GMA Cancels Adam Lambert Concert, Early Show Picks it Up
Good Morning Americacanceled
the Adam Lambert live concert that was supposed to air tomorrow morning. The network was reacting to 1500 complaints about the raunchiness of his performance at the American Music Awards on Sunday night.
The official explanation from GMA is kind of hilarious. An ABC News rep told TVNewser
that "given his controversial live performance on the AMAs we were concerned about airing a similar concert so early in the morning."
So ABC News execs have no problem with man on man kissing, bondage or simulated oral sex, so long as it's not too early in the morning before they've had their coffee.
Arch rival The Early Show jumped on this opportunity and now Adam will appear tomorrow morning on the CBS talk show. He'll sing live and talk about his AMA performance.
Here's what Adam had to say to Ryan Seacrest this morning.
On his racy AMA performance:
"It's choreography, we were dancing. The sexuality of it kind of got a little more extreme when I got up on stage. I think the adrenaline kind of took me over, and I admit it, and i'm proud of the fact that I did get a little carried away."
"I don't feel I owe anyone an apology for anything. I performed, it was late night TV, I did something that female performers have been doing for years, no different. It's just the fact that I'm me and it's a little different for people. It's really not that big of a deal....I'm not a babysitter, I'm a performer."
On the appearance of a double standard:
"I do think there's a slight double standard. We've seen female pop performers doing extremely sexual routines for years and all of the sudden a guy does it and it's crazy."
On ABC's decision to cancel his GMA performance:
"Obviously I respect their decision, they gotta do what they gotta do. It's too bad, I think there were a lot of fans who were excited to come see me.
They probably had a lot of pressure coming at them from certain people who weren't happy about it. I respect their decision -- I don't necessarily agree with it, but they need to do what they need to do."
We seriously doubt Adam was going to to anything inappropriate on Good Morning America: he is aware of what is appropriate for morning talk shows.
As for his AMA performance, we don't think Adam was expecting children in the audience, hence the "I'm not a babysitter" comment. He may not realize
how many children were allowed to stay up late to see him on ABC because their entire families watched him faithfully on American Idol.
Most parents don't want their young children to see sexualized performances of any kind: whether the performers are gay or straight is irrelevant. No parent was expecting that on ABC; they do expect it on MTV or HBO and take appropriate steps to make sure their children don't see it until they are older. We get the feeling from his interviews that Adam believed he was doing a performance for a strictly adult audience, and that it would be aired late at night.
