Actor and comedian Jay Thomas has apologized for comment he made on CNN regarding James Franco, Seth Rogen, and the Sony hacking controversy. The comments left CNN host Brooke Baldwin speechless for a moment.
“If I did the movie and I said that I wanted all of this creative integrity,” Thomas told Baldwin “how could I not have thought the guy, the crazy person that we’re doing the movie about, wouldn’t launch missiles?” The controversial comment came later, when Thomas added “”If they do strike Seth Rogen and James Franco, what a great end to their careers.” The last comment seemed to catch Baldwin off guard.
Thomas has since told E! News that he meant “no ill will” with his comments on CNN. Tom Estey, Thomas’ publicist, also told E! News exclusively “”That was a poor choice of words and Jay certainly meant no ill to either one of them but was emphasizing that their right to ‘creative independence’ has caused a fire storm that he felt they should have seen coming by stirring the hornets’ nest of a dangerous dictator with weapons of mass destruction.”
Here is the clip from CNN:
http://youtu.be/KPuY4_HNRzc
Aside from his comments directed at James Franco and Seth Rogen, Thomas also commented on the cowardice of Hollywood in general, saying “Look at ’em running! Look at ’em running! So they’re ally tough and they’re, you know, creative, you know, integrity and all that and that becomes immediate crap when someone scares them. So they all run away.”
While Jay Thomas may not be recognizable in name alone, his face is certainly familiar. Thomas is a character actor who has appeared in Mr. Holland’s Opus, the Santa Clause movies, and countless television shows. Most notably, the 66-year old actor won two Emmys for his role on Murphy Brown.
The Interview has been all over the news and social media for days now, after North Korea has been confirmed to be behind the Sony hack and The Interview has been pulled from all screenings. James Franco and Seth Rogen have not commented on Jay Thomas’ comments.