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5th February 2019
03:10pm GMT
Liam Neeson has spoken out for the first time since his controversial "black b******" interview featured in the UK edition of The Independent.
The Irish actor was on Good Morning America on Tuesday morning to try and clear up the situation.
Liam Neeson tells @RobinRoberts he wants to set the record straight: he's 'not a racist.' https://t.co/qtifVy7ET0 pic.twitter.com/x0y25qerHN
— Good Morning America (@GMA) February 5, 2019
Neeson did not apologise for his comments, denied being racist and said that he was trying to "honour his dead friend."
"I remembered an incident nearly 40 years ago when a very dear friend of mine was brutally raped and I was out of the country and when I came back she told me about it.
“I had never felt this feeling before, which was a primal urge to lash out. I asked her did she know the person, and his race. She said he was a black man."
"If she'd said he was Irish, or a Scot, or a Lithuanian, it would have had the same effect."
Former Liverpool and England footballer, John Barnes surprisingly stood up for the Taken star saying that his interview was taken out of context.
"I have listened to the whole transcript, Liam Neeson was talking about his film Revenge and how it doesn't do anyone any good. And he spoke about being brought up in Northern Ireland and how destructive that can be.
"He went on to tell a story about a friend of his that was raped. And if you listen to everything he is talking about, he's talking about in the moment - and you can't blame Liam Neeson for thinking what he feels because this is what, and this is a while ago, society has shown him black people do, Muslims do."
However, his comments have been blasted quite publicly by lots of famous stars including Piers Morgan and Samantha Mumba.
