Last week, Jerry Seinfeld and Kesha made headlines together when video of the hug that never was began spreading all over the internet. At the time, it seemed pretty clear why the comedian declined to embrace the Warrior singer; he didn’t appear to know who she was. Although Kesha’s request was harmless enough, his response still seems perfectly in line with being asked for a hug mid-interview by a stranger (we are, admittedly, not that big on PDA here at The A.V. Club).
But Seinfeld’s recently clarified his no-hugging position to Extra, explaining that as a 63-year-old, he doesn’t “know every pop star… I don’t know everyone.” So the comedian wasn’t about to hug a “total” stranger” while he was “right in the middle of an interview,” a request he found “a little off.” He continued: “When you get to be my age and you’ve done a couple things, you have your own reality, in my reality … I don’t hug a total stranger. I have to meet someone, say hello. I gotta start somewhere… hug isn’t first moment of a human, two humans. I never did that.”
Seinfeld says he and Kesha ended up laughing off the whole thing off camera, though he felt the need to note that he still refused to hug the singer. Maybe next time, they’ll just stick to compliments.