Alan Carr - stuffs herb into mouth of team member who says she is allergic to it

[cakeorwine]

‘I used to say awful things’: Alan Carr on divorce, dating and the skit that haunts him | Alan Carr | The Guardian

Idiot. There is so much to say about this - power, control and a total lack of understanding of allergies.

"We’re in a big echoing loft with wood floors and he’s talking to his team as if they are all on stage and I – sitting in the corner – am the audience. He wants to know why one of them is picking bits out of her salad. He doesn’t accept that she’s allergic to coriander. Whoever heard of being allergic to coriander?"

There are six of us in this photo studio, including Carr’s manager, makeup, wardrobe and a publicist from ITV. He picks up the coriander and stuffs it into the mouth of the woman who said she was allergic. “See!” he declares, triumphant. “You’re not really allergic. If you were, you’d be dead by now.” He cackles. Everyone else cackles. It’s like the canned laughter of witches"

I just don't know what to say about this. Some allergies are less well known but still cause allergic reactions. And should be taken seriously.

Ah this is disappointing! Especially as I have a friend who was a runner on the Allan Carr Show years ago and absolutely loved him - apparently he was very sweet and kind.

So the woman in the article is lying?

Just want to amplify this.

A lot of disgusting posts on this thread minimising Carr's behaviour and minimising allergies in general.

Apparently some people have a different gene and coriander tastes like soap - its likely she was just using 'allergy' as a short cut but regardless that is appalling behaviour if it happened.

Tbh while not life threatening an intolerance reaction is awful, it can be many hours of severe pain, exhaustion, sweating, feeling hollowed out etc as well as impacting bowel movements so being blasé about the impact of these because it is not immediately life threatening is not nice, or necessary imo both can be true

1. Some allergies are contact only, so yes you can pick the offending item off a plate. But
2. It doesn't matter why she didn't want to eat coriander. It tastes vile to some people-like soap. She didn't want to eat it. His behaviour was appalling.

That's exactly what I thought. Could be an 'in joke'. It seems unlikely he would do something genuinely unpleasant and aggressive in front of a journalist.

I’m allergic to lavender and it’s everywhere!
I can walk past it and as long as I don’t touch it I don’t need my epipen.
I can however, dig it out of the garden and be fine.

even so, the attitude towards someone’s allergies are almost abusive on here.
would they have found it funny if he’d smashed a cream cake into their face just because he wanted to?
is it just banter?
tom foolery? Just like John Barrowman??

I pick out and pick round the food that I am allergic to as it won’t cause me immediate life threatening issues but the vomit, the bloating, the pain when I have eaten them without initially realising is horrid. I am amazed at the over confidence shown here about how this woman probably wasn’t allergic. Bit like the nursery staff who deliberately fed my allergic ds a fruit that isn’t a usual allergen as “she didn’t want him to miss out” which is what he did when it was a week before he was well enough to return to school.

It's an interesting interview, apart from the coriander business, there's a few other significant bits and various words used which seem to imply that Carr is a bit of a cunt in real life.

Maybe he is or maybe it's a hatchet job from the Guardian - who knows?

So The Guardian is lying?

The allergy is only relevant as to how serious this assault was.

Even if she was an "i'm allergic to everything " type that doesn't give anyone the right to shove food(or anything ) in her mouth or even in her face.

The lack of an allergy does not an excuse make. The behaviour is still shit. The lack of an allergy only means that the consequences for the VICTIM were less severe. So just manhandled and humiliated, rather than seriously ill on top of it as well.

The minimising on this thread, victim blaming and mental gymnastics to excuse shitty behaviour is mind boggling.

It didn't happen.
If it happened it wasn't that bad.
If it happened you deserved it.

It was ever thus.

I agree with this. Coriander is well known as a herb that divides the crowd, and although it doesn't excuse his actions it might explain why he had this hunch about her.

If she'd had a reaction I expect he would have been arrested for assault. He's lucky she didn't press charges anyway.

I think everyone is taking this too literally when the journalist is clearly trying to use emotive language and dramatic storytelling o create a controversial or publicised story.

I thought the article was well written. The journalist was pointing out what Carr did and letting people draw their own conclusions...

This - clearly she was not allergic

However, he is still out of order

I don't like Carr. He's tedious, irritating and attention-seeking. Perfect for stand up, maybe, but not in things like Interior Design Masters.

Have you read the thread and the contributions from people with allergies?

stuffing something into someone’s mouth when you know that at best they don’t like or at worst are allergic to it is a cuntish thing to do but then tbh I always thought he came over as a bit of a cunt 🤷🏻‍♀️

Food intolerance is not fucking funny it's really horrible. Some of you need to educate yourselves before you comment.

I remember he had a whole part of his act ridiculing allergies when he first started. We'd just found out my dd had a serious allergy at the time & it scared me that he was so dismissive.

Thank you for your wise words.

@LimitIsUp how is it "clearly "?

Allergies differ in the seriousness of a reaction, what kind of contact is needed for a reaction, the form the allergen is in (raw,cooked etc. ) and so on.There is no clearly.

I take it, OP, you are never going to watch any comedian. They all cover something, which people will look for take offence to. As this has put most of you off Carr, I take it, also, you will regret watching After Life. Ricky Gervais makes some excellent points about offence taking.
As for pp saying witches cackle is misogynistic, seriously..

This was not a "joke" in a comedy set.

This was real life behaviour. You can see the difference?