Sharon Osbourne has harsh words — and an obscene gesture — for those involved in her firing from The Talk.
The topic — as well as other ups and downs she’s endured during her time in the spotlight as a TV host, reality star and manager — is the subject of a Fox Nation docuseries titled, Sharon Osbourne: To Hell & Back which debuts Monday. Osbourne gets real with Yahoo Entertainment about being cut from the Emmy-winning CBS daytime talk show after 11 seasons amid a racism controversy, and says she’ll probably never work again in the U.S. after being what she deems “canceled.” She and husband Ozzy recently announced they’re moving back to their native England.
“I was thinking to myself: This is gonna be it,” she recalls of her March 2021 firing. “Over 50 years working in this industry and this is going to be it. This is it. I’m gonna go out as a racist? I found it so heartbreaking. And it was like: Why, why did this happen? Why?”
While retelling her side of the story in the four-part doc — about defending her friend Piers Morgan after he accused Meghan Markle of fabricating allegations of racism from within the British royal family — The Osbournes alum is at her most candid. She fires off f-bombs at those she says wronged her, literally gives the finger to CBS and reminds us that the network is imperfect, citing, in explicit terms, former CEO Les Moonves (and husband of her former The Talkco-host Julie Chen)’s sexual misconduct scandal. She tells us all she has left is her truth having lost her job and credibility when CBS’s internal investigation determined her behavior “did not align with [company] values.”
“Let’s be truthful about this: They destroyed my credibility in America,” she says. “Let’s be really truthful. It’s like: I have nothing to be afraid of. Their allegations were wrong and were twisted and distorted.”
Osbourne, who says she wasn’t repentant enough for the network, continues, “We weren’t dealing with a company that runs, you know, religious programming. This company is like every other — ruthless — and will do whatever they have to do to not have any stain on their network. They [don’t want] anything that’s going to rock the boat…”
Asked if she considered suing CBS, she tells us, “Sure I could have. But do I want to waste two, three years of my life on them? No, I don’t want to do that. For what?” She also scoffs as reports she left the network with a payout. She says she got “nothing … a ‘see ya.’ It was like in the movies when people get let go [and] you take out your box full of stuff. That was it.”
Sharon Osbourne will no longer be a co-host on “The Talk.” Her departure was announced by CBS on Friday after Osbourne had come under fire for defending her friend Piers Morgan after he made controversial comments about Meghan Markle’s Oprah interview.
The boat was rocked when Osbourne backed Morgan who suggested Markle lied in her infamous Oprah Winfrey interview. The Markle-Prince Harry interview also aired on CBS, with the network investing a lot of money into it. The next day, Osbourne’s co-hosts Sheryl Underwood and Elaine Welteroth accused her on-air of unconscious racism, which Osbourne claimed show producers and CBS executives put them up to. Welteroth, who later left the show, and her hairstylist later filed complaints alleging a “racially insensitive and hostile environment” on the set, leading to the show going on hiatus so CBS could conduct an internal investigation. During that time, Leah Remini, a co-host of Osbourne’s in Season 1, claimed Osbourne used derogatory language toward co-host Sara Gilbert, who is a lesbian, and Chen, who is of Chinese descent. Osbourne maintained she wasn’t racist and denied using slurs against Chen.
Osbourne invited Underwood and Welteroth to appear in her doc, but they declined. She is clearly hurt by what she views as Underwood’s betrayal, having considered her a close friend as they worked side-by-side for 10 seasons. The doc details that friendship, talking about Underwood visiting Osbourne in the U.K. and referring to herself as “the Black Osbourne” in a 2018 podcast interview with the Osbourne family. While Underwood recently said she missed Osbourne, Osbourne tells us she’ll never makeup with her.
“Never. No. Never ever,” she replies. “Why? Why would I? I worked with somebody for all those years, sat beside her, traveled the world with her, laughed, cried with her. No, because she’s not a friend.”
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