Sharon Osbourne took some heat from her co-hosts on “The Talk” and from fans for publicly defending her “friend” Piers Morgan’s controversial criticism of Meghan Markle. Now, she’s apologizing, admitting she “got defensive” and let her “fear & horror of being accused” of racism “take over”… but not without throwing CBS under the bus.

Morgan’s take is that Osbourne was “shamed & bullied” into apologizing, demanding an apology from CBS. And Osbourne is also blasting the network, telling “Variety” that she “blames” them for the tense episode of “The Talk,” claiming CBS “blindsided” her with questions about defending Morgan. “In my 11 years, this was the first time I was not involved with the planning of the segment,” she adds. “I felt like a lamb held out for slaughter…They had me there for 20 minutes.”

While all this gets figured out, CBS has silenced “The Talk” for a few days. With all the drama swirling around the show, the network is set to run repeats until at least Wednesday – that’s the word, according to “TV Line,” who reports that an internal memo has suits planning an ‘internal review’ of the entire situation in the meantime. Check out the tweets below.

  • Someone who isn’t exactly shocked by what’s happening at “The Talk?” Holly Robinson Peete, who you might recall was on the show as one of the original hosts. She stayed for one season before leaving in 2011. As Peete tells it, her exit had everything to do with Mrs. O. Taking to Twitter, Peete says “Sharon complained that I was too ‘ghetto’ for #theTalk…then I was gone.” She later added, “I LOVED being on The Talk … but sometimes awesome gifts come in humiliating packages.” While you digest that, consider that Osbourne is responding. She’s sharing an email Peete purportedly sent her via Twitter. It references a so-called ‘gag order’ that show execs had in place after Peete’s departure and Osborne adds that she’s never had power to fire anyone on the show. Jumping on it almost immediately? Journo Yashar Ali, who offers a point by point response to what he calls Osbourne’s “incomplete telling” of what happened. Check out the tweets below.

Source: Variety