotypes, that's what
makes it funny.
But they just took the sexist thing out."
John Mayer
John Mayer's reputation never fully recovered
after his February 2010 Playboy interview,
and his single charting hasn't either.
Mayer told the mag he hoped to someday write
adult films and claimed ex-girlfriend Jennifer
Aniston was, quote, "hoping it goes back to
1998."
He also made a remark about only dating white
women, and at one point, he even dropped the
n-word.
His most infamous remarks, though, were about
his ex, Jessica Simpson.
Comparing being intimate with her to using
drugs, he said,
"It was like napalm, sexual napalm."
Implying that Simpson had made him, quote,
"want to quit the rest of [his] life," in
addition to a slew of other un-reprintable
sentiments.
Tannenbaum recalled of their meeting,
"When I met [Mayer] in the kitchen of his
L.A. home he was talking about not talking
anymore: 'I think the world would be better
off if I stopped doing interviews.'"
He might be right about that.
R. Kelly
Journalist Touré interviewed R. Kelly in
2008, just as the singer was starting to get
heat for his alleged predilection for
girls.
In their sit-down, Touré asked the singer
outright if he liked teenage girls, to which,
Kelly replied,
"When you say teenage, how old we talking?
"Girls who are teenagers."
Kelly then nodded, but denied being attracted
to anyone, quote, "illegal".
When Touré asked about the concerns raised
by Kelly's manager and his brother regarding
his interactions with young girls, Kelly said,
"Unfortunately, the people who don't work
for me say that […] Do not listen to the
people who [were] fired."
Touré later wrote in The Daily Beast of the
bad interview,
"The interview aired on BET once because as
soon as Kelly's team saw it they demanded
that it never be shown again.
But that one airing set the world on fire.
It's crazy to have Aziz Ansari do a bit where
he's talking about R. Kelly and you."
"First question the guy goes, 'Now Robert,
are you attracted to teenage girls?'
[...] R. Kelly goes, "Define teenage.'"
Paula Abdul
In January 2007, ahead of the sixth season
of American Idol, judge Paula Abdul wobbled,
swayed, and slurred through an interview,
which went viral almost instantly.
"What do Idol fans have to look forward to
this season and what are you looking forward
to seeing?"
"Well... is THAT what it is?!"
She later explained of the incident that she
had been doing a series of press junkets,
saying,
"You're in that one little room and you're
looking at one camera and there are 30 cities
talking into your ear."
"Right, exactly."
She denied any alcohol or drug use, explaining
it as:
"I guess it was Alabama was in my ear and
so was Seattle at the same time, so I'm answering
questions to the wrong answers of the cities."
The Fox affiliate that conducted the interview
corroborated Abdul's explanation, saying,
"Rather than getting angry about these difficulties
[...] Paula forged ahead and decided to have
fun with the increasingly challenging situation.
Unfortunately, because reporters and viewers
were unaware of the situation, her humor was
misconstrued."
Two years later, Abdul failed to negotiate
a new American Idol contract, and her loopy
reputation stuck for years until she nabbed
a judging role on So You Think You Can Dance
in 2013.
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