Valerie Jarrett is an African-American woman who was appointed as a senior advisor to former President, Barack Obama. Having a position in the White House calls for a fair share of critics, but there was one in particular that really caught the eye of the public – Roseanna Barr. Barr tweeted out a racist comment towards Jarrett that lead to a cancelation of her revival show, Roseanne after it had proven to be very successful on ABC.
Jarret had talked to a crowd at an MSNBC town hall meeting about her conversation with Bob Iger. “Bob Iger, who’s the C.E.O. of Disney, called me before the announcement,” she added. “He apologized. He said that he had zero tolerance for that sort of racist, bigoted comment, and he wanted me to know before he made it public that he was canceling the show.” This was a smart move and the best decision for Disney who was looking to diversify and changeup stereotypes.
Months after the news broke that Roseanne was canceled, a spinoff was announced. The Conners, saw its debut last night on ABC without Roseanne. Viewers wondered how the show would address Roseanne’s absence on the show. We finally got our answers in the premiere. Roseanne had died from an opioid overdose.
The decision did not sit so well for Roseanne as we can see evidently from her tweet last night.
Lecy Goranson had nothing but empathy for Barr. “We really miss Roseanne and love her very much,” said Goranson, who plays older daughter Becky Conner. “Her spirit is still very much with us, so we understand that she’s hurting right now and she’s in pain. She’s always with us, so hopefully we can see her and kind of remedy this at some point in time, I hope.”
Michael Fishman who plays DJ Conner understood the circumstances that went into killing off such an important character. “The tone of the way she passed away was related to last season,” he explained. “If you listen to our producers, they really wanted to take a real crisis that’s happening to our country and find a way to give voice to that. I know that the reaction to that is going to be different for different people, but we’ve always tried to tackle big topics and be very honest about them.”
Showrunner Bruce Helford was optimistic about coming to this decision. “I wanted a respectful sendoff for her,” he said, “one that was relevant and could inspire discussion for the greater good about the American working class, whose authentic problems are often ignored by broadcast television. If you watched the first episode, I hope you’ll agree we did that.”
The Conners drew in a 2.3 rating amongst 18-49 years old. Overall, they took in 10.500 million viewers.