James Corden Is Experiencing His ‘Ellen’ Moment

Earlier this week, James Corden was exposed as one of “those” customers, as restaurateur Keith McNally, owner of fancy French brasserie Balthazar in New York City, posted on Instagram that Corden was “the most abusive customer to my Balthazar servers since the restaurant opened 25 years ago.”

McNally claimed that Corden was “extremely nasty” and “yelling like crazy” at restaurant staff, and was allegedly infuriated by the sight of “a little bit of egg white” inside an egg yolk omelette with gruyere cheese that his wife had ordered. Corden, McNally declared, was banned from Balthazar.

Hours after McNally’s viral Instagram post, Corden called the restaurateur and “apologized profusely,” and was promptly unbanned from the brasserie. But the damage had been done; Corden’s reputation as the stuff of server’s nightmares was already cemented (and frankly, Corden never had a great reputation to begin with).

Social media soon lit up with stories from people claiming to have had a bad experience when dealing with Corden.

Much like Ellen DeGeneres, damning stories highlighting Corden’s allegedly dismissive attitude to workers have been floating around the internet for several years, without being acknowledged by mainstream media (unlike DeGeneres, Corden never had a reputation as a kind-hearted celebrity).

Three years ago, Corden’s disastrous Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) became the stuff of internet legend, after Redditors refused to engage in the PR machine, exchanging stories of tantrums and rude exchanges with Corden, leading to the AMA being promptly abandoned by Corden and his team. Interestingly, this isn’t the first time that an anonymous Redditor has posted a negative story about Corden.

Something similar happened on Twitter in the wake of the Balthazar ban, as users started to exchange Corden horror stories, and a common theme began to emerge. It really doesn’t cost anything to be nice to the workers who serve you – wealth and fame isn’t an excuse for rude and dismissive behavior.

Twitter users soon started having fun with Corden’s “cancellation,” cracking jokes and posting satirical stories.

Following the controversy, an interview with The New York Times saw the Late Late Show host claiming to be completely unbothered by the drama, yet he couldn’t seem to stop talking about it:

“I haven’t done anything wrong, on any level … I feel so Zen about the whole thing. Because I think it’s so silly. I just think it’s beneath all of us. It’s beneath you. It’s certainly beneath your publication.”

Corden then claimed to have not read any of the posts about him on social media, and said he would acknowledge the incident on The Late, Late Show: “I haven’t really read anything. It’s strange. It’s strange when you were there. I think I’m probably going to have to talk about it on Monday’s show.”

Corden then went on to complain about Twitter, claiming that the social media platform doesn’t reflect the opinions of the real world, stating that if he “lived on Twitter” then “Hillary Clinton is the president of the United States and Jeremy Corbyn won by a landslide.”

He went on to compare the critical social media posts about him (which he totally didn’t read, and feels very Zen about) to a school principal giving a platform to bullies: “The principal makes the decision to stand up and say, ‘I’d like all of those bullies to come up onto the stage and say, into the microphone, what they’ve just been saying in the hallway over there.’”

Amusingly, the NYTimes interview sparked the ire of McNally, who again took to Instagram to criticize the British comedian, writing:

“Was he joking? Or was he denying being abusive to my servers? Whatever Corden meant, his implication was clear: he didn’t do it. Although I didn’t witness the incident, lots of my restaurant’s floor staff did. They had nothing to gain by lying. Corden did. I wish James Corden would live up to his Almighty initials and come clean. If the supremely talented actor wants to retrieve the respect he had from all his fans (all 4 of them) before this incident, then he should at least admit he did wrong. If he goes one step further and apologizes to the 2 servers he insulted, I’ll let him eat for free at Balthazar for the next 10 years.”