ABC Drops ‘Roseanne’ From Press Site

ABC canceled its reboot of Roseanne on Monday, May 29 hours after series star Roseanne Barr sent out a racist tweet comparing former Barack Obama aide Valerie Jarrett to an ape, among other inflammatory statements.

The network announced the cancellation in a statement from ABC Entertainment president Channing Dungey.

“Roseanne’s Twitter statement is abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values, and we have decided to cancel her show,” the statement read, via The Hollywood Reporter.

Since the announcement, ABC has already removed the show from its press website, making it clear that they plan on quickly severing ties with the series.

Since the reboot of Roseanne premiered, its ratings had been impressive despite the near-constant controversy surrounding Barr and her inflammatory opinions. The show had just finished its season last week and was expected to return in the fall.

In a now-deleted tweet on Tuesday, Barr had written that if “muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes had a baby=vj.”

Barr later apologized for the tweet.

After Dungey released her statement, Robert A. Iger, the chief executive of the Walt Disney Company, retweeted her words and added, “There was only one thing to do here, and that was the right thing.”

Sources told the New York Times that the cancellation was decided on by Dungey with Iger’s support and that Iger was involved in the process starting early on Tuesday.

Just weeks ago, Barr had been the centerpiece of ABC’s pitch to advertisers regarding its fall lineup, with the actress’ Twitter account even making for some lighthearted banter at the event.

When she was introduced, Barr joked that her tweets were actually written by the head of ABC’s television group, Ben Sherwood, with Sherwood joking that he had “absolutely nothing to do with Roseanne’s Twitter account” while a parody tweet by Barr was displayed that referred to Sherwood as more “handsome” and “rugged” than Ben Affleck.

Photo Credit: ABC / Robert Trachtenberg