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Celebrities living in a bubble has never been more entertaining! Join us as we count down the talk show moments that left viewers cringing at the sheer disconnect from reality. From Tom Cruise's psychiatric meltdown to billionaires who can't fathom everyday life, these interviews reveal what happens when fame, wealth, and ego collide with basic self-awareness.
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00:00How about to the future?
00:02And for both of our futures, who knows what they hold?
00:05Who knows?
00:06Welcome to WatchMojo.
00:08And today we're counting down our picks for the interviews that left viewers wondering,
00:11what planet are these people on?
00:13You know, Scientology is something that you don't understand.
00:17It's like you could be a Christian and be a Scientologist.
00:21Number 20. Larry King and Danny Pudi don't see eye to eye on luxury.
00:25A luxury you can't live without.
00:28A luxury I can't live without coffee.
00:31I really like good coffee.
00:33It's not a luxury you can get in anywhere.
00:35I guess, yeah, I like good coffee.
00:37I love coffee.
00:39When the legendary Larry King asked community star Danny Pudi what luxury he couldn't live without,
00:43he expected a Hollywood answer.
00:45Private jets, yachts, designer goods.
00:47Instead, Pudi replied,
00:49I like nice socks.
00:51Socks?
00:52Your socks would you put in your shoes?
00:55Yeah, I really love them.
00:56I like kind of like, you know, cozy feet.
00:58The veteran CNN host looked baffled.
01:00The generational and financial disconnect was instant,
01:03with Pudi's increasingly bewildered answers causing King to break into laughter.
01:07The moment went viral years later as an unintentional commentary on perspective.
01:11One man's luxury is another's baseline.
01:14That's not a luxury though.
01:16Coffee and socks are not a luxury.
01:17Alright, give me a luxury.
01:18What luxury should I have?
01:19Private plane.
01:20Larry, I'm on DuckTales and Mythic Quest.
01:25There's no private planes for me.
01:28Pudi's sincerity contrasted King's old school materialism, creating an awkward but oddly endearing cultural snapshot.
01:35It wasn't cruel or scandalous, just a perfect accidental display of how wealth skews our understanding of enough.
01:41Favorite superhero?
01:43Favorite superhero?
01:44Uh, probably Batman.
01:47Yeah, me too.
01:48Yeah.
01:49Because he didn't fly.
01:50He's got this humanity to him, right?
01:51Yeah.
01:52He's like you and I, you know?
01:53He struggles with allergies.
01:54And it was the dark side.
01:55Yeah, yeah.
01:56Bruce Wayne, money.
01:57Oh, money.
01:58Evil.
01:59Right?
02:00And then like cool gadgets.
02:01I don't like cool gadgets.
02:02He was a techie.
02:03Number 19.
02:04Bobby Flay complains that no one cooks for him.
02:07You must get invited to a bunch of summer barbecues, right?
02:09I do.
02:10Yeah.
02:11And you go and-
02:12Actually, you know what?
02:13I don't.
02:14I just realized I do not get invited.
02:16People don't want to cook for me.
02:17So I have to invite all my friends over to my house.
02:19That's really what happens.
02:20Would you cook for me?
02:21I would totally cook for you.
02:22What would you cook for me?
02:23A hamburger.
02:24Even world class chefs crave a little appreciation.
02:27But Bobby Flay's gripe about dinner invites was a recipe for backlash.
02:31On The Tonight Show, Flay lamented to host Jimmy Fallon
02:34that people never bring food to his parties
02:36because they're intimidated to cook for him.
02:38Jon Hamm actually took your seat.
02:40But I don't want to talk about him.
02:42I want to talk about his wife, Anna.
02:43Do you know Anna?
02:44I love him.
02:45She's amazing.
02:46And whenever she comes over, she always brings dessert.
02:48So she made this like sour cherry crisp for everybody.
02:51It was absolutely spectacular.
02:52But she was the only one that brought food.
02:54Everybody else is like, feed me, Bobby.
02:55Let's go.
02:56He meant it as self-deprecating humor.
02:58But the subtext landed differently.
02:59A wealthy celebrity chef complaining that his guests don't serve him.
03:03It was the culinary equivalent of no one buys me gifts anymore.
03:06While it wasn't malicious, it underscored a broader truth about fame.
03:09When everyday gestures feel beneath you, you've already lost the plot.
03:13I would ask you for a little help, probably.
03:15Yeah, well.
03:16I wouldn't let you just stay away from the grill.
03:17You know, Jimmy, there's two kinds of guys in the world.
03:19Guys that can grill and guys that think they can grill.
03:22That encompasses every guy in the United States.
03:24Which guy do you think I am?
03:25Which guy are you, Jimmy?
03:26Number 18.
03:27Kim Kardashian won't remove her own coffee cup sleeve.
03:30Obviously, people are interested in your life and the things that you do and they write things.
03:35Sometimes they're true, sometimes they're not.
03:37And I have some things that are kind of interesting I want to run by you and you tell me if they're true or false.
03:41Okay.
03:42You mind? All right.
03:43In 2024, Kim Kardashian confessed on Jimmy Kimmel Live that she despises the sound and texture of cardboard coffee sleeves so much that she has someone else remove them for her.
03:52The crowd laughed nervously, unsure if she was joking.
03:55She wasn't.
03:56You have someone take the Starbucks sleeve off your coffee because you hate the sound of cardboard.
04:01And I, yes, that's true. And I hate the feeling.
04:04Is that a, like, is that somebody's only job?
04:07What began as a quirky personal tidbit quickly became a viral shorthand for celebrity detachment, outsourcing discomfort down to the most trivial task.
04:17In a world where most people don't even have time to savor their morning coffee, hearing a billionaire describe tactile ick as an ordeal hits a nerve.
04:25It wasn't the worst scandal of her career, but it was easily one of her most telling.
04:29Whoever I'm with, I just can't see it being done or I can't hear it and I can't feel it.
04:34Like, the cardboard getting moved off of the cup is like nails on a chalkboard to me.
04:41Wow.
04:42Yeah.
04:43So when the Amazon delivery driver comes, do you, like, run upstairs?
04:48Number 17.
04:49Drew Barrymore crosses the picket line.
04:51I wanted to own a decision so that it wasn't a PR protected situation.
04:59And I would just take full responsibility for my actions.
05:03During the 2023 WGA writer's strike, Drew Barrymore reignited controversy when she resumed production of the Drew Barrymore show without writers.
05:11And soon after issued a tearful video apology.
05:14She prefaced her remarks with, I believe there's nothing I can do or say in this moment to make it okay.
05:19Acknowledging the backlash.
05:21There are so many reasons why this is so complex.
05:29And I just want everyone to know my intentions have never been in a place to upset or hurt anyone.
05:41Barrymore explained as she wanted to put her arms around the situation, but her public goodwill had taken a critical hit.
05:47The clip circulated widely, reframing what might have been a moment of goodwill into one of performative guilt.
05:53Her reversal, including postponing future episodes and apologizing to writers and unions, underlined how quickly the narrative had turned.
06:00I deeply apologize to writers.
06:03I deeply apologize to unions.
06:06I deeply apologize.
06:08Number 16, Ellen DeGeneres compares quarantining to prison.
06:12So if you're feeling down, I want to lift you up.
06:14If you're feeling trapped, I want to set you free.
06:17During the early days of COVID lockdown, Ellen DeGeneres decided to lighten the mood.
06:21Broadcasting from her sprawling California mansion, she joked that quarantining was.
06:26This is like being in jail is what it is.
06:28It's mostly because I've been wearing the same clothes for 10 days and everyone in here is gay.
06:33The jokes that I have.
06:35The joke bombed instantly. Viewers struggling with layoffs, illness and isolation saw the remark as a cruel snapshot of celebrity privilege.
06:43For years, Ellen had cultivated an image of empathy and relatability. This was the crack in the facade.
06:49It was devastating. It was because it started with me. It started with attacks on me and attacking everything that I stand for and believe in and built my career around.
06:59The backlash was swift and the clip resurfaced later amid allegations about her show's toxic workplace.
07:04A throwaway quip became an unofficial epitaph for Ellen's brand of performative kindness.
07:10I am a kind person. I am a person who likes to make people happy. I am a people pleaser. You know, this is who I am.
07:20Number 15. Elizabeth Warren is blindsided by Stephen Colbert.
07:24If you can't get rid of the filibuster, what about and just hear me out here and try to hear this objectively.
07:30I'm ready.
07:31What if we just get rid of the Senate and I'm 100% serious here?
07:38Even seasoned politicians can stumble under the spotlight.
07:41During a 2019 appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Senator Elizabeth Warren was caught off guard when Colbert unexpectedly asked if she supported abolishing the U.S. Senate.
07:50The audience laughed. Warren didn't.
07:53What possible positive purpose the United States Senate provides right now?
08:00Wow.
08:02Look.
08:05I hear you.
08:08Her awkward pause and attempt to reframe the question made for excruciating television, a moment where preparation collided with spontaneity.
08:17Here's what we provide, in theory, is that we are supposed to be the deliberative body. That was what we envisioned. But so long as we are tangled in the filibuster, then we don't get to do what the founders envisioned that we would.
08:35Colbert's smirk said it all. The senator wasn't ready to go off script. While hardly scandalous, the exchange became a viral clip for its humanizing discomfort, showing how even the most media-trained public figures can falter when the conversation strays one inch past the talking points.
08:49So, a Senate with a filibuster? It's a serious question. Why are we there?
08:56Number 14. Gwyneth Paltrow doesn't know what Marvel movie she was in.
09:00What is this TV show for?
09:02We don't know.
09:03Nobody knows. You don't know.
09:04We don't really know. It's like, I started just filming. We were actually doing it when we were filming Spider-Man.
09:09That was the first time. We just brought a film crew with us down to Atlanta, and we cooked at the Optimus.
09:13Spider-Man?
09:14Well, yeah, we were in Spider-Man together. Remember we were on Spider-Man?
09:17Even Marvel's actors sometimes lose track of the timeline. But Gwyneth Paltrow took it to another level. While cooking with actor-filmmaker Jon Favreau on his Netflix show, Paltrow casually revealed she didn't realize she'd appeared in Spider-Man Homecoming.
09:29We weren't in Spider-Man.
09:30Yes, we were.
09:31Homecoming.
09:32You were in Spider-Man?
09:34No.
09:35Yeah.
09:36I was in Avengers.
09:37No, you were in Spider-Man also.
09:38She'd filmed her scene opposite Tony Stark, and assumed it was just another Iron Man movie. Favreau's stunned reaction said it all.
09:45The internet erupted with memes, mocking her aloofness, and the disconnect between A-listers and the franchises that made them billionaires.
09:52For fans, it crystallized the essence of celebrity detachment. When your paycheck's so big you forget what film it's for, maybe you've officially transcended the concept of caring.
10:01Remember Spider-Man at the end, and Tom Holland's there, and you're gonna walk out and do a press conference, and I give you the ring?
10:08Oh, yes.
10:09That was Spider-Man.
10:10That was Spider-Man?
10:11Oh, my God.
10:13Number 13. Star Jones quits The View on air.
10:16Something's been on my heart for a little bit, and after much prayer and counsel, I feel like this is the right time to tell you that the show's moving in another direction for its tenth season, and I will not be returning as co-host next year.
10:34Daytime television thrives on unpredictability, but Star Jones took it too far.
10:39After weeks of rumors about her future on The View, Jones blindsided both her co-hosts and the network by announcing her departure live on air without warning producers.
10:48It's been the most amazing nine years of my entire professional and personal life.
10:53Barbara, I want to thank you for giving me the opportunity of a lifetime to sit at this table and sit with you guys.
11:00My co-hosts Joy and Elizabeth and my Meredith in absentia.
11:05We have a lifetime of memories together.
11:08A lot of fun.
11:09The awkward tension was instant.
11:11Barbara Walters looked visibly stunned, and Joy Behar cracked an uneasy joke.
11:15Behind the scenes, ABC executives had planted a quieter exit.
11:18I'm not sure what the future holds, but I'm absolutely sure who holds the future.
11:24And I thank you very much.
11:26Instead, they got a daytime detonation that played out in real time.
11:32What could have been a graceful transition became a televised power move, a reminder that talk shows, no matter how polished, are still governed by human ego, emotion, and surprise.
11:42Barbara Walters, did she have, we showed the clip earlier, did she have words with you after that day that you fatefully announced that you were leaving the show live on the air and caught a lot of people by surprise?
11:53It was the best moment.
11:56Really?
11:57You, you love it.
11:58Sipping that tea.
11:59Oh my God.
12:00Number 12, Aziz Ansari defends performing in Saudi Arabia.
12:04This is something that's become a big part of the news because people, a lot of comedians especially, are very upset because this is, the people who paid the comedians to come to this are not good people.
12:15They are, it's a pretty brutal regime.
12:17They've done a lot of horrible, horrible things.
12:20And so people are questioning why you would go over there.
12:24In 2025, beleaguered comic Ansari joins the Riyadh Comedy Festival, a government backed event held just a few years removed from the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
12:34When pressed about the decision by Jimmy Kimmel, Ansari justified it by saying comedy should go everywhere.
12:39I have an aunt that lived there for a while and I talked to her about this and she said, you know, there's people over there that don't agree with the stuff that the government's doing.
12:49And to ascribe like the worst behavior of the government onto those people, that's not fair.
12:54His defense struck many as evasive, sidestepping human rights concerns in favor of career diplomacy.
13:00Critics accused him of moral compartmentalization, choosing access and a considerable payday over ethics.
13:07This is a very young country.
13:08Half the country is under the age of 25 and things can really change.
13:11And to me, like a comedy festival felt like something that's pushing things to be more open and to push a dialogue.
13:18And you kind of have to make a choice of whether you're going to isolate or engage.
13:22While Ansari might have seen the event as apolitical, audiences did not.
13:26In an era when entertainers face pressure to take stands, the interview revealed how even progressive comedians can sound out of touch when empathy collides with global PR calculus.
13:36So many people were there talking about stuff.
13:38And I hope people see that and they go, wow, this was really great.
13:42And I want more of this, not just in comedy, but in everything to push things to be more open and to have the ability to say what we want and to have dissent and all this stuff.
13:51And hopefully it's a step in that direction.
13:53Number 11, Bill Gates fails to guess grocery prices.
13:57There is rice-a-roni right there.
14:00The San Francisco treat, of course.
14:03How much do you think rice-a-roni would be within a dollar?
14:06Mmm, five dollars.
14:09The audience didn't like that.
14:12Let's see.
14:13Oh, it's a dollar.
14:15Look, what a bargain.
14:17I'll take five.
14:18I know.
14:19Even billionaires can have blind spots, but few have been exposed as memorably as Bill Gates.
14:24In 2018, The Ellen DeGeneres Show invited Gates to play a guess that price game with everyday supermarket items.
14:30As you probably could have guessed, his guesses were painfully off.
14:33Okay.
14:34Tide Pods.
14:35You've been hearing a lot about those lately.
14:37What do you think?
14:38Four dollars.
14:40No, no.
14:43They want me to go higher.
14:44Yeah.
14:45Let's go with ten.
14:46Ten.
14:47Ten dollars.
14:48Alright.
14:4919 dollars and 97 cents.
14:53It's expensive to do laundry.
14:55The audience laughed, but the moment revealed just how disconnected extreme wealth can make someone from basic reality.
15:00Gates smiled through it, but the online reaction was brutal.
15:03A man worth billions couldn't fathom the cost of groceries.
15:06It was awkward, absurd, and deeply symbolic.
15:09The billionaire guessing game no one really won.
15:12How do you feel about this?
15:13This is TGI Friday's frozen spinach and artichoke dip.
15:17It's eight ounces.
15:18Eight ounces.
15:19It's branded.
15:21You know, you guys think less than ten dollars?
15:25Yes.
15:26Yes, we do.
15:27Yes, we do.
15:30Yes, we think it is less.
15:32Number ten.
15:34Paris Hilton Hawks NFTs.
15:36Last time you were on the show, I asked you to explain NFTs.
15:40And you did so in a great way, which is a very hard thing to really explain to a lot of people.
15:45But since then, Forbes has named you one of the 50, top 50 most influential people in the NFT space.
15:52So congrats on that.
15:53Sometimes, a segment ages like milk.
15:56At the height of the NFT craze of the early 2020s, The Tonight Show turned into a late-night infomercial when Paris Hilton joined Jimmy Fallon to gush about their matching bored apes.
16:05They giggled through awkward applause, compared their digital art, and told viewers they could get one too.
16:11The audience didn't bite.
16:12But this is, uh, you have a new NFT.
16:15You have one being released soon.
16:17Uh, we have it here.
16:19What can you tell us about this?
16:20Um, well, it's an NFT series that I'm doing with super plastic and releasing on Origin Protocol.
16:26And then I made another piece by hand.
16:29It took me six months.
16:30And it's a collage of all of my memories with Carter.
16:34And it's called my forever fairy tale.
16:36Within months, NFTs had crashed.
16:39And the clip went viral again as the embodiment of tone-deaf celebrity capitalism.
16:43Two millionaires trying to sell cartoon monkeys to middle America was never going to land well.
16:48Fallon later moved on.
16:49Hilton doubled down.
16:50But for many, the moment marked the precise instant late-night TV jumped the crypto shark.
16:55Well, if you love it so much, I actually want to give you the first one.
17:00I will be honored.
17:03And I want to give one to everyone in the audience.
17:06Everyone gets an NFT.
17:08Yes, everyone.
17:09Everyone gets an NFT.
17:10That, come on.
17:11I think that's the first NFT giveaway in television history.
17:16We love you.
17:17Iconic.
17:18Paris Hilton.
17:19Number nine, Joaquin Phoenix's bizarre Letterman appearance.
17:23You know, it's been three years since the last time you were on the show.
17:26And I will just say right off the top here, you look different than I remember you.
17:31You've got a nice beard going?
17:33Oh, yeah.
17:35How is that, the beard?
17:36In my way.
17:38Well, is it comfortable?
17:39Is it itchy?
17:40Are you pleased with it?
17:42I'm okay with it, but now you're making me feel weird about it.
17:46When Joaquin Phoenix appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman in 2009, audiences
17:50didn't know they were watching performance art.
17:52And neither did Letterman.
17:53In character for director Casey Affleck's mockumentary, I'm Still Here, Phoenix arrived
17:57in dark sunglasses and a full beard, mumbling one-word answers and refusing eye contact.
18:19A visibly bewildered Letterman tried to salvage the interview, but the vibe was off the charts awkward.
18:24The bit was later revealed as deliberate method acting, but it left viewers squirming and Letterman fuming.
18:29The stunt blurred the line between satire and self-importance, proving that sometimes, the
18:56only person laughing at an art project is the artist himself.
18:59And Joaquin, I'm sorry you couldn't be here tonight.
19:06He's funny, you're funny.
19:09He's a funny dude.
19:11Number 8.
19:12Jimmy Kimmel mocks Megan Foxe's uncomfortable situation.
19:15The first time I ever worked with him, actually, I had just turned 15 and I was an extra in Bad Boys 2.
19:22Really?
19:23Yeah, they were shooting this club scene and they brought me in and I was wearing a stars
19:28and stripes bikini and a red cowboy hat.
19:31In 2009, Megan Foxe told Kimmel about being over-sexualized as a teenager on the set of
19:36Transformers, including being asked to dance in a bikini under a waterfall at age 15.
19:41Kimmel juggled and joked about it as the audience laughed along.
19:44Years later, the clip resurfaced during the hashtag MeToo era and was rightly put on blast.
19:49Michael, she's 15, so you can't sit her at the bar and she can't have a drink in her hand.
19:54So his solution to that problem was to then have me dancing underneath the waterfall getting soaking wet.
20:02And that's...
20:03Perfectly wholesome?
20:04At 15, I was in 10th grade.
20:06Wow!
20:07That's sort of a microcosm of how Bay's mind works.
20:10Yeah.
20:11What had once been treated as a punchline was now recognized as a disturbing admission of Hollywood's predatory culture.
20:16The laughter, the dismissiveness, all of it underscored how normalized exploitation was in the 2000s.
20:22Kimmel later apologized, but the damage was done.
20:25The segment aged like a masterclass in obliviousness.
20:28Well, that's really a microcosm of how all our minds work.
20:31But some of us have the decency to repress those thoughts and pretend that they don't exist.
20:37Number 7.
20:38Sharon Osbourne's employee faces life or death.
20:41And then I think, right, where is that of an assistant?
20:47So I go into the guest house and he's going, everything alright?
20:51You know, and I'm like, no, house is on fire, get out, help, go in and get the paintings out.
20:57It's what a personal assistant's number one job, go into a burning building and get the art out.
21:02On a British panel show, media personality and Ozzy Osbourne's longtime spouse, Sharon, told what she thought was a funny story.
21:08Her home caught fire, so she sent her assistant back inside to save artwork.
21:12And when he didn't laugh about it later, she fired him.
21:15He was like humming and hawing this ex-assistant.
21:19So anyway, he did get the dogs and so the fire engines arrived.
21:24Very lovely people.
21:25And then they came and they had this oxygen for the assistant.
21:29So then I said to him, how very dare you.
21:34The audience's laughter quickly turned uneasy as they realized she wasn't joking.
21:38The tale painted a grim picture of how far removed the rich can be from reality.
21:42A woman sending an employee into danger for material possessions, then punishing him for not sharing her sense of humor.
21:48I don't see what's funny about any of this.
21:51And he said, I think I'm gonna have damaged lungs.
21:54And I mean, please.
21:56So then, if you don't think that's funny, do you think this is funny?
22:03And he goes, what?
22:04I said, you're fired.
22:06You used the word fired?
22:08The backlash was swift and justified.
22:11In trying to demonstrate her eccentricity, Osborne accidentally revealed her entitlement.
22:15Sharon, were you telling the truth or were you telling a lie?
22:19Well, the answer is, it's true.
22:24Number six, Kelly Osborne asked Trump who will clean his toilets.
22:29There are a lot of Latinos here in this country that do agree that the immigration problem is a problem,
22:36and it does need to be addressed and it does need to be fixed.
22:39Interesting.
22:40But making those comments, those racist comments, do not help.
22:44During a 2015 episode of The View, Sharon's daughter Kelly tried to criticize Donald Trump's anti-immigrant rhetoric
22:50and ended up doing the opposite.
22:52While Osborne clearly had good intentions, her misguided attempt at advocacy fell flat,
22:56and the studio audience fell silent.
22:58If you kick every Latino out of this country, then who is going to be cleaning your toilet, Donald Trump?
23:04Oh, that's…
23:05In the sense that…
23:06You know what I mean?
23:07Like, when I'm saying that…
23:08There's more…
23:09There's more jobs to be…
23:10In LA, they always…
23:11But Latinos are not only the only people doing that.
23:13No, I didn't mean it like that.
23:14Come on.
23:15Co-host Rosie Perez called her out on the spot, and Osborne awkwardly backpedaled.
23:19It was a case study in performative allyship gone wrong.
23:22A privileged person trying to sound progressive while reinforcing the very stereotypes she meant to condemn.
23:27The gaffe followed her around for years as one of daytime TV's most uncomfortable mic drop moments.
23:32I'm okay with people calling me whatever they want to call me.
23:35However, I'm not okay that I hurt people's feelings.
23:39And it was my poor choice of words, and it doesn't reflect my opinion at all,
23:44and I do not want to be brought into this political nightmare.
23:48And I don't quite understand how it got this big considering, like, Rosie and I are really good friends.
23:54Number 5.
23:55Bill Maher uses a racial slur.
23:57I've got to get to Nebraska more.
24:00You're welcome.
24:01We'd love to have you work in the fields with us.
24:03Work in the fields.
24:05In 2017, real time with Bill Maher crossed the line on HBO.
24:10When Republican Senator Ben Sasse invited Maher to work in the fields,
24:14Maher responded with a jaw-droppingly insensitive quip.
24:17The audience gasped, then laughed nervously.
24:20Within hours, the backlash was nationwide.
24:22DeRay McKesson, a Black Lives Matter activist, tweeting,
24:25Bill Maher has got to go.
24:27There's no explanations that make this acceptable.
24:30Tara Setmayer, a political analyst, is a frequent guest on Maher's shows.
24:35I think it was an unfortunate remark that he thought would be a funny joke that went wrong on the fly, and it was inappropriate.
24:43Critics accused Maher of weaponizing a slur for shock value, while defenders claimed it was satire gone wrong.
24:49Maher apologized, but the damage was irreparable.
24:52The moment exposed a chronic issue in comedy, when privilege convinces someone they're immune from consequence.
24:57It wasn't edgy. It was arrogant.
25:00HBO kept the show, but Maher's reputation for smug self-righteousness was far from rehabilitated.
25:05Maher releasing this written statement of apology.
25:08Friday nights are always my worst night of sleep because I'm up reflecting on the things I should or shouldn't have said on my live show.
25:15Last night was a particularly long night, as I regret the word I used in the banter of a live moment.
25:21The word was offensive, and I regret saying it, and I'm very sorry.
25:26Number four, Jimmy Fallon tousles Donald Trump's hair.
25:30Can I mess your hair up?
25:35With America on edge, owing to a contentious upcoming election, Jimmy Fallon made a fateful choice to humanize Donald Trump.
25:42Inviting the Republican presidential candidate on The Tonight Show, Fallon giggled, cracked jokes, and tousled Trump's famously stiff hair to prove it was real.
25:50The answer is yes, but the people in New Hampshire where I'm going to be in about an hour from now, I hope they're going to understand.
25:56You say yes?
25:57Go ahead, with my hairspray.
25:59Critics saw the moment as late night comedy, abandoning accountability, treating authoritarian politics like a sketch bit.
26:16Fallon insisted he wasn't political, but that was the point. He didn't need to be.
26:20The clip quickly became a cultural artifact of media complicity, a symbol of how laughter can sanitize genuine danger.
26:26Years later, Fallon still calls it his biggest regret.
26:29Number three, Ellen forces Mariah Carey to reveal her pregnancy.
26:33Leave it to Ellen DeGeneres to turn gossip into cruelty.
26:57When Mariah Carey appeared on The Ellen Show, she dodged questions about pregnancy rumors.
27:02Ellen, undeterred, brought out champagne, insisting Carey drink to prove she wasn't expecting.
27:07Mariah, visibly uncomfortable, pretended to sip, and Ellen pounced.
27:11I'm not going to ask you if you're pregnant or not.
27:12I'm just going to say.
27:13This is peer pressure.
27:14You see what Ellen is doing?
27:15This is peer pressure.
27:16No.
27:17Let's toast to you not being pregnant.
27:20If you're not pregnant, then we should.
27:21Oh my goodness.
27:22I can't believe that.
27:25Why would we toast to that?
27:29The audience roared.
27:30Carey smiled through gritted teeth.
27:32Weeks later, she miscarried.
27:34In hindsight, the moment is unbearable.
27:36An intimate boundary violated for ratings.
27:39Once hailed as harmless mischief, it's now viewed as emblematic of DeGeneres' manipulative streak.
27:44For many, it marched to the exact point where the Be Kind brand curdled into something darker.
27:49Performative empathy masking control.
27:51It's too early for me.
27:53I only drink it after 3pm.
27:56Yeah.
28:02You're pregnant.
28:03You're pregnant.
28:05Number two, Bill Maher's cowards comment after 9-11.
28:08We have been the cowards.
28:10Lobbing cruise missiles from 2,000 miles away, that's cowardly.
28:15That is a cowardly.
28:16Staying in the airplane when it hits the building, say what you want about it, not cowardly.
28:21Longtime media buyer Bill Konigsberg says three of his clients, Geico Insurance, Boston Market and International House of Pancakes, also bailed out of politically incorrect.
28:31Six days after the tragic September 11 attacks, Bill Maher used politically incorrect to make a point that ended his show.
28:38Responding to President Bush calling the hijackers cowards, Maher said that America itself had been cowardly in its overseas war efforts and implied that the attackers had exercised a certain bravery in their decision to literally go down with the ship.
28:50The heightened sensitivity about clients and advertisers being extremely careful as the environment that they're going to put their shows in has given the advertiser a lot more leverage in the marketplace in terms of how their dollars are allocated, where their dollars are allocated, and in many, many cases even getting involved with content discussions.
29:13Advertisers fled overnight, and ABC canceled the show. Even those who defended free speech admitted Maher's phrasing was disastrous, intellectual contrarianism devoid of empathy.
29:23The episode lives on as a case study in how detachment masquerading as bravery can destroy credibility.
29:29A dozen ABC affiliates dropped politically incorrect in the last two weeks. That further hurts ABC's cash flow.
29:36They're not getting the revenue, and then if the show stays on for a long period of time and the affiliates don't carry it, and you have more affiliates that bail out of the show, they're going to lose that time slot.
29:47Before we continue, be sure to subscribe to our channel and ring the bell to get notified about our latest videos.
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30:02Number one, Tom Cruise blasts psychiatry.
30:07It's very impressive to listen to you because clearly you've done the homework and you know the subject.
30:11And you should. And you should do that also because just knowing people who are on Ritalin isn't enough.
30:17Maybe you saw this one coming, but it's arguably the out-of-touch talk show moment to end them all.
30:22In 2005, Tom Cruise sat down with Matt Lauer on Today and unleashed a tirade against psychiatry, antidepressants, and Brooke Shields' postpartum depression treatment.
30:31I've never agreed with psychiatry, ever. Before I was a Scientologist, I never agreed with psychiatry.
30:39And then when I started studying the history of psychiatry, I started realizing more and more why I didn't agree with psychiatry.
30:44The rant was meant to project conviction. It came off as cultish condescension. Viewers watched a global superstar lecture the public on medicine with the fervor of a true believer.
30:53Matt, you have to understand this. Here we are today where I talk out against drugs and psychiatric abuses of electric shocking people against their will, of drugging children with them not knowing the effects of these drugs.
31:10Do you know what Adderall is? Do you know Ritalin? Do you know now that Ritalin is a street drug?
31:15Within days, Cruise was lampooned everywhere from South Park to The Onion. It wasn't just awkward, it was catastrophically cringe-worthy.
31:22One televised meltdown turned Hollywood's Oscar-nominated Golden Boy into a seemingly permanent punchline.
31:28And if you understand the history of it, it masks the problem. That's what it does. That's all it does.
31:34You're not getting to the reason why. There is no such thing as a chemical imbalance in a body.
31:40So postpartum depression to you is kind of a little psychological gobbledygook?
31:45No, no, I did not say that.
31:47I'm just asking, what would you call it?
31:48No, no, Matt, that is, now you're talking about two different things.
31:52Which Out of Touch Celebrity moment had you cringing the hardest? Be sure to let us know in the comments below.
31:57So, let us know in the comments below.
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