Being a provider of entertainment also sets up a company for a lot to go wrong.
There are so many people working on so many shows that something is bound to break along
the way.
Here are all the times ABC made the news for scandal and controversy.
ABC News debuted Good Morning America in 1975, but it didn't really challenge NBC's Today
until the late 1980s, with the hosting duo of Joan Lunden and Charles Gibson.
In 1997, Lunden announced her departure from the show she'd co-hosted for 17 years, but
which had "trailed NBC's Today show in the ratings for 88 weeks," per the Los Angeles
Times.
Lunden told the newspaper she’d been offered several scripts, indicating a move into acting,
although she also signed a third book deal around the time of her exit and there were
rumors of a syndicated talk show.
Ultimately, though, Lunden said she wanted to spend more time with her three young children.
Less than a year later, per The New York Times, Gibson left Good Morning America too, after
more than 10 years.
The real reason for the switch-up, according to Lunden: age.
Lunden later told Oprah: Where Are They Now, that
"The words are, 'We've decided to make a change on the show,' and so they found a 30-year-old
version of me.”
She was alluding to her replacement, Lisa McCree, who was actually 25 when she got Lunden's
old job.
The anchor said ageism was a factor in Gibson's exit, too, as the 56-year-old's successor
was 38-year-old Kevin Newman.
The ouster didn't even work.
Ratings continued to falter, and in 1999, ABC News dispatched McCree and Newman and
brought in Diane Sawyer... and Charles Gibson.
Ever wonder what happened to Charles Gibson?
Well, he ended up in the center of yet another game of musical anchor chairs at ABC that
resulted in hurt feelings and the network coming off poorly.
Following the death of longtime World News Tonight anchor Peter Jennings in 2005, ABC
named Bob Woodruff and Elizabeth Vargas, a former Good Morning America reporter, co-anchors
of the nightly program.
Just about six months later, both were out — Woodruff because of a severe injury suffered
while on-assignment in Iraq, while Vargas became pregnant and went on maternity leave,
per NPR, planning to return to ABC to work on 20/20.
This meant that the new and sole anchor of ABC's World News Tonight would be former Good
Morning America co-host Charles Gibson.
“I’m more tired now on a Friday night than I was when I was doing this.”
How he got the job is a little bit more complicated than ABC may have led viewers to believe.
According to New York, Gibson was still bitter with ABC over how he'd been fired from Good
Morning America and he wanted a better job — the nightly anchor gig — and more money,
too.
He threatened to leave ABC entirely if he didn't get what he wanted.
ABC acquiesced, but at the expense of losing Vargas and overlooking veteran TV journalist
Diane Sawyer.
One of the biggest, most breakout stars of Saturday Night Live in the late 1980s and
early 1990s was Dana Carvey.
A comic force of nature, he provided both prominent impressions — Johnny Carson, President
George H.W. Bush, Paul McCartney — and some of the show's most popular characters, too,
including the Church Lady, Hans, and Garth.
When he was ready to return to TV in 1996, a few years after leaving SNL, it was a majorly
anticipated event when ABC ordered The Dana Carvey Show, a 30-minute primetime sketch
comedy series.
Giving the show a plum time slot after mega-hit Home Improvement, Disney-owned ABC likely
expected the mild, crowd-pleasing comedy Carvey had performed on SNL.
What it got was a weird and edgy series written by future comedy superstars including Louis
C.K., Stephen Colbert, Steve Carell, and Charlie Kaufman.
Carvey and company pushed the network's buttons from the drop — the first sketch featured
Carvey as President Bill Clinton breastfeeding a litter of puppies.
According to the Los Angeles Times, that very sketch sent Taco Bell running.
The company was actually a "title sponsor," meaning that this first episode was titled
The Taco Bell Dana Carvey Show, mocking overstepping advertising.
All that, plus dropping ratings, likely led to ABC to reduce its order of The Dana Carvey
Show from 13 to 8 episodes, and then cancelling it after 7.
A combination of sexy soap opera and high-stakes medical drama made Grey's Anatomy a hit for
ABC from the outset.
Debuting as a midseason replacement in early 2005, the show finished the season as the
number 5 show on broadcast television.
Nearly every member of the ensemble cast, playing doctors, surgeons, nurses, interns,
and residents, became a star.
This freshman roster included Isaiah Washington, who portrayed cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Preston
Burke, and T.R.
Knight, who played surgical intern George O'Malley.
Those two actors were involved in an on-set incident in October 2006, according to People.
Washington and co-star Patrick Dempsey got into a heated argument, during which Washington
allegedly referred to Knight by a slur used to describe homosexuals.
Washington issued an apology, but when news of the fight broke, it forced Knight to publicly
come out as a gay man to People Magazine.
A few months later, at a Golden Globes event, Washington denied he'd used the slur... and
then used the slur to explain that he never used the slur.
Once again, Washington issued another apology, while ABC released a statement, outlining
its, quote, "longstanding policy to maintain respectful workplaces."
At the conclusion of the third season of Grey's Anatomy, in June 2007, ABC Studios confirmed
that it had fired Isaiah Washington.
After primarily programming only the newsmagazine Nightline in its post-local news late night
slot, ABC got into the comedy talk show business in 1997 with Politically Incorrect.
The series, hosted by acerbic stand-up comedian Bill Maher, ran for four years on Comedy Central
before making the jump to network TV.
It continued to encourage spirited debate about current events from its ever-changing
panel of four guests, which included actors, writers, pundits, and elected officials from
across the political spectrum.
It's arguable that Maher's commentary in the days after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 was
the most controversial thing he ever said on Politically Incorrect, because it's what
got the show cancelled.
According to The New York Times, on the September 17, 2001, episode, Maher and guest Dinesh
D'Souza discussed President George W. Bush's remarks that the terrorists who had hijacked
planes and crashed them into U.S. sites were "cowards."
D'Souza disagreed, calling the terrorists people who, quote, "slammed themselves into
pieces of concrete," and labeling them "warriors."
“We have been the cowards.
Lobbing cruise missiles from 2000 miles away, that’s cowardly.”
Some affiliates then refused to air the show, and Maher released a statement clarifying
that his remarks were not an attack on the U.S. military.
Ratings fell and advertisers pulled out over the next few months, prompting ABC to cancel
Politically Incorrect in May 2002.
One of the biggest new shows of the 2017-18 TV season was an old show.
ABC's revival of the nineties sitcom Roseanne, about the working-class Conner family and
starring stand-up Roseanne Barr, finished the year as the second-most-watched scripted
show on network TV.
ABC ordered a second season of the very popular series before making a shocking reversal and
cancelling Roseanne.
In the early hours of May 20, 2018, Barr tweeted her thoughts on Valerie Jarrett, a senior
advisor in the administration of President Barack Obama.
Barr compared Jarrett to an organization that some have called a terrorist group, and likened
her appearance to that of an ape.
When the backlash began, Barr deleted the tweet and then apologized, writing,
"I am truly sorry for making a bad joke about her politics and her looks.
I should have known better."
But the fallout came anyway, and then kept coming.
Show writer Wanda Sykes announced her resignation from the show on Twitter, cast member Sara
Gilbert called Barr's comments "abhorrent," and ABC Entertainment President Channing Dungey
delivered the fatal blow.
"Roseanne's Twitter statement is abhorrent, repugnant, and inconsistent with our values,
and we have decided to cancel her show.”
ABC then had another change of heart and ordered The Conners, a continuation of Roseanne, in
which Barr's character, Roseanne Conner, had died.
ABC's longest-running late-night show isn't a comedy variety program — it's Nightline,
an in-depth ABC News production that takes a deep dive into its subject, usually a complex
current event.
Journalist Ted Koppel, the host of Nightline since its origin in 1980, broke the format
in April 2004, and added 10 minutes to the show, with a simple and stark reflection on
the ongoing war in Iraq.
According to CBS News, Nightline displayed a photo of every American serviceperson killed
in the conflict since it began in March 2003, with Koppel soberly reading their name, age,
military branch, and rank.
There was no commentary, and no music or graphics — just a remembrance of the deceased for
40 minutes.
It proved controversial.
Sinclair Broadcast Group refused to air Nightline on seven ABC affiliates it owned, alleging
that the Nightline gesture was a subtle and innate protest against the Iraq War.
Koppel defended his action in a brief introduction in the episode.
"This was never intended to be about us [...] Tonight is just going to be about the men and women
who have died in the war in Iraq."
“We owe it to the men and women who have died in the cause of freedom that we complete
their mission with honor.”
Nightline repeated the concept in May 2004 with the names of military members killed
in the war in Afghanistan, and in May 2005 with a list of those who died in Iraq and
Afghanistan since the previous broadcasts.
In 1997, and early into its run as a subsidiary of family entertainment juggernaut Disney,
ABC's primetime lineup consisted mainly of innocent stuff, including Home Improvement,
Boy Meets World, and The Drew Carey Show.
And then into the mix came Nothing Sacred, a Thursdays-at-8 p.m. drama about a young
Roman Catholic priest in Chicago named Father Ray, who, while coping with the staggering
problems of the modern world and his congregants, greatly questions his faith and his choice
to become a member of the clergy.
He also nearly has an affair with a woman, a major violation of his priestly vows.
The Catholic League, America's most prominent and biggest "Catholic civil rights organization"
and religious defense organization, deeply and vocally objected to Nothing Sacred.
The group, likening the show to "sacrilege", urged American Catholics to not only boycott
Nothing Sacred, but to hit ABC where it hurt, in the ledger, advocating the boycott of the
show's sponsors, too.
ABC ultimately buried the show in a little-watched Saturday night time slot before cancelling
it in March 1998.
As the host of Jimmy Kimmel Live since 2003, host Jimmy Kimmel has remained largely noncontroversial,
at least, when compared with his time hosting Comedy Central's edgy The Man Show.
In 2020, some of the more problematic bits from that sketch comedy series came back to
haunt Kimmel, a de facto face of ABC as its late-night standard-bearer and go-to host
for special events, including the Academy Awards and Emmy Awards.
On more than one occasion on The Man Show, Kimmel performed imitations of Black celebrities,
including Oprah Winfrey and NBA star Karl Malone.
In portraying those characters from 1999 to 2003, Kimmel donned blackface, according to
The New York Times.
In June 2020, Hollywood reckoned with its relatively recent use of blackface makeup,
with Jimmy Fallon apologizing on The Tonight Show for darkening his skin to play Chris
Rock in a 2000 Saturday Night Live sketch and Tina Fey authorizing the removal of a
30 Rock episode from streaming services for blackface content.
The conversation turned to Kimmel's controversial make-up use on The Man Show, and after a few
weeks of online criticism, he released a statement, saying, in part,
"I never considered that this might be seen as anything other than an imitation of a fellow
human being, one that had no more to do with Karl's skin color than it did his bulging
muscles and bald head."
Three's Company was TV's number two show from 1978 to 1980.
Viewers were compelled by the provocative premise: swinging bachelor Jack Tripper shared
a bungalow with two young women, sharp Janet Wood and ditzy Chrissy Snow.
Suzanne Somers was a major part of the popularity of Three's Company, portraying Chrissy as
the quintessential "dumb blonde," a broadly likable comic character who also wore a lot
of tight and skimpy outfits.
In 1980, Somers was up for a contract renewal, and she asked for a raise from $30,000 to
$150,000 per episode — roughly the amount that major male stars earned at the time,
per Biography.
Producers said no.
Somers recalled to People:
"The show's response was, 'Who do you think you are?’
[...] They said, 'John Ritter is the star.'"
Somers was forced to finish the season, but with a greatly reduced role.
She appears at the end of an episode and speaks on the phone to Jack or Janet.
She told the Television Foundation Academy:
"They built a little side set — it was crazy what they did.
They would have a police guard come meet me at the back door, walk me in.
I was not allowed to see anybody from the original show, only the wardrobe guy, who
would bring me a pair of shorts and something.”
After her contract was fulfilled, Somers was fired and replaced by Jenilee Harrison as
a new, Chrissy-like character.
ABC's Desperate Housewives was one of the hottest shows on TV in the mid-2000s, a comic
soap set in a suburban neighborhood with a modest exterior hiding a world of scandal.
Nicolette Sheridan played the show's villain, Edie Britt, with campy relish, and in recompense
for making life miserable and complicated for the good housewives, this bad one met
her end in Season 5.
Edie crashed her car into an electric pole, and when she emerged, stepped in a puddle
and fatally electrocuted herself.
Sheridan wasn't happy about it.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, she didn't get along with Desperate Housewives creator
Marc Cherry, and their on-set friction escalated to the point of violence.
On The Talk, Sheridan said:
"I was a victim of assault and battery by my boss on the set [...] and I reported him
and was retaliated against and fired off the show.
All of which is illegal."
To that end, Sheridan sued ABC and Cherry for 20 million dollars, citing wrongful termination,
assault and battery, gender violence, discrimination based on sex and sexual orientation, and infliction
of emotional distress, per The Wrap.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the assault in question was, quote, "a light tap on the
side of the head".
At least, that’s what an ABC investigation concluded, saying also that Sheridan's claims
were "without merit."
The suit stretched on for years, and according to the AP, a judge dismissed the case in 2013.
In September 2012, ABC News ran a series of investigative reports on what they called
"finely textured beef," a type of ground meat product that accounted for around 70 percent
of beef sales in the United States.
In its coverage, ABC likened finely textured beef to "pink slime," a term coined by interviewee
and USDA microbiologist Gerald Zirnstein.
The so-called pink slime was a substance consisting of cost-saving fillers, lower-grade meat trimmings,
and bacteria-killing ammonia.
The large South Dakota-based meat processing company Beef Products Inc., which provided
the vast majority of this kind of ground beef to American grocery stores and restaurants,
sued ABC News for 1.2 billion dollars.
They alleged that the organization's reporting contained, quote, "false and misleading and
defamatory" statements numbering in the hundreds, and that it had led to a consumer backlash
and dramatic drop in beef sales.
BPI claimed that sales of its beef had gone from five million pounds a week to under two
million in the wake of the reports.
Moreover, BPI claimed it shut down three of its plants and laid off 650 employees.
Via a statement, ABC News vice president Jeffrey Schneider said
"The lawsuit is without merit [...] We will contest it vigorously."
And contest it vigorously they did — for five years.
ABC’s parent company Disney settled the case in June 2017, agreeing to pay 177 million
dollars, which was a record for corporate defamation cases of this type.
Portraying surgical oncologist Dr. Izzie Stevens for five years on Grey's Anatomy was a bridge
for Katherine Heigl, who went from teen roles in My Father the Hero and Roswell to roles
in grown-up movies 27 Dresses, One for the Money, and Knocked Up.
Heigl won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama for Grey's Anatomy in 2007,
but failed to earn even a nomination the next year after some self-destructive comments.
Potential Emmy nominees have to submit their work for consideration in 2008 — but Heigl
didn't.
In a statement, she said:
"I did not feel that I was given the material this season to warrant an Emmy nomination
and in an effort to maintain the integrity of the academy organization, I withdrew my
name from contention.”
This major shade followed remarks Heigl made in a 2008 issue of Vanity Fair, where she
criticized the film in which she played her first major leading role, Knocked Up, as "a
little sexist" because, as she also noted,
"It paints the women as shrews, as humorless and uptight, and it paints the men as lovable,
goofy, fun-loving guys."
That all earned Heigl a reputation as a "difficult" actor, a reputation that solidified in 2010.
According to E!, Heigl had aggressively attempted to get out of her Grey's Anatomy contract
for three years, and producers finally let her leave.
As of 2021, only one Black man — Matt James — and one Black woman — Rachel Lindsay
— had been cast as the lead on The Bachelor and The Bachelorette respectively.
Even after the long overdue casting, race remained a complicated and difficult issue
for The Bachelor.
In James' season, a contestant named Rachael Kirkconnell received the final rose and won.
However, she and James broke up after Kirkconnell's social media history revealed that she’d
liked Confederate flag-related posts and had attended a Southern plantation-themed party
in 2018.
Kirkconnell apologized for her, quote, "offensive and racist" actions via an Instagram statement.
That apology hadn't gone public when Lindsay interviewed Chris Harrison on the TV magazine
show Extra in February 2021, where the host of The Bachelor seemingly defended Kirkconnell's
actions.
Harrison said,
"We all need to have a little grace, a little understanding, a little compassion.”
When Lindsay pointed out that Kirkconnell had taken, so far, six weeks to draft an apology,
Harrison got agitated and asked a rhetorical question.
"Who is Rachel Lindsay and who is Chris Harrison and who is whatever woke police person out
there, who are you?"
Harrison apologized via a statement on Instagram, but three days later, announced that he would,
quote, "be stepping aside for a period of time" from The Bachelor.
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