The top 5 moments from Gayle King’s R. Kelly interview that fueled endless Black Twitter memes

Writer Dustin Seibert pulls out the moments from the Gayle King and R. Kelly interview that had Black Twitter in a tizzy.

Mar 9, 2019
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I never thought I’d see anyone mining anything related to R. Kelly for laughs anytime soon following January’s Surviving R. Kelly documentary. But then high priestess Gayle King gave us Black Twitter content overload this week when she and CBS released the first part of R. Kelly’s first interview since he was sent to the clink on sex crime charges.  

None of us were quite prepared for the gold in this interview – most notably the Kells standing up and shouting like a pedophilic banshee whilst shedding the crocodile-iest of tears. The social media reaction was so profound that CBS realized they had ratings platinum on his hands and dragged it out all week, waiting until prime time on Friday evening to give us the whole interview.

As Kells sits in a jail cell for something unrelated to sexual assault, let’s deconstruct the f–kery, shall we?

 

1. Trapped in the Closet, Pt. 2,047
When Kelly stood up and started “crying” while shouting “Y’all just don’t wanna believe the truth,” I thought he was about to break out in song. The way his voice moved when he was thumping his chest is similar to any song in which he scream-cry-sings. His crisis manager (who has a crisis manager?!?) stepping in to calm him down looked so much like some shit out of the “Trapped in the Closet” series that King might’ve been an unwilling participant in the latest entry.

 

 

 

2. “Is this camera on?”
Kells consistently asking if the camera is on him was just one aspect of the consistent and craven manipulation he employed during the interview in order to get people in his corner –the same deception that he’s used to get his tenterhooks into girls and women throughout the years. The examples in the interview are manifold, and Kells has an uncanny tendency to try to convince people much smarter than he is they should feed into his stupid shit while maintaining a straight face. There’s no surprise that all the low-information n—-s that you’ve probably already blocked on Facebook are the ones most likely to defend him.

 

 

3. Something’s fishy in the parental waters
King spoke to Azriel Clary and Joycelyn Savage, Kelly’s current (young) girlfriends and both subjects of the six-hour Surviving R. Kelly documentary. Of course, both women defended Kelly (who was in the room during the interview) and threw their parents under the bus in the process, claiming that they attempted to get money from Kelly in exchange for their children. The parents have been vocal in their condemnation of Kelly, but how on Earth can any adult non-blunt-force-trauma victim trust their minor daughter with Kelly in the 21st century? I believe the truth is somewhere in the middle since I refuse to believe that the parents are that galactically stupid.

 

4. Gayle King really is the truth: Oprah Winfrey
 has always gotten the love she deserves for her interview style, but her longtime bestie King is coming for her throne. She remained unflappable as Kelly insulted her intelligence and started screaming at her, mainly because she’s a professional, but likely because she was containing a huge smile since she knew she would have the best content of the year as it was happening. King didn’t act remotely scared or swell up in response to Kelly’s nuttiness. But when dude said, “What do you mean reputation? You mean rumors? I know 43-year-old women too”, King got the closest I saw her to saying, “yeah n—a whatever you know what the f— I mean.”

5. McDonald’s does not want your endorsement, fam
“When it comes to McDonald’s, that M stands for Mom.” Kells admitting that McDonald’s is his favorite restaurant might be the saddest part of the interview that doesn’t involve keeping young women hostage. You don’t sell almost 75 million albums, win however many Grammys and your favorite goddamn restaurant is McDonald’s. If you’re reading this, Kells, you’re going to prison for a while, homie – aim higher while you still can.

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Dustin J. Seibert is a native Detroiter living in Chicago. Miraculously, people have paid him to be aggressively light-skinned via a computer keyboard for nearly two decades. He loves his own mama slightly more than he loves music and exercises every day only so his French fry intake doesn’t catch up to him. Find him at his own site, wafflecolored.com. 

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