Reggie Watts: Festivals Remove Comedian, ‘Comedy Bang! Bang!’ Drops Theme Song
tags:Removed
Musician was accused of “reckless” encouragement of drug use and abusive behavior in multiple relationships. One ex died by suicide earlier this year
Comedy Bang! Bang! has quietly removed its Reggie Watts-created theme song as upcoming music festivals have removed Watts’ name from their lineups following Rolling Stone’s report on the comedian-musician’s “reckless” behavior in the wake of his ex-girlfriend’s death.
Fans of the popular comedy podcast were greeted with a generic British woman’s voice stating the episode number today instead of Watts’ improvisational beatboxing riff that served as the show’s intro since 2011.
The show did not acknowledge the replacement, nor has it directly commented on the recent accusations against Watts, a longtime friend of the show who starred in the TV version of the podcast from 2012 to 2016. (A representative for Comedy Bang! Bang! and its host, Scott Aukerman, did not immediately reply to Rolling Stone’s request for comment.)
Watts was also scheduled to perform at both the Shambala and Greenbelt festivals in Northamptonshire, England, this week, but his name has since been wiped from their websites. A representative for Greenbelt Festival confirmed that Watts would no longer be appearing, while the Shambala Festival did not respond to a request for clarification. (In a screenshot reviewed by Rolling Stone, however, a festival representative acknowledged that Watts was no longer part of the event.) Over the weekend, a set of shows with frequent collaborator CAPYAC, a surrealist electronic dance band, was canceled in Bristol with no acknowledgment from the venue or any of the parties.
The removals follow a lengthy report published by Rolling Stone on Thursday, where loved ones of Watts’ late ex-girlfriend Katherine McCollough came forward to claim that Watts encouraged McCollough to take a heavy array of drugs, particularly ketamine, throughout their relationship. Friends said they witnessed abusive aspects of the couple’s relationship, including financial dependence, and Watts allegedly withholding emotional support from McCollough.
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“[Watts] cultivated a dynamic and a relationship where she felt like she could only truly access intimacy, closeness, and empathy from him if they were both using [drugs] together,” one friend said.
After McCollough suffered a drug-induced manic episode last summer, Watts ended the relationship in October. She died by suicide in March. McCollough’s loved ones claim Watts was reckless in his behavior, and they firmly believe if McCollough had never met Watts, she wouldn’t have developed an addiction to ketamine and she’d still be alive today.
Watts’ attorney, Andrew Brettler, said it was “dangerously false” to suggest that Watts was responsible for McCollough’s suicide. Brettler also pushed back on Watts’ alleged prompting of McCollough to take drugs, claiming she was already an “experienced” drug user before dating Watts.
Rolling Stone spoke with five women who previously dated Watts, three who claimed they also experienced Watts encouraging them to take drugs, including ketamine, with him. Two exes alleged Watts blew past their boundaries to satisfy his own needs. One woman claimed Watts recorded an explicit video of her that she had not consented to, and another claimed Watts initiated sex with her without wearing a condom, despite an implicit agreement they would always use protection due to Watts disclosing that he had an STD.
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Through an attorney, Watts said any suggestion that he was an “abusive” boyfriend was false, but did not comment on the women’s accusations directly.
McCollough’s loved ones view her experience with Watts as a devastating cautionary tale and voiced concern that his actions could lead “to irreparable harm or death of another person.”