Michael Richards Reveals How He's Changed After Racist Laugh Factory Rant
The career of former “Seinfeld” cast member Michael Richards hasn’t been the same since his racist rant at a Los Angeles comedy club in 2006.
Now he’s revealing how the incident changed him in a new memoir, “Entrances and Exits,” that adds details about the incident and other aspects of his life that he had kept hidden.
Richards was performing a stand-up routine at the Laugh Factory in November 2006 when a group of Black men heckled him. He responded with an N-word-laced diatribe that quickly went viral.
Richards told People magazine that he “was immediately sorry” and said the outburst happened because “my anger was all over the place and it came through hard and fast.”
The comedian said that, rather than run from his anger, he “dove into the deep end and tried to learn from it. It hasn’t been easy,” according to People.
Richards told the magazine that crisis managers “wanted me to do damage control” but insisted that “as far as I was concerned, the damage was inside of me.”
After spending the last 17 years in what he calls “deep analysis” and studying religion and philosophy, Richards said, he thinks he’s figured out the source of his anger. Part of it, he said, was a core feeling of insecurity sparked by a sense of never being wanted by a family that had been broken by tragedies.
“Somehow I couldn’t connect to the joy of being an artist,” he told People. “I was a good character actor, but I was comfortable being the character, not in being me.”
The deep-seated insecurity also led Richards to turn down hosting “Saturday Night Live” twice and to not accept a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame because “I didn’t feel deserving,” he told People.
Though Richards said he was reacting to his inner fears by lashing out specifically at Black men, he insists it wasn’t racial. “I’m not racist,” he told People, adding, “I have nothing against Black people.”
“The man who told me I wasn’t funny had just said what I’d been saying to myself for a while. I felt put down. I wanted to put him down.”
The memoir, published by Permuted Press, includes a foreword by Jerry Seinfeld. It will be in stores starting June 4.
