LOS ANGELES, CA - OCTOBER 07: Sharon Osbourne arrives at the FENDI Boutique opening hosted by Chloe Sevigny and in conjunction with LACMA's Avant-Garde at FENDI Beverly Center Boutique on October 7, 2010 in Los Angeles, California.
Angela Weiss/Getty ImagesSharon Osbourne‘s days as an NBC employee are apparently numbered.
The judge on the network’s summer reality series America’s Got Talent says she will leave the show once the season wraps after claiming that NBC fired her son Jack Osbourne from its upcoming competition entry Stars Earn Stripes after he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
“I just can’t be fake,” Osbourne told the New York Poston Monday. “It’s discrimination, and it was badly handled.”
Osbourne claims producers behind Stars Earn Stripes — the series that sees celebrities compete in intense military challenges to earn prizes for charities — contacted her two days before Jack was supposed to start work on the series claiming the show could not move forward with her son on board.
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Producers claim that while they were in talks with Jack to join the series, his contract was never signed, with both mother and son noting they were operating under good faith that he’d be among the contestants on Stars, which premieres Aug. 13 on NBC.
“It’s time to move on,” said Osbourne, who remains under contract with AGT. “They can’t make me do something I don’t want to do. All they can do is stop me from being a judge on another network for five years.”
NBC declined comment on Osbourne’s future with AGT, with the judge who has been with the series since its second season confirming her departure on Twitter on Monday.
“Please don’t misunderstand. I love @nbcagt w/ all my heart and will of course finish out the season. It is still one of the best shows on tv,” she wrote.
NBC Entertainment chairman Bob Greenblatt deflected questions about Osbourne’s future with the show this month during NBC’s time at the Television Critics Association’s summer press tour, telling reporters between sessions that the issue was likely “much ado about nothing.”
Osbourne’s future with AGT first surfaced when she tweeted in July that “Money is not the reason I’m not returning. It’s because…” That was followed by radio silence by the judge, who also co-hosts CBS’ The Talk.
