"Saturday Night Live" veteran Norm Macdonald was dropped from the guest lineup for Tuesday's episode of "The Tonight Show" after making controversial comments this week regarding the #MeToo movement, Roseanne Barr and Louis C.K.
In a statement to The Times on Wednesday, NBC said it decided to cancel his appearance "out of sensitivity to our audience and in light of Norm Macdonald's comments in the press [Tuesday]."
The comedian had been slated to plug his Netflix talk show, "Norm Macdonald Has a Show," which debuts Friday. But his commentary in the Hollywood Reporter published earlier that day derailed the promotional stop.
In a Q-and-A, Macdonald said he was "happy the #MeToo movement has slowed down a little bit."
"It used to be, 'One hundred women can't be lying.' And then it became, 'One woman can't lie.' And that became, 'I believe all women.' And then you're like, 'What?' Like, that Chris Hardwick guy I really thought got the blunt end of the stick there," he said.
Macdonald, 58, who worked on the original "Roseanne" sitcom and was a writer on the ABC reboot, spoke at length about his former boss and her reaction to the show's abrupt cancellation in May.
"Roseanne was so broken up [after her show's reboot was canceled] that I got Louis [C.K.] to call her, even though Roseanne was very hard on Louis before that," he said. "But she was just so broken and just crying constantly. There are very few people that have gone through what they have, losing everything in a day. Of course, people will go, 'What about the victims?' But you know what? The victims didn't have to go through that."
Macdonald also said people used to receive a second chance, but, "now it's admit wrongdoing and you're finished. And so the only way to survive is to deny, deny, deny. That's not healthy _ that there is no forgiveness."
Hours after the interview was published online and the backlash ensued, Macdonald tweeted an apology, saying Barr and C.K "both made terrible mistakes" and he would never defend their actions.
"If my words sounded like I was minimizing the pain that their victims feel to this day, I am deeply sorry," he tweeted.
