Megyn Kelly has mocked her former employer NBC for canceling her show due to a discussion about blackface, after a fourth show on the network was singled out for featuring the offensive makeup.
Kelly, 49, had her NBC show Megyn Kelly Today canceled in 2019 following her remarks surrounding the appropriateness of blackface during Halloween.
On Friday Netflix announced that it was pulling an episode of NBC’s sitcom Community after they realized it featured blackface.
NBC has also withdrawn episodes of 30 Rock for depicting the same racially insensitive practice.
Saturday Night Live and Scrubs have also featured blackface, and on June 1 Jimmy Fallon made an emotional apology for donning blackface on SNL.
Kelly tweeted on Friday, in response to questions over the four shows: ‘Turns out NBC loves blackface!’
Megyn Kelly on Friday mocked her former employer, saying that NBC ‘loves blackface!’
Megyn Kelly has taken aim at her former employer’s hypocrisy with a scathing tweet
She then listed the names of those who had performed in the makeup – Jimmy Fallon, Fred Armisen, Tina Fey, Ted Danson, Jane Krakowski, John Hamm, Zach Braff, Sarah Chalke, Ken Jeong, and Julianne Hough.
Kelly’s brief career at NBC ended in the wake of her comments defending reality TV star Luann de Lesseps’ use of blackface to dress like Diana Ross for Halloween.
The journalist said on her show: ‘When I was a kid, that was okay as long as you were dressing up as like a character’.
Despite later apologizing for the remarks, her show was canceled three days later.
Kelly’s contract with NBC was terminated January 11, 2019.
And the former lawyer seemed to be enjoying the controversy this week.
Three days prior, on Tuesday, she tweeted in response to news about 30 Rock: ‘Wait – what network aired those episodes again?
Tina Fey and Jimmy Fallon have apologized for the use of blackface on their shows
Fallon painted himself to look like Chris Rock in a 2000 skit on Saturday Night Live.
On June 1 he apologized, and used his show to discuss issues of race and racism with Derrick Johnson, the president and chief executive of the NAACP, the CNN anchor Don Lemon and the anti-racism educator Jane Elliott.
‘I had to really examine myself in the mirror this week because a story came out about me on SNL doing an impression of Chris Rock in blackface,’ he said.
‘And I was horrified. Not of people trying to ‘cancel’ me or cancel this show, which is scary enough.
‘The thing that haunted me the most was, how do I say I love this person?
‘I respect this guy more than I respect most humans. I’m not a racist. I don’t feel this way.’
Kelly’s tweet comes after Tina Fey along with her 30 Rock co-creator Robert Carlock and NBCUniversal requested to remove four episodes of the comedy series because they feature the use of blackface.
Vulture first reported that the episodes were being removed from Hulu and Amazon Prime, and they weren’t available to purchase on iTunes or Google Play.
Fey addressed the episodes’ removal in a letter sent to streaming platforms and obtained by Variety.
‘As we strive to do the work and do better in regards to race in America, we believe that these episodes featuring actors in race-changing makeup are best taken out of circulation,’ she wrote.
‘I understand now that ‘intent’ is not a free pass for white people to use these images. I apologize for pain they have caused.
‘Going forward, no comedy-loving kid needs to stumble on these tropes and be stung by their ugliness. I thank NBCUniversal for honoring this request,’ she concluded.
Kelly mocked the network earlier in the week when it was forced to pull episodes of 30 Rock
Kelly’s brief career at NBC ended in the wake of her comments defending blackface as a child
In addition to disappearing from streaming services and digital rental outlets, the offending episodes will no longer be broadcast on television.
Two of the episodes, season three’s Believe In The Stars and season five’s Christmas Attack Zone, feature the character Jenna Maroney, played by Jane Krakowski, darkening her face.
In the former, she puts on blackface while her co-star Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan) lightens his skin and dresses as a woman to determine if white women or Black men face greater struggles in society.
In the latter episode, Jenna wore blackface to dress as former Pittsburgh Steelers star Lynn Swann, while her boyfriend (guest star Will Forte) dressed as Natalie Portman in a spoof of her film Black Swan.
In one episode of 30 Rock, Jane Krakowski wore blackface to dress as former Pittsburgh Steelers star Lynn Swann, while her boyfriend (guest star Will Forte) dressed as Natalie Portman in a spoof of her film Black Swan
In another episode, regular guest star Jon Hamm blackened his skin in a sketch critiquing the racist television series and radio show Amos ‘n’ Andy
Though Hollywood and its stars are trying to stamp out blackface depictions, 30 Rock’s uses of blackface received a mix of praise and criticism at the time.
In 2010, journalist and cultural critic Touré commended Christmas Attack Zone in Mediaite for ‘not using blackface as a simplistic visual way of turning a white person Black but as a complex tool that makes a multi-layered joke at the character’s expense.’
Journalist Jamil Smith was less forgiving of Hamm’s Amos ‘n’ Andy spoof in 2012.
‘And #30Rock has Jon Hamm in almost-kinda-yeah-actually-it’s-Blackface,’ he tweet disapprovingly at the time.