Kevin Hart said he wouldn’t change anything about the way he handled the past month of controversy over his years-old, homophobic tweets and decision to step down as host of the Academy Awards on The Late Show Wednesday.
Hart’s interview with Stephen Colbert came after a full day of interviews with other media outlets, during which he continually said of the scandal, “I’m over it.” Hart repeated the sentiment on The Late Show, saying, “It’s an onion – no matter how many times you keep peeling it, it’s just endless. There is no end to it. I apologized, I apologized again, I said I apologized before, I apologized after that apology. It just keeps going.”
Colbert then asked Hart whether he had the sense that the audience was over the controversy. Hart replied that he felt like he’d done everything possible to please, and that at a certain point he had to make a decision to stop trying to please.
“My job is me, putting myself out there 24/7, I’m authentic, I’m honest, I give you all of me, there is no version of me that’s fake,” Hart said. “The bonus of doing that, is that when things like this happen, you’re supposed to understand and know that I’m so true to me that there is no b.s… At some point you just have to be ok with you. I’m ok with me and all the decisions I’ve made in my life.”
While Hart also reiterated that he had no plans to re-accept the Oscars gig, he did tease what would have been the opening to his monologue. Explaining that Oscars audiences are very tense, Hart said he would’ve told the crowd, “Relax! The last thing you want to become is a meme. A meme will end your career.”