Ahh, reddit’s famous AMAs (Ask Me Anything) have attracted everyone, from A-list celebs to even former presidents. While most celebs who participate in AMAs leave with a “cool” reputation, for many others, the experience backfires. For one, redditors hate when celebs use AMAs only to promote a project. They also hate when famous folks refuse to answer questions, give blunt/rude answers, or use fake accounts to control the type of questions being asked. In other words, AMAs are about being an open book, and when celebs try to skirt the rules, the reddit community responds with vengeance. Below, a few celebrity AMAs that went horrifically south.
When Woody went on reddit to promote his film Rampart, he mistakenly treated the AMA like his own personal press conference, answering only softball questions and directing all conversation back to his film. This angered redditors, who started asking more personal questions. When one person accused Woody of allegedly sleeping with an underage classmate, Woody surprisingly responded by saying he only wanted to answer questions that were related with the film. From that point, the comments spiraled as redditors openly mocked him for using the platform solely for promotional purposes. Halfway through the AMA, many started to suspect that the answers weren’t even written by Woody but by his publicist. “This whole AMA is a good example of how not to use the internet for marketing,” a redditor wrote. To date, his AMA is still considered one of the worst.
When Morgan decided to do an AMA, it should’ve been epic. After all, it’s Morgan friggin’ Freeman, an actor as beloved as Tom Hanks (whose AMA was less disastrous, in comparison). But as cool as it would’ve been to riff with Morgan as he told Shawshank stories, the reality was that the 81-year-old actor didn’t really get reddit. His answers were blunt, insincere, and downright odd at best. For example, when someone asked what did he look for when reading scripts, Morgan wrote, “I am looking for interest.” Really? That’s it?
Halfway into the AMA, redditors started to wonder if the person posting was really Morgan. When people started demanding proof, Morgan uploaded a questionable picture of himself sleeping with a clearly Photoshopped sign on his chest. Many started to suspect that Morgan fell asleep during the AMA, forcing a publicist to write answers for him. Others had a theory that neither Morgan or his team were behind the AMA at all. Although people still don’t know what happened, at least the whole incident birthed a hilarious meme.
The author and political commentator already had a polarizing audience when she decided to do an AMA in 2014, but instead of arguing and debating with people like she does on TV, she used her AMA to brush up her comedic chops. Too bad none of her jokes landed. It all started when someone asked her what did she think of transgenders. Her response? “I loved TransWorld Airlines. So sorry to see them go.” Um, Ann, sweetie, that’s not an answer? But she continued this throughout the whole AMA as she left baffling non-answers to legitimate questions. To make the AMA even more frustrating, Ann had technical problems with her computer and had to create a second account, which made it difficult to see which questions she was even answering. Maybe Ann didn’t realize AMAs were something to take seriously.
Mark’s 2013 AMA wasn’t too bad. He answered the majority of fans’ questions and seemed to be having a good time with it. However, a few redditors couldn’t help but bring up his infamous past. When the question of his old assault record came up, Mark wisely ignored it. But the question, which got upvoted 2,000 times, soured the tone of the AMA, with some fans even turning against him entirely. All Mark wanted to do was promote his film 2 Guns, but he ended up losing fans in the process.
You have to give the infamous gossip blogger some credit. His AMA was brutal. Although he was a refreshingly good sport about it — debating with redditors, answering every question sincerely, and even apologizing for some of his past behavior — the tone of the AMA was so negative, it was hard to enjoy. After several questions from people asking Perez why he was so terrible, one person eventually asked, “Do you regret doing this AMA yet?” Perez answered no, but who knows what he was really thinking.
When the actress started an AMA to promote her show Imaginary Mary, she got flooded with questions about her involvement with the controversial religion (and alleged cult) Scientology. She avoided answering all those questions and, instead, only answered easy questions written by people with new accounts. Redditors found that suspicious and started suspecting that Jenna had a team of people create reddit accounts for the sole purpose of writing PR-approved questions. Once everyone found out, reddit tore her to shreds, causing her to abandon the AMA and never return.
Maybe Denis was just having a bad day, but his AMA from earlier this year was a Woody Harrelson-level disaster. It probably didn’t help that people on reddit weren’t fans of his work to begin with, so many of the questions were snarky and negative. To make matters worse, many of Denis’ answers were focused on the book he was trying to promote, which angered folks even more. “Did nobody tell you what AMAs were about?” a redditor asked him. For the rest of the AMA, Denis barely gave any real answers, nor did he address any rumors or accusations against him. He did, however, spend a good hour arguing and trading insults with neckbeards. So there was that.
If you truly want to anger reddit, only do an AMA for 20 minutes. That’s what Hilary did when she had a super quick AMA while promoting her album in 2015. Although she answered a few questions and was super sweet, redditors didn’t appreciate being “used” and quickly downvoted the entire AMA. Although, to be honest, Hilary probably aborted the AMA once she realized how brutal the questions were. Hey, reddit’s not for everyone.
However, the worst allegation came from a redditor who claimed to be Jose’s former neighbor. In his comment, he wrote that Jose once threatened to shoot his dog, which caused his parents to take the proactive approach and give the dog away. “I only hope the one day you realize what a horrible human being you have been and how poorly you have treated those around you and live with that guilt until you die lonely and miserable,” they wrote.
Jose ignored answering any serious questions and instead traded petty 6th grade-level insults with people, like telling someone, “I know u r but what am I.” Classy.
The action movie star doesn’t have the most glowing reputation, so it’s unclear why he thought doing an AMA would be a good idea. Most of the AMA was filled with people asking him about controversial rumors, like if it was true that he punched actor John Leguizamo or if he did in fact knock a stuntman’s teeth out. Steven ignored all those questions, obviously, but even when he did answer questions, they were weird and vague. For example, when someone asked him what were the names of his pets, he answered, “I have horses and I have dogs.” Oookay.
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