\u201cSearch my car?\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the moment Arsenio Hall says everything shifted.<\/p>\n
In an excerpt from Arsenio: A Memoir, published by Page Six<\/a>, the former late-night host recalls being stopped by security on the Paramount lot in 1992 \u2014 the same day equipment had been stolen from the set of The Arsenio Hall Show.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have to search your car,\u201d a guard told him as he tried to leave, according to the excerpt.<\/p>\n Hall said he couldn\u2019t believe what he was hearing. \u201cSomebody stole equipment from my show\u2026 You think I stole my own stuff?\u201d<\/p>\n For him, the accusation wasn\u2019t just about the moment \u2014 it was about what it represented. “I know Johnny [Carson] has never been accused of stealing Doc Severinsen\u2019s equipment,” he wrote, before asking, “Did you search Ted Danson\u2019s car when he left?”<\/p>\n Danson, Hall pointed out, “unlike me, is white.”<\/p>\n The situation escalated quickly. Hall said his assistant, J Dub, snapped part of the Paramount gate during the confrontation \u2014 something he still reflects on years later. \u201cI\u2019m not proud that we broke the Paramount gate,\u201d Hall wrote. \u201cI\u2019m less proud of the anger I feel constantly, coiled inside me like a live electrical wire.\u201d<\/p>\n But the moment didn\u2019t happen in isolation.<\/p>\n Hall, who became the first Black host of a nationally syndicated late-night talk show, said he was navigating constant pressure behind the scenes, including what he described as “outpourings of hate, both blatant and thinly disguised.”<\/p>\n As the show\u2019s ratings began to shift, that pressure showed up in new ways.<\/p>\n Hall said he was told focus groups viewed the show as \u201ctoo black,\u201d and recalled being advised not to call guests \u201cbrother\u201d or wear ripped jeans.<\/p>\n At the same time, he felt pulled in opposite directions. \u201cBlack people saying I\u2019m too white, white people saying I\u2019m too black\u2026\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n The Arsenio Hall Show, which ran from 1989 to 1994, helped reshape late night \u2014 bringing hip-hop, younger audiences, and a different cultural perspective into a space that hadn\u2019t fully made room for it. But behind the scenes, Hall suggests, that shift didn\u2019t come without resistance.<\/p>\n The Black Information Network is your source for Black News! Get the latest news 24\/7 on The Black Information Network. Listen now on the\u00a0iHeartRadio app<\/a>\u00a0or click\u00a0HERE<\/a>\u00a0to tune in live.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cSearch my car?\u201d That\u2019s the moment Arsenio Hall says everything shifted. In an excerpt from Arsenio: A Memoir,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375454,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[168276,168275,321,93,61,60,168277],"class_list":["post-375453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-arsenio-hall","tag-bin","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-the-arsenio-hall-show"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375453"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375453\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}