More from Michaels
Michaels also shared another interesting nugget in his interview with Belloni. He said he would have liked to have invited the late singer, Sinéad O’Connor, onto the “SNL50” anniversary special to sing “Nothing Compares 2 U.”
Back in 1992, in one of the most famous moments in “SNL” history, O’Connor ripped up a photo of Pope John Paul II. It was her protest against child abuse in the Catholic Church. The public backlash against the Irish singer was harsh and her career was severely damaged. “SNL” and Michaels might have played a role in that. O’Connor was never invited back to the show.
In a 1993 interview with Spin, Michaels said, “I thought (it) was sort of the wrong place for it, I thought her behavior was inappropriate. Because it was difficult to do two comedy sketches after it, and also it was dishonest because she didn’t tell us she was going to do it. … We were sort of shocked, the way you would be shocked at a houseguest pissing on a flower arrangement in the dining room.”
However, Michaels eventually changed his opinion. In the documentary “Ladies & Gentlemen … 50 Years of SNL Music,” Michaels said, “There was a part of me that just admired the bravery of what she’d done, and also the absolute sincerity of it.”
In the years since O’Connor’s “SNL” controversy, we have also learned more about child abuse inside the Catholic Church, and O’Connor’s actions are viewed differently.
O’Connor died in 2023 at age 56. For the “SNL50” special, Miley Cyrus and Brittany Howard performed “Nothing Compares 2 U,” the song written by Prince that was O’Connor’s biggest hit.
Michaels told Belloni, “If (O’Connor) were still alive, I would have asked her to sing that song. But it was represented by Miley singing it with so much power.”
A witness to ICE
Powerful work from CNN senior reporter Chelsea Bailey with “I stopped for gas and witnessed an ICE arrest. Then, I spent days looking for the man who was detained.”
Bailey reports she was getting gas on her way to work in Washington, D.C., last Thursday when she saw a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement apprehension. Bailey passed along some disturbing details. While she acknowledged she didn’t see what happened before a man running was captured, she wrote “… the masked men were driving a Kia — a family car I don’t typically associate with law enforcement. And the SUV had generic Maryland flag license tags. Though they appeared to be law enforcement, I didn’t hear them identify themselves. Their tactical gear said ‘police,’ but they didn’t seem to be linked to a particular department or agency, and I couldn’t see any badges.”
Bailey added, “What I saw of the arrest lasted less than five minutes, but it felt terrifying and surreal. I never heard the agents tell Samuel why he was being detained. As the masked men put him in the back of the blacked-out SUV, I felt like I was watching someone being kidnapped.”
Bailey passes along more details about what happened and what she learned about the man who was apprehended. It’s a story worth your time.
Question of the day
“Meet the Press” moderator Kristen Welker interviewed Vice President JD Vance on Sunday’s NBC program, but her best question of the day was to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
Welker asked Lavrov, “Mr. foreign minister, here are the facts: Close to 50,000 civilians have either been killed or injured in this war. Russia has hit maternity wards, churches, schools, hospitals, a kindergarten just this past week. So either the Russian military has terrible aim or you are targeting civilians. Which is it?”
What a question.
Lavrov responded by saying, “Look, look, NBC is a very respectful structure, and I hope you are responsible for the words which you broadcast. I ask you to send us or to publicize the information to which you just referred because we never targeted the civilian targets of the kind you cited. You might be mixing, you know, the information because it is a fact that quite a number of churches were purposefully hit by the Ukrainian regime. Quite a number of just civilian settlements, human settlements.”
After another back-and-forth, Welker defended NBC to Lavrov, saying, “Mr. foreign minister, it’s all publicly documented, and we have reporters on the ground who’ve seen it with their own eyes. All of the information is publicly available. We do have reporters on the ground who’ve seen these strikes with their own eyes.”
Welker was strong throughout the interview, pushing and pushing back on Lavrov in a rare interview with the Russian foreign minister.
Odd choice
Media journalist Oliver Darcy made a keen observation in his Status newsletter: “For some reason, FCC chair Brendan Carr threw the first pitch at the Yankees game.”
It’s true. Carr threw out the ceremonial first pitch at Saturday’s New York Yankees-Boston Red Sox game in New York. And then he was interviewed on the Yankees broadcast on the YES Network.
By the way, Darcy will be my guest on the next episode of “The Poynter Report Podcast,” which will come out Wednesday. We don’t talk about Carr throwing out a first pitch, but we do get into Darcy leaving CNN a year ago to launch his own media venture. We also discuss the latest media topics, including what’s going on at CNN, The Washington Post and what Darcy thinks is the most undercovered media story right now.
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