In what’s been almost a year since her controversial photo with a bloodied Donald Trump mask went viral, Kathy Griffin has retreated from the national spotlight, save a contrite interview or two. Because no one in this country would book her and she was fired from her job as Anderson Cooper’s co-host of CNN’s New Year’s Eve broadcast, Griffin has been touring internationally, doing shows in 23 countries since the incident. Now, she’s back, and her first shows will be happening right on the Commander-in-Chief’s home turf.
“I’m dipping my toes into touring again even though the Trumps and nobody wants me to work again,” Griffin told Bill Maher on HBO’s Real Time Friday night, her first major public appearance since the photos. The first two in the tour are set for New York’s Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center, which Griffin joked was right in “Trump’s backyard.”
Griffin told Maher she appreciated his ongoing support, saying, “Thank you for being one of the first and only people to publicly support me and say what happened is bullshit, publicly.” Maher responded that, in today’s political climate, everyone in the country goes “bat shit nuts about everything.”
“You took a very bad selfie,” Maher said. “I blame the photographer… it turned out to be very wacky.”
Of her international tour, Griffin said it wasn’t easy. “I was detained at every single airport,” she said. “They scan your passport. They put me in a detention room… There were times when they took my devices. When you’re in that moment, you’re at the mercy of the one or two people in that room.” She mentioned that she was on Interpol’s international criminals list, to which Maher joked, “You were on the D-list. Now you’re on the no-fly list.”
Griffin ended her segment by announcing that, for her next photoshoot, she’d pose with Mike Pence’s disembodied head. “Just kidding! Ten months I waited to do that joke. Ten months!”
(Excerpt) Read More in: Vanity Fair