Live TV has gifted us more than a few awkward moments.
When cameras are rolling, Hollywood drops the glitz and glamour and gets real - sometimes,
too real.
Though you can thank JT and Janet for NBC's five-second delay, live TV can get a whole
lot worse than an accidental curse word.
From Raven-Symoné's workplace policy to Joaquin Phoenix's legendary Letterman interview,
these live TV moments are so uncomfortable you can't help but keep watching.
While we all know some things are better left unsaid, these celebs said it anyway.
Naya Rivera's shower habits
Naya Rivera has had a lot going on, including her called-off engagement to Big Sean, her
surprise wedding to actor Ryan Dorsey, and her eventual divorce - which she later called
off.
Along with a domestic battery arrest, a secret abortion, and her lifelong struggle with anorexia,
you've got a proper media firestorm.
When she's not busy publicly labeling her husband a "pushover," she's throwing caution
to the wind on live TV and firing off some rather racially-charged ideas.
In a 2015 episode of The View, Rivera revealed:
"I think that white people shower a lot more than ethnics.
I feel like showering more than once a day or every day is such a white people thing."
Rivera admitted, as a person of mixed-race, she showers "once or twice every three days."
Unsurprisingly, a lot of people found her comments offensive, and the actress later
apologized.
Kelly Osbourne's toilet talk
In an August 2015 episode of The View, Kelly Osbourne shared her stance on Donald Trump's
immigration policy.
The lavender-haired starlet asked,
"If you kick every Latino out of this country, then who is going to be cleaning your toilet,
Donald Trump?"
Latina co-host Rosie Perez threw Osbourne some pretty fierce side-eye, as Osbourne struggled
to back-peddle.
Osbourne eventually apologized on Extra, where she said,
"It was my poor choice of words, and it doesn't reflect my opinion at all, and I do not want
to be brought into this political nightmare."
Too late, Kelly.
Kathie Lee Gifford's insensitive questions
In his memoir, comedian Martin Short described losing Nancy Dolman, his wife of 36 years,
as the most awful thing he's ever been through.
And he admitted to still regularly having conversations with her long after she passed
away from ovarian cancer in 2010.
But in 2012, when Short stopped by Today, Kathie Lee Gifford complimented Short on his
long, happy marriage.
And it was clear she had no idea that Dolman had passed away two years prior.
"But you're still, like, in love."
"Madly in love, madly in love."
"Why?"
"Cute, I'm cute."
Short managed to keep his composure and harbors no hard feelings towards Gifford for the mix-up,
telling E! News,
"On live television, people make mistakes.
There's no ill-will intended.
It's nice to aspire to be kind of elegant."
Gifford tweeted an apology after realizing her error, but our hearts still break for
Short.
Raven-Symoné's workplace policies
Remember when Raven-Symoné was a fresh-faced Disney channel darling?
If only real-life Raven could've seen into the future...
Since Raven-Symoné joined The View as a full-time co-host in 2015, she's frequently come under
fire for her views on race.
She told Oprah that she doesn't identify as "African American" and also argued that Harriet
Tubman didn't deserve to be on the twenty dollar bill.
Then, the former Disney star admitted on live TV that she supports workplace discrimination
if someone's name is sounds too ethnic, saying,
"I'm not about to hire you if your name is Watermelandrea.
It's just not going to happen.
I'm not going to hire you."
The actress eventually issued a public apology where she admitted to being the victim of
workplace discrimination on numerous fronts.
Joaquin Phoenix… being Joaquin Phoenix
In 2008, Joaquin Phoenix quit acting, grew out his beard and kinda became a rapper.
After a few disastrous performances and public appearances, it was revealed that the two-year
mental breakdown was completely staged for the mockumentary I'm Still Here.
Of course, Phoenix's fake descent into madness wouldn't be as infamous had it not been for
his appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman.
It was so uncomfortably full of awkward pauses that Letterman joked,
"What can you tell us about your days with the Unabomber?"
Phoenix later apologized, and Letterman shrugged it off during a follow-up appearance.
"But I apologize, I hope I didn't offend you in any way."
"Oh no, oh no no no no.
I was not offended!"
But the general public wasn't so keen on his fake mental breakdown.
Phoenix told the Daily Mail,
"There was definitely a period after I'm Still Here when there was a discernible difference
in the quality of movies I was being offered."
Kanye's callout
These days, Kanye West regularly gets friendly social media nods from President Trump, wears
"Make America Great Again" swag, and has publicly claimed slavery was a choice.
But during a 2005 Red Cross telethon, as the rapper helped raise money for Hurricane Katrina
victims, he famously announced,
"George Bush doesn't care about black people."
West later apologized to George W. Bush because he, quote, "didn't have the grounds to call
him racist."
Miley's third-wheel beef
Miley Cyrus and Nicki Minaj used to be pretty friendly.
The pair even posed together in a 2013 studio snap and sat next to each other at the 2015
Grammys.
Then Cyrus told The New York Times that Minaj wasn't very nice.
Cyrus was responding to a minor beef between Minaj and Taylor Swift.
Minaj tweeted that her song "Anaconda" was snubbed by the VMAs in favor of women with
"very slim bodies," and Swift assumed the tweet was about her, when it wasn't.
They cleared things up, and all was well in the pop world - until Cyrus opened her mouth.
The feud played out on live TV during the MTV VMA's when - after her win - Minaj said,
"Back to this b---h that had a lot to say about me the other day in the press: Miley,
what's good?"
Minaj later told MTV she felt Cyrus should have been more sensitive about black issues
if she wanted to enjoy the culture.
The two reportedly buried the hatchet in 2017.
Jamie Foxx's transphobic joke
While he was hosting the 2015 iHeartRadio awards, Jamie Foxx opted for a roast-like
monologue that took aim at Suge Knight for his hit-and-run murder charges.
But what came next was a whole lot worse.
"We got Bruce Jenner, will be here doing some musical performances.
He's doing a his-and-her duet all by himself."
At the time, Caitlyn had yet to make her Vanity Fair debut and the only evidence of her lifelong
struggle with gender dysphoria were tabloid rumors and a new hairstyle.
Afterwards, Foxx didn't just suffer the unyielding wrath of the Internet.
The Kardashian clan also joined in, with both Khloé Kardashian and Kanye allegedly expressing
their disappointment in Foxx's low blow, which he insisted was not transphobic.
"They made a name up, 'transophobia' or something.
I didn't even know what that was."
Tom Cruise's judgy interview
In 2005, famous Scientologist Tom Cruise went on Today to debate the merits of modern psychiatry.
"I've never agreed with psychiatry, ever.
Before I was a Scientologist, I never agreed with psychiatry."
In the interview, the star famously dubbed psychiatry a "pseudoscience," slammed Brooke
Shields for using antidepressants to treat her postpartum depression, and claimed,
"There is no such thing as a chemical imbalance."
Cruise later apologized to Shields for calling the fact that she treated her depression with
doctor-prescribed medicine "irresponsible."
He also apologized to Matt Lauer for the off-the-rails interview.
Samuel L. Jackson is not Laurence Fishburne
Laurence Fishburne is a sci-fi superstar who has been in The Matrix, Passengers, and Event
Horizon.
Samuel L. Jackson is an action legend who starred in Pulp Fiction and The Hateful Eight.
One taught us the difference between red and blue pills, while the other got those motherf-----g
snakes off the motherf-----g plane.
They are not the same dude, and they look nothing alike.
But KTLA news reporter Sam Rubin learned this the hard way when he asked Samuel L. Jackson
about his Super Bowl commercial.
"Did you get a lot of reaction to that Super Bowl commercial?"
"What Super Bowl commercial?"
The problem was that Jackson didn't do a Super Bowl commercial - Laurence Fishburne did.
Jackson quipped,
"You're as crazy as the people on Twitter.
I'm not Laurence Fishburne!"
The following Monday, Rubin apologized, admitting it was an embarrassing "amateur mistake."
Later that year, Fishburne lamented to The Guardian that he's been confused with Jackson
for the last 25 years.
As for the live TV snafu, he didn't take offense - but thought it was pretty funny that Jackson
called Rubin out.
"We don't all look alike.
We might be all black and famous but we all don't look alike."
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