NEWSTom Bergeron Savagely Shades Tyra Banks After She Replaced Him as Host of 'DWTS'
Tom Bergeron didn't seem to have anything nice to say when it came to his Dancing With the Stars replacement Tyra Banks.
During a recent appearance on the "S--, Lies and Spray Tans" podcast, hosted by former DWTS pro Cheryl Burke, the 68-year-old spoke out about his forced exit from the dancing competition show ahead of Season 29 in 2020.
Tom Bergeron called Tyra Banks 'a curiosity.'
When speaking with Burke, Bergeron went into lengthy detail about the end of his time with ABC, however, when it came to what he thought of Banks, he simply labeled her "a curiosity."
Banks' time on DWTS didn't last nearly as long as the 15 years Bergeron hosted the hit series. The 49-year-old only remained on the show for three years before she was replaced by judge-turned-host Julianne Hough for the current season.
Tyra Banks hosted 'DWTS' for three years after Tom Bergeron was fired.
As for Bergeron's exit from his longtime gig, the Breakfast Time alum dated his demise back to 2019, when he said he specifically advised DWTS executives not to cast any political figures for the upcoming season — which was falling around the same time as the 2020 presidential election.
"And this former showrunner says to me,'You might want to sit down for this last one.' I said 'Why?' And then they told me who it was, the former press guy for [then-President Donald] Trump,"" Bergeron explained in reference to ex-White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer.
"I said, 'Guys, this is exactly what we said we wouldn't do. Don't go there. This is, you know, not the right time, play to our strengths, be the show that gives people a break from all this bulls---," he recalled.
Due to his outrage on the matter, Bergeron suggested he'd "take the season off," however, the showrunner and the producer of the show instead offered to "let you out of your contract if you want."
Tom Bereron was angry about Sean Spicer being cast for the series in 2020.
"That's how strongly they felt," he noted, admitted their response "really pissed me off."
Although "furious," Bergeron tried to be "Switzerland" and host Spicer's season despite his disapproval of the politician's casting.
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Bergeron said he knew his time was up from the second Spicer was announced via Good Morning America as a cast member of the dancing competition — which as the former host anticipated, it didn't receive the best reaction from viewers at home.
"At that moment, I knew this is probably my last season, because of that one betrayal. Up until that point, there were people of character there," he dished.
Tom Bergeron didn't want 'DWTS' to cast someone political during the year of the 2020 presidential election.
Just days after Spicer was eliminated from the series, Bergeron released a statement via X (formerly named Twitter) in an effort to "let people know that they f------ lied to me" about picking Spicer as one of the stars for that season.
He continued: "So I wrote the statement that I wrote, that did not name anybody, that did not name a political party. It merely said, 'I was told certain things when I was asked my opinion, they agreed, and now they've thrown a curveball.' I even went so far as to say it's their right to do that. They're the producers of the show, if that's what they want to do they are entitled to do that. We will have to agree to disagree.”
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When Burke asked if producers were aware of the statement he he released, Bergeron sternly said, "They didn't deserve to know."
"They had screwed me. I'm gonna screw them. But I wanted the viewers to know this was a step too far to me. This was a step too far on the cusp of an election year. And again — had it been a Democrat, same statement," he reiterated.
