Graham Norton has admitted that Harvey Weinstein is the worst guest he’s ever had on The Graham Norton Show.
Graham Norton, the Irish comedian best known for The Graham Norton Show, has had multiple celebrities as guests on his chat show over the years. And so, it’s only natural that he’s come to have favourites and… least-favourites.
Norton artfully dodged the question, ‘Who’s the worst guest you’ve ever had on your show?’ right up until 2018 when he suggested that Robert De Niro was his least favourite guest because of De Niro’s “benign presence”.
But now, Norton has amended his answer and flat out declared that Harvey Weinstein was the worst guest he’s ever had on The Graham Norton Show. As reported by JOE, while in Dublin, promoting his latest novel, Forever Home, Norton said:
“I often talk around who my least favourite guest was, but now, someone reminded me, I have a really good answer to this now. It’s Harvey Weinstein. He’s in jail, so he gets the prize for the worst guest ever.”
Graham Norton
Weinstein was one of the most successful producers in Hollywood until he was found guilty of sexual assault and rape in 2020. Weinstein is currently serving a twenty-three-year sentence in prison for his crimes.
Norton clarified why Weinstein was the worst guest he’s ever had on his show, namely because of Weinstein’s persistence.
“It was weird because [Weinstein] asked for my e-mail. And he e-mailed me something very nice, a complimentary thing. And then he decided he wanted to be on the show because he was going to promote something.”
Graham Norton
“And it was a show that was fully booked, so I replied saying, ‘Oh, thank you so much, but the show is fully booked’. He e-mailed back, ‘What if I blah de blah de blah’. [I replied,] ‘No, the show is fully booked, blah de blah.’”
“And he e-mailed back again, ‘But I think…’, and I just had to turn to my booker and say ‘Can you please deal with this?’ And at the time, I thought that sort of attitude, that kind of ‘Oh no, I’m going on,’ that is what makes you a very good producer.”
Graham Norton
“But of course, now that we know what we know, that is what makes him a predator. It was that kind of weird, tunnel-vision thing. And it was sort of chilling in retrospect because I was just laughing at those emails. But you realise, ‘Oh my God, that is an insight into how that man is.’”
Weinstein appeared on The Graham Norton Show in 2015 alongside David Tennant, Olivia Colman and Jessie J. While nothing of note happened during the episode, considering how infamous Weinstein has become since then due to his deplorable behaviour, we agree with Norton and think he’s definitely earnt the title of ‘worst guest’.
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