Rosie O'Donnell: 'Ching Chong' Jokes

Rosie: Over One Billion Offended?

Mon., Dec. 11, 2006 1:56 PM PST by Gina Serpe

Apparently, offending Kelly Ripa and the whole of the Claynation was just a warm-up for Rosie O'Donnell.

The loose-lipped View master completed her alienation hat trick last Thursday, managing to offend some in the Chinese-American community with an impromptu impersonation.

O'Donnell was discussing Danny DeVito's earlier visit to the show, in which the actor showed up drunk after a late night of Limoncello-guzzling with George Clooney, saying the incident was blown way out of proportion by the media.

"The fact is that it's news all over the world," she said of DeVito's intoxicating appearance. "You know, you can imagine in China it's like, 'Ching-chong, ching-chong. Danny DeVito. Ching-chong, ching-chong-chong. Drunk. The View. Ching-chong.' "

O'Donnell's fellow coffee talkers, including grand dame Barbara Walters, could be heard laughing during the remarks.

But not all View viewers were yukking it up.

New York City Councilman John C. Liu, who earlier this year spouted off on the un-PC premise of a racially divided Survivor, was quick to respond to O'Donnell's ill-advised impression, something he says his office received many complaints over.

"Her caricature of the Chinese language hits a raw nerve in our community," Liu wrote in a letter to Walters, whom he claimed should have known better than to sit idly by while the "derogatory remarks" were made. O'Donnell's words, he added, "have consequences beyond the stupidity of the person who made them."

"What will you do to hold yourself and those who host the program accountable for such offensive remarks?" Liu asked.

O'Donnell's rep shot back with an unapologetic response to the New York Daily News, painting her client as being targeted by those who apparently just can't take a joke.

"I certainly hope that one day they will be able to grasp her humor," Cindi Berger told the newspaper.

Incidentally, while O'Donnell's remarks may have damaged her race relations, it should be noted that she was not, as the Daily News incorrectly reported, in cahoots with particularly jocular producers.

The paper claimed that following O'Donnell's comments, a gong was sounded off camera. However, that specific piece of sonic insensitivity was actually added to a clip of the incident posted on Gawker and was not something that had actually occurred on air.

As it is, even the gongless remarks were enough to irk the larger community.

"The use of distorted phrases is insulting to the Chinese and Chinese Americans, and gives the impression that they are a group that is substandard to English-speaking people," the Asian-American Journalists Association said.

It's not O'Donnell's first time sparking outrage over comments she's made on air. It's not even the first time in the past month.

In late November, the veteran chatterbox declared that Kelly Ripa unforgivably spouted a homophobic remark toward the sexually undeclared Clay Aiken after she scolded him for covering her mouth during an interview by saying she didn't know where his hand had been.

Ripa called in to the View to defend herself, calling O'Donnell's implication that she was a homophobe "outrageous."

Whatever viewers may make of O'Donnell's occasional headline-grabbing bursts, they certainly aren't tuning out.

The femme-fueled morning show averaged 3.4 million viewers during November sweeps, increasing 27 percent since this time last year.

The DeVito incident added to the show's drawing power. In fact, what precipitated O'Donnell's comments was Walters' revelation that DeVito had called him to apologize for his incoherence, saying he wasn't drunk, just groggy.

"Danny, I love ya," O'Donnell said. "It's all right that you were drunk."

Walters also said DeVito invited her out the next time he goes boozing with Clooney, and then she added that the makers of Limoncello were so psyched by all the View-powered publicity that they shipped over a case of the liquor.

And despite some talk last week that O'Donnell was planning on ditching the show for a possible full-time stint on FX's Nip/Tuck, the comedian shot down those rumors on Thursday's show.

After noting that  Nip/Tuck shoots during The View's hiatus, O'Donnell said, "Don't anybody worry where Rosie's going. She's right here."

Source
http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/b53940_rosie_over_one_billion_offended.html

Rosie Ching Chong O'Donnell

Rosie Apology