James Cordon did not monitor the social media reaction to the scandal he faced this week.
“I really haven’t read anything. It’s weird. It’s weird when you were there,” Corden said. “I think I’m probably going to have to talk about it on Monday’s show. My feeling, often, is never to explain, never to complain. But I’m probably going to have to talk about it.”
This given that, on Monday, celebrity restaurateur Keith McNally publicly accused Corden of being “the most abusive customer” to servers at his New York restaurant, Balthazar, since the venue opened 25 years ago.
McNally tweeted that he banned Corden, who he called “a little jerk of a manand gave two examples of the comedian’s alleged misbehavior. Six hours later, he said he lifted the ban after Corden called him and “profusely apologized.”
Thursday, the host of The Late Late Show with James Corden weighed in on the entire saga, which has become a popular topic on and off social media, in an interview with the New York Times.
“It’s so silly to talk about it,” Corden told reporter Dave Itzkoff.
Their interview had been scheduled before the news broke, to talk about Corden’s new Prime Video comedy-drama. Mammalsand Corden didn’t look like he had considered retiring.
“I didn’t do anything wrong, on any level,” Corden told Itzkoff. “So why would I ever cancel this? I was there. I get it. I feel so zen about the whole thing. Because I think it’s so silly. I just think it’s below us all. It’s below you. It’s definitely below your publication.”
Itzkoff reported that he met Corden at a restaurant breakfast and they overheard a woman complaining about her eggs. One of the examples McNally gave of Corden being a bad customer was that he allegedly berated a waiter, after the employee presented his wife with an egg yolk omelet with “a little egg white “.
Corden saw the similarities in his own situation.
“Can you imagine now, if we just lambasted her on Twitter?” he said. “Would that be fair? That’s my point of view. It’s insane.”
He noted that social media isn’t everyone and no one in New York has told him about the story.
He was obviously unhappy that the media picked up the story, comparing it to, as Itzkoff put it, “a school principal offering help to bullies in the classroom.”
