Michael Richards
Image Source: photo by Alan Light, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
What Was the Accusation?
On November 20, Richards appeared by satellite on the Late Show with David Letterman, where his former Seinfeld co-star Jerry Seinfeld was a scheduled guest. Richards acknowledged that he had lost his temper and responded badly to the heckling. He apologized to the Black, Hispanic, and white audience members who had witnessed what he described as his anger, hatred, and rage. At the same time, he attempted to explain his behavior by referring to the heckling, his spontaneous and uncontrolled performance style, and the way his anger had overtaken him. Later that week, Richards addressed the controversy on Jesse Jackson’s radio program, saying he was shattered by his remarks. His response combined mortification with explanations centered on provocation, emotional loss of control (defeasibility), and the improvisational conditions of his performance.
Key Apologia Strategies:
Mortification, Provocation, Defeasibility
Video
Transcript
Michael Richards Appearance ocn the Late Show with David Letterman:
Letterman: Why don’t you explain exactly what happened for the folks who may not know.
Richards: I lost my temper on stage. I was at a comedy club trying to do my act and I got heckled and I took it badly and went into a rage and said some pretty nasty things to some Afro-Americans, a lot of trash talk, and uh…
Letterman: And you were actually being heckled or were they just talking and disturbing the act?
Richards: That was going on too. You know, I’m really busted up over this and I’m very, very sorry to those people in the audience, the blacks, the Hispanics, whites everyone that was there that took the brunt of that anger and hate and rage and how it came through, and I’m concerned about more hate and more rage and more anger coming through, not just towards me but towards a black/white conflict. There’s a great deal of disturbance in this country and how blacks feel about what happened in Katrina, and, you know, many of the comics, many of performers are in Las Vegas and New Orleans trying to raise money for what happened there, and for this to happen, for me to be in a comedy club and flip out and say this crap, you know, I’m deeply, deeply sorry. And I’ll get to the force field of this hostility, why it’s there, why the rage is in any of us, why the trash takes place, whether or not it’s between me and a couple of hecklers in the audience or between this country and another nation, the rage…
Letterman: But Michael, let me interrupt here for a second and ask a question about had the people doing the heckling or the people who were not paying attention, had they been white or Caucasian or any other race, what would have been the nature of your response then?
Richards: It may have happened. It may have happened. You know, I’m a performer. I push the envelope, I work in a very uncontrolled manner onstage. I do a lot of free association, it’s spontaneous, I go into character. I don’t know, in view of the situation and the act going where it was going, I don’t know, the rage did go all over the place. It went to everybody in the room. But you can’t you know it’s, I don’t I know people could, blacks could feel I’m not a racist, that’s what so insane about this, and yet it’s said, it comes through, it fires out of me and even now in the passion that’s here as I confront myself.
Sources
Farhi, P. (2006, November 21). ‘Seinfeld’ comic Richards apologizes for racial rant. Washington Post. Retrieved from: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/21/AR2006112100242.html
‘Kramer’s’ racist tirade caught on tape (2006, November 20). TMZ. Retrieved from: http://www.tmz.com/2006/11/20/kramers-racist-tirade-caught-on-tape/
‘Seinfeld’ star Michael Richards apologizes on ‘Letterman’ for racial slurs (2006, November 21). Fox News. Retrieved from: http://www.foxnews.com/story/2006/11/21/seinfeld-star-michael-richards-apologizes-on-letterman-for-racial-slurs.html