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Richard Branson Gets Firey With Stephen Colbert: Was it a Real Fight?

By: Daniel Chubb | August 17, 2007 | 5 Comments

richard_branson-custom.jpg

The man behind Virgin airlines, media, phones, trains, drugs, tobacco and everything else in the world Richard Branson recently appeared on a show, The Colbert Report to be exact, last Tuesday, and apparently, got a little hot under the collar with the host, Stephen Colbert.

The billionaire, Richard Branson came on the show to publicize details of his brand new Virgin American airline, but ended up getting a little annoyed at Stephen Colbert. Reports say that he splashed Stephen Colbert with a glass of water, with Colbert retaliating in the same way to Branson.

If you ask me, I say it was all a huge publicity stunt. I mean don’t get me wrong, even billionaires will go pretty damn low to get some attention. I mean seriously, Richard Branson of all people getting annoyed? I would let Stephen Colbert throw two glasses of water at me and talk about my mother without a care in the world if i had half of Branson’s digits.

The New York Post says, “audience members who attended the taping last Tuesday blogged that Colbert looked ruffled and angry afterward – and that the two men sat in stony silence for a few seconds.”

What do you think? Was it all a publicity stunt? Or is there reason to believe that even billionaires get angry?

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  • http://nofactzone.net jennie

    It may have been a publicity stunt on Branson’s part, but I think there is reason to believe that even billionaires can not know how to react when things don’t go their way.

    First: The audience quote you are reporting is not accurate – the original quote, first posted here:
    http://www.nofactzone.net/?p=1969
    gives a less “angry” version of the incident.

    Second: this isn’t the first time Branson has used water against a TV host… I believe he threw water at Clive Anderson when he mentioned Virgin Air’s bad reputation. And YouTube has a clip of Branson throwing Aussie Rove McManus in a pool “for fun.”

    I don’t know whether Sir Richard was angry or joking – I’ll wait to see it. Stephen Colbert is famous for improvising in character with his guests and I imagine his response was simply keeping in his comedic character.

  • Colbeagle

    Of course it was a publicity stunt! Most Colbert guests don’t get glasses of water for their interviews.

  • http://nofactzone.net jennie

    @ Colbeagle –

    I’m tempted to say every guest – but as I haven’t studied every episode I’ll say MOST guests interviewed at the “interview table” have a mug of water. It can be seen sitting on the table on the guest’s side as Stephen runs over to the table. You can go to comedy central MotherLoad and watch the videos of the interviews to confirm this.

    Guests interviewed at the first part of the show (at the desk) often do not.

    Besides – if it had been planned, certainly they would have taped this part at the end of the taping – not in the middle of taping a show for that same night and having to find a way to get Stephen dry (as well as drying his suit jacket with a hair dryer) so they could continue the rest of the show.

    But certainly Colbert will now play it up for all it’s worth – his character has to.

  • http://www.endlesshumanpotential.com Chris Lyons

    In my opinion billionaires are all just people like you and I. Richard Branson is one of those billionaires who is genuine, he’s a down to earth, no BS kind of guy. I think he would genuinely show his emotions but there is no way of knowing 100% if this particular incident was for publicity or not.

    I think Branson is a great man and a true success story and he has a right to get upset from time to time like everyone else. It’s like here in Australia, just recently our next candidate for prime minister Kevin Rudd was reported as being blind rotten drunk. Is he not human? Most of us have done this at some point in our lives or at least something equally as silly. I agree that stunts like these do appear to be stupid and people in their position should maybe more careful but what’s done is done, they can’t change, all they can do is move on. I believe they should be given the chance to put something like that behind them.

    If it did happen to be a publicity stunt then good on him. It worked, I mean we’re talking about him right here aren’t we?

    Another point I would just like to add with no disrespect; you said, “I would let Stephen Colbert throw two glasses of water at me and talk about my mother without a care in the world if i had half of Branson’s digits”. The amount of money we have may help towards our freedom and security and to own the nice things we want but by no means does money wipe all concerns aqnd negative emotion from your life. Money is a great thing to have lots of but it doesn’t mean you will float around on a cloud without a care in the world, you can still have moments of vulnerability.

    That,s just my two cents.

    Chris Lyons.
    http://www.endlesshumanpotential.com

  • http://fakerichardbranson.blogspot.com Fake Richard Branson

    It wasn’t a stunt… Stephen Colbert really did piss me off. 30% of his show is dedicated to interviewing guests and helping promote them. Well, apparently not with Sir Dick, here. So I threw some water on him… so what?

    You can find the real story here:
    http://fakerichardbranson.blogspot.com/2007/08/my-waterfight-with-stephen-colbert-real.html