Jerrod Carmichael says he's thankful for the awkward conversation he had with Tyler, The Creator on his reality show.
On Tuesday morning, April 16, the comedian sat down with The Breakfast Club to talk about several trending topics about his life. Carmichael began by addressing the first elephant (or should we say "donkey") in the room directly. The host of HBO's "Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show" clarified his "slave-play" joke that earned him "Donkey of the Day" from Charlamagne. Later on, Jess Hilarious brought up his cringeworthy discussion with Tyler and asked if he actually had romantic feelings for him.
"Yeah I did," Carmichael replied. "I was in turmoil over that for a year and that's a hard thing to do deal with. I see people online talking about it being awkward and cringe— yeah having feelings for your best friend is very awkward, very, very cringe."
The emotional conversation occurred in the first episode of Carmichael's reality series. In it, Carmichael tells Tyler about his feelings for him, and Tyler basically laughed it off, called him "a stupid b***h" and proceeded to eat his meal like nothing happened. The scene caused plenty of second-hand embarrassment among some viewers while others criticized Tyler's reaction. Despite his best friend's response, Carmichael says he's "thankful" for the moment.
"I'm thankful that he did it because I've never seen a conversation like that played out on television or in any space and I thought it was really, really important," Carmichael explained. "I've never seen a Black man express his feelings for another Black man like that ever before. I'm trying to make art that I wish I'd seen as a kid. I'm trying to make things and put things out there that I needed. So it was really important. I thought it was a really important conversation and I'm so thankful for Tyler for doing it."
Carmichael agreed Tyler's comments did hurt him, however, he doesn't seem to be fazed by it. The "Earfquake" rapper addressed the discourse from the awkward scene during his headlining set at Coachella over the weekend.
“Probably seen my homie tried to f**k me on camera, it was terrible,” Tyler told his fans. “I told the n***a ‘no’ and he said, ‘But what about if we filmed it?’”
Carmichael also saw that reaction, but at the end of the day that's still his best friend. Watch The Breakfast Club's interview with Jerrod Carmichael below.