Bill Maher Says ‘Quiet On Set’ Made Nickelodeon Seem Like Neverland Ranch

Bruce Haring
·3 min read

An exasperated Bill Maher, notorious for not having his own children, asked on Friday’s ‘Real Time’ why he is the one who is always left trying to defend them.

In his “New Rules” editorial, Maher trained his guns on the shocking Max documentary Quiet on Set, which detailed what the past young stars went through on the Nick sets. “OMG,” was Maher’s opening salvo.

More from Deadline

Maher said that the Nickelodeon depicted “wasn’t a studio – it was Neverland Ranch with craft services.” He said the documentary was “scene after scene of the child stars of their day being exposed to…degradation.” He added, “I was grossed out and I’ve gone camping with John Waters.”

The documentary is the talk of the town in Los Angeles, Maher said, but pointed out that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was derided when he was saying the same things about Disney’s actions.

He cited a famous Willie Sutton quote about robbing banks “because that’s where the money is.” The reason we find pedophiles in certain corners of show business, Maher said, is because “That’s where the kids are.” He noted “DeSantis wasn’t wrong,” and expressed disgust that the left “will support child f**king if the wrong party calls it out.”

Case in point, he noted how Brian Peck was rehired to work on a children’s series after serving 16 months for abuse. “For pedophiles in Hollywood, it’s a small world after all,” he said.

Maher also called out Instagram moms pimping young daughters and Drag Queen Story hours. “Not that there’s anything wrong with being a drag queen,” he said. “But lets admit it’s more for the Queen than the kid.”

Maher said he can’t pretend that certain things are cool.

“Wokeness is not an extension of liberalism any more. It’s taking something so far that it’s the opposite.” Teaching kids not to hate is fine, “but at a certain point, inclusion becomes promotion.”

Children are “gullible morons who just want to please grownups,” Maher said. Thus, endless talking about gender to six-year-olds is “what law enforcement calls entrapment.” It’s suggesting someone into something they wouldn’t do, he said, “and if you think that’s not happening, you haven’t seen any TikTok videos.”

The gender themes are pervasive and lumped in with arguments against the patriarchy and other things, Maher said.

“Maybe we should think abut giving kids a break from our culture wars for a minute,” Maher concluded. “Or at least until the election is over.”

Earlier, Maher had a one-on-one interview with fitness guru Jillian Michaels, who warned of the horrors of Ozempic weight-loss use.

“Diet and exercise is the only way” to lose weight, she said, calling the drug use “a devil’s bargain.” She said to look at the warnings on the box, which has a laundry list of side effects that range from nausea to kidney failure and vision loss. “They are hacking your biochemistry,” she said, and leading to “yo-yo dieting on crack.”

Maher’s panel discussion had Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and author of The Call to Serve: The Life of an American President, George Herbert Walker Bush,” and Jane Ferguson, foreign correspondent for PBS NewsHour, The New Yorker contributor, and author of No Ordinary Assignment.

They talked about the New York Trump Trial and the NPR reporter who resigned this week because of his distaste at the partisan politics of his newsroom.

Maher had the best line about NPR, calling its CEO Kathryn Maher (no relation), “a Portlandia character. She’s the kind of white woman who would say she’s Beyoncé spirit animal.”

Best of Deadline

Sign up for Deadline's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

  • Up next
  • Up next
  • Up next
  • Up next

Latest Stories