Roseanne Barr Calls Former Co-Star Michael Fishman a ‘Little F***ing Worm’

Roseanne Barr launched an angry, profanity-laced attack on former co-star Michael Fishman during a recent podcast appearance.

The actress and political activist was responding to Fishman’s criticism last month of her 2018 comments about Valerie Jarrett, a former adviser to President Barack Obama. The remarks were widely condemned as racist and prompted ABC to cancel the Roseanne revival in May 2018.

Barr, 73, whose revived self-titled sitcom lasted less than two months before being pulled from the schedule, branded Fishman a “little f***ing worm” during Wednesday’s episode of the Can’t Be Censored podcast. 

Fishman, 44, said in August that the show had been “rightfully canceled” because of Barr’s comments, describing them as “indefensible” and “dehumanizing.”

Barr had compared Jarrett, who is Black, to the Planet of the Apes franchise. Critics denounced the comparison as racist, and ABC subsequently canceled the revived series.

Co-host Travis Dhanraj was asking Barr how she responded to Fishman’s remarks when she interrupted before he could finish the question and launched into her tirade.

“He f***ing doesn’t even f***ing know what I said, even though I’ve explained it 10,000 times for nine years on the Internet,” she said.

The comedian, who smoked cigarettes throughout the interview, continued by accusing Fishman of bigotry.

“He hasn’t even taken the time to listen to what I say because he’s a bigot,” Barr claimed. “And he’s a brainwashed bigot.”

Responding to the Daily Mail’s request for comment, a representative for Barr said: “I’m glad she finally decided to say something. A person can only take so much disgust before snapping.”

The Daily Mail also contacted Fishman’s representative for comment but had not received a response.

During the interview, Barr said Fishman had asked her to explain the meaning of the post she made about Jarrett: “muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes had a baby=vj.”

Critics at the time called the tweet racist because of its reference to Planet of the Apes. The mention of the Muslim Brotherhood also drew condemnation, as there is no indication that Jarrett has ever been a practicing Muslim.

Barr claimed she responded to Fishman by saying: “Let me explain this, Michael. Go and f*** yourself and stay f***ed ‘til the day you die. Don’t put my name in your f***ing mouth, shut the f*** up. You are an ignoramus and a bigot, and you have no idea what I said because it contradicts the Democrat party platform that you’ve had shoved down your throat and up your ass. So just f*** you. You have no geopolitical context whatsoever to discuss what I said.”

Barr then attempted to explain the meaning behind the tweet that ended her prospects of returning to television with Roseanne.

She said the post referred to the 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran, negotiated during Obama’s second term. The deal was later abandoned by Donald Trump after he took office.

Barr alleged that the deal had ‘destroyed the rights of women in Iran,’ and she claimed that ‘Planet of the Apes’ is what she had nicknamed Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

While she initially defended herself against accusations of racism, Barr later publicly apologized to Jarrett ‘for making a bad joke’ and even removed herself from Twitter (now X).

However, her apology did little to quell the backlash, and ABC canceled Roseanne, despite it being the third-highest-rated US show that year.

‘You think I said Black people look like monkeys,’ Barr continued as she redirected her fury at her former costar, Fishman. ‘Go f*** yourself, you little f***ing worm. 

‘And I’m glad they fired you, because I was the only reason you were ever on that show,’ Barr claimed. ‘They wanted to get rid of you in the reboot, and I made them take you back.’

Fishman appeared on the Roseanne reboot, which featured the rest of the main cast and was retitled The Conners, for its first seasons before he was given the ax. 

In 2022, he announced: ‘I was told I would not be returning for season 5.’

Fishman set off Barr after he spoke out on her racism scandal last month on Instagram

Fishman, who famously starred as Barr’s son D.J. Conner in the original series, the reboot and the 2018 spin-off The Conners, declared that the reboot was ‘rightfully canceled’ as he slammed the ‘indefensible’ and ‘dehumanizing’ remarks that Barr made nearly a decade ago.

He was responding to a fan comment speculating that Roseanne was axed because ‘woke crap took over.’

The commenter also condemned America for ‘backstabbing’ Barr after decades of celebrating her as an ‘edgy comedian.’

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Fishman included a screenshot of the comment in his video as an example of the ‘ignorant and inaccurate comments’ he claims to receive on a daily basis.

‘Mostly, I try to ignore them for over eight years. I’ve been dealing with it quietly. Usually, I don’t respond,’ he said. ‘After eight years, turning the other cheek is really not helping.

‘So, I guess the world failed to learn the lesson, so I’m going to point out – we are perpetuating a lie and people are using a political smoke screen to justify the indefensible.’

He reminded fans that Barr referred to her own comments as ‘indefensible’ in the aftermath of her racism scandal as he explained that justifying the ‘indefensible’ can lead ‘to real consequences.’

‘Real crimes situations like Trey Reed and Tasha Fortune, because dehumanizing people is never a joke,’ he said, referring to two Black people who mysteriously died in Mississippi this year.

‘See, when we’re on stage as comedians or on camera, we have the freedom to say whatever we want but that doesn’t mean there’s no responsibility and no consequences.

‘The brilliant comedians help us laugh at the darkest, darkest topics. Sadly, in this case, there was no joke. And the show was rightfully canceled. It’s the last time I’m really gonna go into this.’

While he greatly condemns Barr for the ‘joke’ that got her canned, Fishman also said that he ‘loves’ her and acknowledged that ‘good people make mistakes.’

‘And I love the one who made this mistake. I always will. I’ll always have compassion and love, and I’ve shown it continuously and she helped the world understand that good people can make mistakes.

‘But there was no joke. There’s only damage and dehumanizing and perpetuating racial tropes. Leads to real world consequences,’ he said.

‘And the only people who are “backstabbed” were the people who were targeted by the statements. And those who became collateral damage from it.’ 

To conclude his video, Fishman encouraged his 207,000 followers to think before they speak because ‘words have real world consequences.’

‘Be smart enough to just shut the hell up. Don’t finish the statement. Don’t hit send and certainly don’t rage against anybody else. Because words have real world consequences.

‘And some of us deal with them every day. That’s freedom of speech.’

Before issuing her apology to Jarrett in 2018, Barr had caused more uproar by tweeting that ‘Islam is not a race.’

As the backlash mounted, the comedian published an apology tweet directly to Jarrett, writing: ‘I am truly sorry for making a bad joke about her politics and her looks. I should have known better. Forgive me-my joke was in bad taste.’

Within hours, ABC made the decision to cancel the renewal for Roseanne’s 11th season, with President of ABC Entertainment Channing Dungey slamming Barr’s tweets as ‘abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values.’

Jarrett herself responded to Roseanne’s comments during a town hall on MSNBC called ‘Everyday Racism in America’ at the time.

She said ABC made the right call in canceling Barr’s show. ‘First of all, I think we have to turn it into a teaching moment,’ she said. 

‘I’m fine. I’m worried about all the people out there who don’t have a circle of friends and followers coming to their defense.’

She also claimed that then-Disney CEO Bob Iger had called her before the cancellation was publicly announced.

Barr’s axing from Roseanne had further consequences for her career as she was also dropped by her then-agent shortly after.

The reboot of the show, which originally ran from 1988 to 1997, looked at how the working-class Conner family were faring during the Trump era.

Along with Barr and Fishman, the short-lived show saw the return of original stars like John Goodman, Sara Gilbert and Laurie Metcalf.

Shortly after Roseanne’s cancellation in 2018, ABC greenlit a spin-off series The Conners, which brought back all of the Roseanne stars except Barr, whose character was killed off via an opioid overdose. The Conners ran for seven seasons until 2025.