Home
entertainment
news
11 of the most awkward and cringe celebrity red carpet interviews of the last decade

11 of the most awkward and cringe celebrity red carpet interviews of the last decade

Esme Mazzeo

Hugh Grant, Tiffany Haddish, and Taylor Swift have had three of the most awkward red carpet moments of the last decade.Mike Coppola/Getty Images; PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images; Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic

Ashley Graham's exchange with Hugh Grant wasn't the only odd red carpet moment at the 2023 Oscars.
From weird remarks to rude replies, celebrities and interviewers sometimes have awkward encounters.

Hugh Grant gave Ashley Graham a crash course in awkward interviews on the 2023 Oscars red carpet.

Ashley Graham asked Hugh Grant some pretty standard questions while interviewing him on the red carpet for ABC's "Countdown to the Oscars," and he didn't indulge her one bit.

After struggling to engage the actor, Graham tried asking an age-old carpet question: "Well, what are you wearing tonight then?"

"Just my suit," Grant replied.

And it only gets worse. When asked about his appearance in the 2022 murder mystery hit "Glass Onion," Grant replied, "Well, I'm barely in it. I'm in it for about three seconds."

The painful exchange left us with one question: if he didn't want to be there, why'd he stop for the interview at all?

George Pennacchio told Kate Hudson she'd won an Oscar.

Kate Hudson attended the 2023 Oscars on March 12. Mike Coppola/Getty Images

In another awkward 2023 Oscars moment, ABC reporter George Pennacchio told Kate Hudson she knew what it was "like to win an Oscar" when, in fact, she's never actually won the golden statuette. (Though she did receive a best supporting actress nomination in 2001 for her performance in "Almost Famous.")

When Hudson reminded him of this, Pennacchio said she'd won in his head.

"I'm sure it's amazing," she said.

Lauren Zima asked Tiffany Haddish about her "costume change" at the 2022 Vanity Fair Oscars afterparty.

When Entertainment Tonight reporter Lauren Zima asked Tiffany Haddish about her "costume change" at the 2022 Vanity Fair Oscars afterparty, the comedian was quick to put Zima in her place. "I'm not wearing a costume, I'm wearing Dolce & Gabbana," the actress replied. "It's called an evening gown darling. No one's paying me for this, I paid for it. It's custom."

Zima tried to ease the tension with a joke, laughing about her "time of death" but Haddish wasn't finished.

"This is not an acting gig, this is my life," the "Girls Trip" star continued. "This what fame look like. This what success look like. This what money look like."

Haddish went on to praise her friend Will Smith for slapping Oscars host Chris Rock earlier that night after Rock publicly mocked Smith's wife and actor Jada Pinkett Smith.

Thanks to Jim Carrey, Catt Sadler expercienced a strange red carpet moment at the 2017 Harper's Bazaar ICONS party.

It's clear that Jim Carrey wasn't thrilled about attending the Harper's Bazaar ICONS party in 2017. What's not clear is why he showed up in the first place.

"There's no meaning to any of this," he told former E! reporter Catt Sadler when asked about his attendance. "I wanted to find the most meaningless thing that I could come to and join and here I am."

Sadler pressed him about the meaning of the word "icon" among other topics, but Carrey only continued on an existential rant about the meaning of life.

His top WTH remarks include, "I believe we're a field of energy dancing through itself" and "we don't matter."

Debra Messing called out E! while live on E! at the 2018 Golden Globes.

Speaking of Sadler, Debra Messing supported her on the 2018 Golden Globes red carpet while talking to E! reporter Giuliana Rancic. Sadler left the company in 2017 after learning that her co-host on E! News, Jason Kennedy, made double her salary.

"We want equal pay," Messing said to Rancic while explaining that she had worn black in solidarity with the #Timesup movement against workplace sexual harassment. "And you know, I was so shocked to hear that E! doesn't believe in paying their female co-hosts the same as their male cohosts. I miss Catt Sadler. So, we stand with her."

Rancic and Messing were both professional about the moment, but it was still awkward to watch E! get called out on its own airwaves.

Taylor Swift quickly put Nancy O'Dell in her place after her strange comment about men at the 2015 Grammys.

Taylor Swift quickly put Entertainment Tonight reporter Nancy O'Dell in her place on the 2015 Grammy's red carpet when O'Dell said that Swift was going to walk home with awards and "lots of men."

"I'm not going to walk home with any men tonight," Swift quickly shot back. "I'm going to go hang out with my friends and then I go home to the cats."

Not even Swift's wit and grace could erase the cringe from that question.

Lil Uzi Vert didn't have much to say to Rancic at the 2018 Grammys.

Rapper Lil Uzi Vert seemed unfazed by both the Grammys and E! reporter Rancic at the 2018 Grammys. He had one-word answers to nearly everything she asked and didn't seem excited about his nominations, which included one in the coveted best new artist category.

"This is normal, this is my life, so it's like, whatever," he said at one point. Okay, whatever.

A TNT reporter didn't do enough research on Mayim Bialik at the 2014 SAG Awards.

Frazer Harrison/Getty

A TNT reporter at the 2014 SAG Awards didn't do enough research on "The Big Bang Theory" actor Mayim Bialik before asking her how many people "think you can solve calculus at the drop of a hat" because of her character Amy Fowler.

Bialik is a trained neuroscientist, so her reply was, "Um, I actually was trained in calculus for several years, yeah. I'm a neuroscientist, so, you may not have known that." He then awkwardly replied that he knew she was a scientist, he just didn't know her specialty.

Terrence Howard rambled on about science, math, and mythology at the 2019 Emmys when asked about his decision to retire from acting.

KTLA made headlines with "Empire" actor Terrence Howard when its reporters asked him to elaborate on if he was retiring from acting forever.

He said he was done "for good." (Pretty straightforward.)

"I spent 37 years pretending to be people so that people can pretend to watch and enjoy what I'm doing," he continued. (That's fair.)

From then on, he proceeded to make very little sense, rambling on about "Pythagoras," "the flower of life," and "platonic solids." (Now, here's where he lost me.)

Melanie Griffith and Dakota Johnson brought family drama to the 2015 Oscars.

Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP

Melanie Griffith and her daughter and actor "Fifty Shades of Grey" star Dakota Johnson attended the 2015 Oscars together following the film's box office debut.

When a reporter asked Griffith if she had seen the erotic romantic drama, an awkward little mother-daughter spat broke out on the red carpet.

"Well, she's a really good actress. I don't need to see that to know how good she is," Griffith told the reporter at one point. Griffith added that it would be "strange" for her to see the thriller, though Johnson said she wanted her mom to see it.

There's nothing more uncomfortable than finding yourself stuck in the middle of a family debate.

A TNT reporter once commented on Rashida Jones' skin tone at the 2015 SAG Awards.

Rashida Jones Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images

At the 2015 SAG Awards, TNT reporter Danielle Demski told Rashida Jones that she looked "tan and tropical," like she'd "just got off an island or something."

Jones, who is biracial and the daughter of African-American music legend Quincy Jones, replied, "I mean, you know, I'm ethnic."

What else is there to say?