Actress and comedian Mo’Nique is the latest to join in on disputing Oprah Winfrey’ recent comments about Whitney Houston.
Mo’Nique criticized Oprah while reacting to Oprah’s claim that Houston had relapsed on drugs and was high during her 2009 “Oprah Show” appearance.
Oprah’s remarks were made at this year’s Cannes Lions Festival.
She said Houston later returned to the show to perform and had relapsed in her addiction. “I had such trust from ‘The Oprah Show’ audience … I think it was [Houston’s] last show with us, and she had gone back on drugs,” Winfrey said. “The first interview I did with her when we’d gone behind stage and I asked her about her intention, she was clean, but the day she came to my show then to perform in front of the audience, she was not, and she fell off of the stage.”
She also said she urged audience members not to share photos.
“I knew that if that story got out … she would be destroyed by that,” Oprah said. “And so even though the audience was there and the audience had cameras, I begged them not to put those pictures out because it would ruin her life, and they did not. That would not happen today, I can tell you that,” she added.
Mo’Nique disputes Oprah’s decision to Houston’s personal struggles
Mo’Nique, a long time critic of Oprah, clapped back on Oprah’s decision in a recent radio appearance.
The comedian questioned the fairness of discussing incidents involving someone who is no longer alive to confirm or deny what happened.
“How do you speak about someone that can’t defend it?” she said. “Now you just want everybody to take your word because you’re the great Oprah Winfrey… I believe that’s unfair.”
Mo’Nique’s comments arrive a few days after radio talk show host Rickey Smiley also called out Oprah. On a livestream, Smiley suggested the comments served no constructive purpose and instead reopened painful conversations about the Grammy-winning singer’s struggles with addiction.