Sharon Osbourne #

Introduction #

Sharon Rachel Osbourne (née Levy, born October 9, 1952) is an English and American television personality, businesswoman and author who rose to fame on the MTV reality show “The Osbournes” (2002–2005) and later judged talent competitions including “The X Factor” and “America’s Got Talent.” She co-hosted CBS’s daytime series “The Talk” from its 2010 premiere, serving for eleven seasons as its last original host. Her exit came after a March 10, 2021 on-air clash with co-host Sheryl Underwood over Osbourne’s defense of her friend Piers Morgan, ending with CBS announcing on March 26, 2021 that her behavior “did not align with our values for a respectful workplace.”

Background Information #

Osbourne, the daughter of music promoter Don Arden, began managing Black Sabbath frontman Ozzy Osbourne — her future husband — after he was fired from the band in 1979, helped launch his solo career and founded the Ozzfest summer touring festival. Her own television career took off with “The Osbournes,” followed by a short-lived talk show in 2003 and judging runs on “The X Factor” and “America’s Got Talent.”

“The Talk” premiered on CBS on October 18, 2010 with Osbourne alongside Leah Remini, Julie Chen, Sara Gilbert, Marissa Jaret Winokur and Holly Robinson Peete, and after eleven seasons she was its last original panelist. Days before the fatal episode, her old friend Piers Morgan declared on UK television that he did not believe Meghan Markle’s claims in her blockbuster interview with Oprah Winfrey, which aired on CBS on March 7, 2021 and in which Markle said members of the royal family made racist statements.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation #

On March 10, 2021, Underwood confronted Osbourne about her support of Morgan, telling her, “While you are standing by your friend, it appears that you are giving validation or safe haven to something that he has uttered that is racist.” A frustrated Osbourne insisted she did not understand what was racist about them. Underwood explained, “It’s not the exact words of racism. It’s the implication and the reaction to it. To not want to address that because she is a Black woman, and to try to dismiss it or to make it seem less than what it is, that’s what makes it racist.” Osbourne countered, “If Piers doesn’t like someone and they happen to be Black, does that make him a racist?” — to which the answer from her colleagues was “no.”

Osbourne reacted explosively on camera and behind it, tweeting an apology of sorts while claiming producers and CBS executives had blindsided her. On March 16, she was alleged to have used racial epithets and sexual slurs toward former co-hosts Chen and Gilbert, with Remini claiming she had sounded off with those insults back in 2010.

Former co-host Holly Robinson Peete accused Osbourne of calling her “too ghetto” for the show and of working to get her axed in 2011 — a claim that gained force when a Season 1 clip showed Osbourne using the very term on-air about Remini. A 2018 clip also resurfaced in which Osbourne said of Markle that she “ain’t Black” and “doesn’t look Black.”

The show went on hiatus on March 12; CBS extended the pause into late March as its internal probe continued.

Public Reaction and Consequences #

On March 26, 2021, CBS announced the result of its review. “The events of the March 10 broadcast were upsetting to everyone involved, including the audience watching at home,” the network said. “As part of our review, we concluded that Sharon’s behavior toward her co-hosts during the March 10 episode did not align with our values for a respectful workplace. We also did not find any evidence that CBS executives orchestrated the discussion or blindsided any of the hosts.” The network also said the co-hosts “were not properly prepared by the staff for a complex and sensitive discussion involving race” and promised new training, with “The Talk” returning on April 12. CBS framed the split as Osbourne’s decision to depart, but it was widely understood as a firing.

Osbourne’s publicist dismissed the allegations: “Sharon is disappointed but unfazed and hardly surprised by the lies, the recasting of history, and the bitterness coming out at this moment.” Peete and Remini took to social media to reproach her; Osbourne responded with threats of defamation lawsuits against both, but never followed through.

Osbourne has remained publicly bitter about how it ended. On “Fox & Friends” in September 2022, she said, “I was this lamb that was slaughtered that morning and CBS denied responsibility.” She told Variety that March 10 was the first time in eleven years she hadn’t been involved in planning a segment, and that she felt “like I was in front of a firing squad” facing Underwood. On Morgan’s show in May 2022, she said the fallout brought death threats against herself, husband Ozzy and their dogs — and that when she told CBS she needed 24-hour security, its response was, “So what?”

Current Status #

In March 2022, Osbourne reunited professionally with Piers Morgan, joining his new UK network TalkTV to host a prime time show of her own — also titled “The Talk.” Morgan announced the hire with a video praising her as “very opinionated, fearless, funny… unpredictable, maybe a little bit dangerous. But also somebody who, every time opens their gobby little mouth, it makes global news.”

She took a brief TalkTV hiatus in December 2022 after a medical emergency, returning in early 2023. In 2024 she appeared as a celebrity lodger on “Celebrity Big Brother.”

Impact on Their Career/Life #

The firing ended an eleven-season run that had made Osbourne a daytime-television fixture as the last original face of “The Talk,” a role she had held since its 2010 debut. She maintained the incident cost her far more than the job, telling CBS she could no longer earn a living without 24-hour security. Sources close to the show told Deadline that her post-exit media blitz, including an Entertainment Tonight interview, “burned a lot of bridges.”

Rather than retreat from television, however, she rebuilt her career in the UK alongside the very friend whose defense had cost her the CBS job, continuing to insist that Morgan was not being racist — “He knew Meghan [Markle] for a long time, so he’s talking from experience.” The controversy permanently redefined her public image, casting the outspoken rock-royalty matriarch as a defender of a colleague accused of racism, and ended her association with the show that had anchored her American television career.