TwitterNo tears were shed during Paula Deen's return to Today.
Fifteen months after the former Food Network host broke down on national TV, she returned to Studio 1A to face Matt Lauer and address the fallout from her legal scandal and reveal her plans for comeback.
When a former employee filed a lawsuit alleging sexual harassment and racial discrimination, Deen admitted under oath to having used the n-word. In the aftermath of her deposition and her emotional Today interview, major partners, including the Food Network, QVC, Target and Walmart, dropped Deen. Several months later, all charges in the lawsuit were dismissed and Deen announced a digital venture.
Today, Deen is back to her bubbly self. "Hello, everybody out there," she said as the interview began.
The Queen of Southern Cuisine couldn't bear to watch the footage detailing her drama. "I looked at none of it, Matt, because I didn't recognize that woman. That was a woman in trauma, in, I would say shock, trying to understand what had happened. The cold, hard fact, Matt, is I probably should not have been here. I probably should have been at home, maybe even under the care of a doctor," Deen said.
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Did she understand why companies severed ties? "I did, but I have to say, it took me a while because I was confused as to the length of time since those words had been part of a language. I had a hard time understanding because it had been 30 years," she confessed. Lauer said Deen had become "radioactive in the business world." She agreed and added, "I had to go home, sit on my sofa and get off the merry-go-round. I had to remove myself and sit quietly so I that I could think and see things from all angles."
The racial discrimination aspect of the lawsuit was dropped because a judge decided that the woman who filed suit, being white, had no legal standing because she hadn't been injured by the comment or the behavior. "The statement that was released at the end got almost no attention," the 67-year-old, best-selling cookbook author complained. "The statement was very powerful and very different."
Although businesses distanced themselves from Deen, she said people continued to be supportive. "I have never had anyone come up to me and be anything other than kind and loving," she told Lauer.
Deen promised she is as open as ever—albeit a bit more cautious. "I've always been very, very naïve, Matt. Unless you do something that can see that you're trying to hurt me, in my heart, you're good. That's childlike and it's naïve," the Georgia native explained. "I'm trying to be more guarded. I don't ever want to get to the point where I'm cynical, because I believe that there are more good people than bad."
How did Deen move past the scandal?
"A family member showed me this website to go on after I got back from New York," she said, "and I just saw myself and I knew I had to guard myself against going backwards. I feared that. So a family member showed me this website. It was called We Support Paula Deen. I could not wait in the morning to put my iPad in my lap and go to that site where my friends out there had nothing but love and support for me."
Asked if she ever stumbled upon any negative comments online, Deen replied, "I never intentionally went there but I did come up on some by accident, but I also noticed those people had no names."
What lessons has Deen learned from her tumultuous time in the public eye? "I really feel like it's going to require another book. We are working on a documentary because I feel like everybody needs to know the entire story," she said. "We're doing a documentary that will be on the Paula Deen Network. But, as I was saying, I learned so much when I sat quietly with my own thoughts. The most powerful thing—and I thought I knew it, because I've talked about it before—is the power of words. I don't care how old they are. Words are so powerful. They can hurt. They can make people happy. Well, my words hurt people. They disappointed people. And frankly, I disappointed myself. And for that, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry for the hurt that I've caused people. Because it went deep. It went deep. People lost their jobs. It went deep into corporate America. I'm here to make people happy, not to bring sadness."
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