She was a music industry trailblazer and her gruff, no nonsense ways eventually landed
her a spot on ABC's daytime chatfest, The Talk.
But was her personality problematic elsewhere?
This is the shady side of Sharon Osbourne.
Sharon Osbourne landed in the hot seat when she tweeted her defense of Piers Morgan after
he walked off the set of Good Morning Britain due to heated discussions over his public
scrutiny of Meghan Markle.
Osbourne supported her friend by tweeting,
"[Piers Morgan] I am with you.
I stand by you.
People forget that you’re paid for your opinion and that you’re just speaking your
truth."
Osbourne's public support of Morgan led to her co-host on The Talk, Sheryl Underwood,
confronting Osbourne in a segment on the show, and things quickly escalated.
Osbourne rapidly put up her defenses and said,
"I'm not trying to slide out of this one.
I don't know, tell me.
What has he uttered that's racist?"
She also warned Underwood,
"And don't try and cry because if anyone should be crying, it should be me."
After the intense exchange, CBS told People in a statement,
"We are committed to a diverse, inclusive and respectful workplace [...] All matters
related to the Wednesday episode of The Talk are currently under internal review."
Due to the investigation, The Talk was put on hiatus.
Things remained complicated, however, as People reported,
"CBS has extended The Talk hiatus for a second time as the network continues to look into
Sharon Osbourne's behavior."
Just days after the announcement of The Talk's extended hiatus and review, journalist Yashar
Ali published allegations against Sharon Osbourne that painted a very different behind-the-scenes
picture than the generally affable roundtable discussion that makes it to air.
Ali spoke with multiple show sources, including former co-host of The Talk, Leah Remini, who
verified that she heard Osbourne using derogatory slurs about not only Remini herself, but also
former The Talk hosts Julie Chen and Sara Gilbert.
Remini said of her time on The Talk,
"[It was a] toxic environment [...] [I was] easily manipulated into a web of high school
vitriol, hatred and bullying."
She told Ali,
"Not only did I do nothing about the racism and bullying I was receiving and witnessing,
I was party to it."
Osbourne's publicist, Howard Bragman, issued a denial statement and seemed to specifically
refute Remini's claims, saying,
"For 11 years Sharon has been kind, collegial and friendly with her hosts as evidenced by
throwing them parties, inviting them to her home in the UK and other gestures of kindness
too many to name."
After two weeks of hiatus and internal review, the powers that be announced on March 26,
2021,
"Sharon Osbourne has decided to leave The Talk."
In a statement, CBS said,
"As part of our review, we concluded that Sharon’s behavior toward her co-hosts during
the March 10 episode did not align with our values for a respectful workplace."
Several days after her on-air blow-up with Sheryl Underwood, Osbourne let loose on The
Talk producers in an interview with Entertainment Tonight, saying,
"Sheryl turns around and asks me this question and [...] she was reading it off a card.
It wasn't on my cards [...] and I'm like, 'I've been set up.'
They're setting me up.
My anger was like, I cannot believe this, I'm your sacrificial lamb."
Osbourne apologised to Underwood and told Entertainment Tonight,
"I wish we could go on and have [an] adult conversation calmly and work it out but I
don't know whether we can [...] I don't know whether I'm wanted there."
CBS refuted Osbourne's notion that there was any kind of plan from show producers to "blindside"
her on the air, and said in a statement,
"We’re also very mindful of the important concerns expressed and discussions taking
place regarding events on The Talk.
This includes a process where all voices are heard, claims are investigated and appropriate
action is taken where necessary."
When co-host Sara Gilbert left The Talk in 2019, she revealed,
"This is something that I have been struggling with for a while, and going back and forth,
but I’ve decided that it’s time for me to leave the show at the end of this season."
"I obviously love it here, and like I said, this was extremely difficult."
However, not all co-hosts have had such a positive experience on the show, especially
when Sharon Osbourne was allegedly involved in their exit.
Former co-host Holly Robinson Peete tweeted about her experience leaving The Talk after
one season, and alleged,
"I’m old enough to remember when Sharon complained that I was too 'ghetto' for [The
Talk] [...] I bring this up now [because] I was mortified watching the disrespectful
condescending tone she took [with] her co host who remained calm & respectful."
In journalist Yashar Ali's exclusive report, former co-host Leah Remini backed up Robinson
Peete's claims, and alleged that Osbourne, in fact, tried to get Robinson Peete booted
from the show before she ever appeared on it.
Ali also pointed out that Osbourne even told Howard Stern in 2011 that she felt neither
Robinson Peete nor Remini were a good fit for the show.
Additionally, when co-host Marie Osmond announced she would also leave the show after only one
season for personal reasons, Page Six reported, per an insider,
"Marie Osmond was ousted from daytime show The Talk after fellow hosts Sharon Osbourne
and Sheryl Underwood went to CBS execs and threatened to quit unless Osmond was canned."
In a blanket denial of the many allegations in Ali's report, Osbourne's publicist, Howard
Bragman, said,
"The only thing worse than a disgruntled former employee is a disgruntled former talk show
host.
[...] Sharon is disappointed but unfazed and hardly surprised by the lies, the recasting
of history and the bitterness coming out at this moment."
There's always so many weird Hollywood stories floating around in regards to celebrities
treating their assistants like non-humans that they can often be swept under the rug.
That wasn't the case for Sharon Osbourne though, as she willingly spoke out about her cringe-worthy
treatment of a former assistant on BBC's Would I Lie To You?
On the game show, Sharon spoke of a time when a fire started in her living room, after husband
Ozzy Osbourne and herself left a candle burning unattended.
During the fiery chaos, the couple forced Ozzy's former assistant to go back into the
house to try and retrieve both their dogs and their expensive artwork amid the blaze.
"And I said, 'You must go in and find the dogs.'"
Osbourne also laughed about taking an oxygen mask off of the assistant while he was being
treated by medics, as she revealed,
"I took the mask, and I put it on my dog."
She ended the tale by telling everyone that the assistant was fired shortly after the
incident for not having a sense of humor about the whole thing.
"You're fired."
After public outcry, Sharon changed her story on an episode of The Talk, saying that she
was only joking about firing this assistant, and that he was actually let go 15 years later.
Sharon Osbourne spent several seasons as a judge on The X Factor, alongside the equally
outspoken Simon Cowell.
Speaking with The Honest AF Show, Osbourne held nothing back in her criticism of Cowell,
bluntly stating,
"Simon doesn't have an ability to see individuals.
He doesn’t like people who are overweight.
Seriously!
That’s why he turned down Jennifer Hudson, that’s why he wouldn’t champion her on
[American Idol].
But it’s the truth.
He’s very dated."
After announcing her decision not to return to The X Factor in 2018, Osbourne shared some
choice words in a chat with Howard Stern for both the young contestants on the show and
her former colleague, Cowell.
"I don't have to have those kids singing in my face [...] They all suck.
It is like, 'Hey, is this f------ karaoke or what?"
Osbourne saved her harshest feedback for Cowell, and said,
“[Simon] loves to be on TV […] he’ll do whatever he has to do to get that f------
fat face on TV […] I like Simon, he’s been very good to me, but he’s a f------
pain in the arse.”
It's certainly a difficult task to try and unpack the relationship between Sharon Osbourne
and her rocker husband, Ozzy Osbourne.
One thing that Ozzy has been honest about with fans is his struggle with alcoholism
and drug addiction.
According to Variety, as of February 2021, Ozzy Osbourne had been sober for about seven
years, after experiencing relapses and many trips to different rehabilitation facilities.
In 2016, Ozzy confessed to Us Weekly,
"Over the last six years, I have been dealing with a sex addiction [...] I am mortified
at what my behavior has done to my family.
I thank God that my incredible wife is at my side to support me."
According to The Sun, Sharon revealed that she'd gone too far while trying to expose
her husband's affairs.
She said,
"I was a broken woman.
He sent me an email that was meant for one of his women.
[...] Then he took his sleeping pills.
I put an extra two in his drink [...] and asked him everything, and everything came
out.
[...] Then, six months later, I found out it wasn’t and there were others."
Even if you never tuned into their show, MTV's The Osbournes became such a phenomenon in
the early 2000s that Sharon and Ozzy Osbourne and their kids, Kelly and Jack, became widely
recognized around the world.
Apart from the TV brood, Sharon and Ozzy actually have another child, an eldest daughter named
Aimee.
Sharon revealed on an episode of The Talk,
"I know my eldest girl, Aimee, left home at 16 and she couldn't live in our house because
we were filming and it drove her insane."
"I mean, I understand how she felt.
It was chaos."
In the same interview, Sharon went on to say,
"She felt, too, that she didn't want to grow up on camera.
She hated the idea, it was appalling to her.
[...] And so she left at 16 and I regret every day that she did."
Although Sharon did say that she regrets the alienation of Aimee, some might point out
that she still chose to star in a reality TV show over the well-being of one of her
children.
Aimee, it should be noted, hasn't changed her mind.
In 2015, she told Rolling Stone,
"I don't think I will ever cross-contaminate my private life and my family life with my
public and professional worlds.
For me, nothing's more important than having a very clear boundary between the two."
People have been discussing Ozzy Osbourne biting the head off of a live bat while onstage
with Black Sabbath for almost four decades now.
But it would seem that he's not the only member of the family doing slightly weird and disturbing
things.
Sharon Osbourne visited The Late Late Show with James Corden in 2015 and told quite the
story of her own.
With giggles throughout, Sharon spoke of how she has since grown up, but when her children
were little, she would have them go to the bathroom in a blue Tiffany's box and then
proceed to send them in the mail to people she didn't like.
She even told the crowd how her son Jack pleaded with her and said that he didn't want to have
to help make her disgusting postal items anymore.
It's hard to imagine the mental toll these types of gifts could take on a small child.
Sharon Osbourne and husband, Ozzy Osbourne, have had quite the tumultuous marriage, with
Ozzy even speaking out about the night he attacked his wife during a drug-induced stupor
in a documentary titled Biography: The Nine Lives Of Ozzy Osbourne.
In the fall of 2017, the world learned that Ozzy had been having multiple affairs throughout
his marriage to Sharon.
She spoke to The Telegraph and confirmed,
"There wasn't just one woman; there were six of them [...] He had women in different countries.
Basically, if you're a woman giving Ozzy either a back rub or a trolley of food, God help
you."
The rock star even had a longstanding four-year affair with his hair stylist, Michelle Pugh.
Infuriated by the revelations and wanting to defend her mother, Kelly Osbourne took
to Twitter to publicly call out Pugh as she wrote,
"Anyone looking for cheap chunky LOW-light and blow out [...] call."
Among other choice words, she even listed a phone number, which presumably belonged
to Pugh, and has since been disconnected.
Obviously, sharing someone's personal information is a dangerous online intimidation tactic
known as "doxing."
Despite this, Kelly also continued fighting online critics of her behavior, at times slinging
even more questionable insults.
When asked about her daughter's Twitter outburst over her husband's affair on an episode of
The Talk, Sharon simply stated,
"Oh, Kelly has the best sense of humor ever.
What can you do but laugh?
You have to laugh.
And she's just so funny."
We're not sure that laughing off this type of online harassment is the way to go.
But honestly, we're just glad Kelly didn't reach for a Tiffany box during all of this.
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