APOLOGY TOUR

Martha Stewart Grovels to ‘Today’ Host She Blamed for Fiasco

Craig Melvin asked her why he was “dragged” into her controversy.

Martha Stewart has issued another apology after her Halloween fiasco, this time to Today host Craig Melvin.

The lifestyle mogul has been under fire since she decided that dressing up as a homeless person was an appropriate Halloween costume. In a bizarre turn of events, she blamed Melvin for the controversy.

Stewart, 85, was condemned after she wore tattered clothes, smearing black “dirt” on her face, and held up a sign reading, “I AM HUNGRY HELP ME!!” She inexplicably accompanied this Halloween post with a pitch to buy her QVC candles.

After being slammed for being “tone deaf” and “out of touch,” Stewart, worth an estimated $400 million, issued two separate apologies but then threw Melvin under the bus.

She blamed the Today host for spilling chocolate ganache on her sweater during the show’s Oct. 30 Halloween special. The two were participating in a cake-decorating segment, during which Stewart was dressed as Snoop Dogg. On air, Stewart quipped, “Real Snoop would never do that.”

But after the controversy reached boiling point, she condemned Melvin more seriously. “What’s his name on The Today Show, Craig, who played Snoop on The Today Show on Friday, he spilled chocolate all over my sweater, which I was gonna wear on Halloween night,” she told the audience onstage at the CrossCountry Mortgage Sales Rally in Orlando, Florida.

“And so when I picked up the sweater, I said, ‘Oh, God, it’s so dirty,’” she continued. Stewart then explained that she only had 10 minutes to put a costume together before a Halloween party she was invited to.

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“The easiest costume was to get dressed up as a bum,” she said. “I looked at myself, and I said, ‘You really look hungry and homeless.’ So I wrote a sign that said ‘I’m hungry,’ and boy, did that go off.”

Her explanation only fueled the PR nightmare further.

But on Friday morning, Stewart appeared on the Today show with Melvin himself to set the record straight, saying her mention of him was just a “joke.”

“I didn’t have a costume because you had spilled some chocolate on my white sweater,” she told Melvin, “And, uh, and I don’t blame you at all. It was a joke that I said I blamed you. It was not a—it was stupid.”

She then said her grandson said it was “tone-deaf.”

‘TONE DEAF’

Martha Stewart Says She ‘Screwed Up’ With Halloween Costume

Meera Navlakha

“It was just stupid,” Stewart said emphatically.

“I apologize because I was not taking—I was not making fun of anybody or making light of the great problems that face our country,” she continued.

Melvin asked her once again, “And why was I dragged into it?”

“Oh, no. I was making a joke. I was giving a talk, and I just made a joke that you had spilled chocolate on me, and so I couldn’t wear that costume which I had planned to wear on Halloween night to this party, and that became part of the story,” she explained again. “Of course they picked up on that, because you’re you.”

“But I did apologize,” Melvin said. “And we moved on.”

“But to be clear, there was no connection between that and the costume later,” he clarified.

Stewart agreed with a laugh, saying, “And it wasn’t your fault.”

The veteran TV host then asked what lessons she had learned.

“Pay closer attention to social issues. Be aware. I’m aware of all those social issues as you can imagine. I care desperately about all the problems facing us. But I made a mistake. I mean, I was stupid. What else can I say? That’s what else can I say? I’m so sorry,” she said.

Her on-air apology was much stronger than her previous statements, which she inexplicably deleted from social media.

Stewart continued to say, “I hope that my followers and my fans and the rest of America forgives me for doing something that was not meant in any way to be a bad thing.”

Melvin and Stewart appeared to bury the hatchet, with the homemaking icon telling Melvin, “Thank you for letting me say it on TV on my favorite show.” Melvin said in turn, “Martha, thank you for coming to apologize.”

She will be turning to Today for an upcoming Thanksgiving special.

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Meera NavlakhaEntertainment Reporter

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