The fatal shooting on the set of Alec Baldwin’s film, “Rust,” resulting in cinematographer Halyna Hutchins’ death has put Baldwin in the spotlight (and the courtroom), but in the past, he made headlines for distasteful name-calling. Per E! News, Baldwin called a Starbucks barista an “uppity queen” in 2011 and a Daily Mail writer a “toxic little queen” in 2013 for incorrectly reporting that Hilaria Baldwin was tweeting during James Gandolfini’s funeral (the story was eventually pulled, per The Hollywood Reporter).
Baldwin’s bigger blunder — what spurred Anderson Cooper to speak out — is when he called a paparazzo a “c**ks*cker” and (potentially) “f****t” in 2013, per TMZ. Later, Baldwin swore he said “fat head,” (via E!). Cooper later tweeted, “Wow, Alec Baldwin shows his true colors yet again. How is he going to lie and excuse his anti-gay slurs this time?” because Baldwin insisted he didn’t know “queen” was a slur.
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The CNN anchor went on the “Howard Stern Show” (via E!) months later, and said he gave Baldwin the benefit of the doubt after the barista comment. However, the paparazzi incident was too much. Cooper said he respected Baldwin, but that it would have been hypocritical to ignore, when he would have called out a conservative for the same thing. “When he called the person ‘a c**ks*cker,’ and then said he didn’t know that ‘c**ks*cker’ was something that was an anti-gay … I mean, what adult does not know that calling a guy a c**ks*cker is… [an anti-gay slur].”
