Amy Schumer got drawn into a complex controversy over comments made by a friend who has written for her Comedy Central show. Her response Wednesday night suggests she's ready to pull the plug on the whole show.
This story started after several women came forward with allegations that a comedian had sexually assaulted them, and he was rumored to have been banned from all Upright Citizens Brigade locations.
On August 14th, Schumer's friend Kurt Metzger weighed in on rumors about the allegedly banned comedian. His snarky response on social media mocked the rumors swirling through comedy circles:
(screencap via Daily Dot)
Many people felt that Metzger's satire crossed the line, and critics started a social media campaign to get Schumer to respond and/or fire Metzger. Many Schumer fans considered her non-response antithetical to her show's brand of feminism, and when she began blocking some Twitter accounts demanding a response, the frenzy built even more. Schumer's new book The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo came out on the 16th, and it quickly became subject to a downvoting campaign on bookseller sites. The story continued to gain momentum as she was doing press for her new book, and she responded on August 17th:
I am so saddened and disappointed in Kurt Metzger. He is my friend and a great writer and I couldn't be more against his recent actions.
— Amy Schumer (@amyschumer) August 17, 2016
90 minutes later, she added:
Kurt does not work for me. He is not a writer on my show. Please stop asking me about it. His words are not mine.
— Amy Schumer (@amyschumer) August 17, 2016
That evening, she hinted that the whole show was over despite being renewed for another season:
I didn't fire Kurt. He isn't a writer for my show because we aren't making the show anymore. There are no writers for it.
— Amy Schumer (@amyschumer) August 18, 2016
Metzger responded at length to his critics in a Thursday Race Wars podcast .
Update: Schumer tweets that the show isn't cancelled; she's just touring.
