Nick Cannon’s Daytime Talk Show Back on Track After Anti-Semitic Comments
Written by SOURCE on January 29, 2021
Variety reports Nick Cannon‘s daytime talk show will be moving forward with plans to launch this fall.
“It’s been a longtime dream of mine to host my own daytime talk show and that I’m able to do this in New York City, bringing daytime television back to the place that has fostered generations of talent, is very special to me,” Cannon said in a statement.
“With this show, we’ll be uniting all aspects of entertainment in a unique way in the very place where a lot of what we know today as our culture started,” the statement reads. “I couldn’t ask for better partners than Debmar-Mercury and Fox and thank them for supporting me in this endeavor.”
The show titled Nick Cannon was set to come out in fall 2020, but Lionsgate’s Debmar-Mercury announced that it was being postponed after the multi-hyphenate made some anti-Semitic remarks on his Cannon’s Class podcast. In his discussion with former Public Enemy member Richard “Professor Griff” Griffin, Cannon suggested that Black people couldn’t be considered anti-Semitic because “the Semitic people and language have nothing to do with white people.”
“It’s never hate speech, you can’t be anti-Semitic when we are the Semitic people,” he continued. “When we are the same people who they want to be. That’s our birthright.” Cannon’s comments came across as if he was dismissing the white Jewish experience, and the idea that they could also encounter anti-Semitism.
ViacomCBS quickly cut ties with Cannon, sparking a messy dispute over the ownership of his popular MTV/VH1 series Wild ‘N Out. Cannon issued an apology, revealing he was stepping away from his radio show to take some time to work on himself. In that time, he confronted the issue on his podcast, inviting a Rabbi to discuss his remarks. Cannon’s mea culpa appeared to impress the higher ups at ViacomCBS, who were optimistic about working with him again.
