A ubiquitous red carpet producer was benched from Sunday’s Grammy awards following a string of online controversies, Variety has learned.
During arrivals for music’s biggest night, social media users and style watchers noticed the absence of Cole Walliser – the field operator that manages the Glambot, a high-speed mechanical camera that captures glamourous looks for the E! network.
Walliser and his recognizable mane of curls were nowhere to be found as the Glambot went up – coinciding with weeks of bad headlines dating back to this year’s Golden Globe awards. Network insiders told Variety that Walliser was indeed not hired for Sunday’s show, and that the company is rethinking its strategy around future telecasts.
At the Jan. 11 Golden Globes ceremony, Jennifer Lopez popped by the Glambot to show off an archival Jean-Louis Scherrer gown. A carpet livestream showed a stoic Lopez barely acknowledge Walliser as he tried to help her through the motions of the camera, leading many to accuse her of being rude. Walliser quickly came to Lopez’s defense, calling her a pro at working the press line.
The tides turned, however, when the Lopez headlines led to the leak of an old email exchange between Walliser and a private citizen hoping to book the Glambot for her wedding. After numerous blunt exchanges questioning the bride’s ability to afford the experience, she informed Walliser she could cover the cost.
“I don’t see how you could be since I didn’t say how much it was and could be between $10,000 and $1,000,000,” he wrote, according to widely disseminated screengrabs. “If you wanted to know how much it costs you just needed to ask, you don’t need to pretend you are going to book it,” he concluded.
The subsequent backlash led to an apology from Walliser last week.
“The tone in these emails was dismissive and curt and that is not OK. In 2019, I didn’t have a team around me. It was just myself. I edited every single video. I answered every single email and I was overwhelmed,” he said in an Instagram post. “But that is not an excuse. Everything lands on me.”
It didn’t land great with E! A production source said the channel, now under the control of Versant following a split from NBCUniversal, is committed to maintaining a respectful and professional environment and does not condone behavior that is inconsistent with its standards.
A representative for E! declined to comment on the matter. A representative for Walliser did not respond to a request for comment. The Glambot was invented in 2016 by prolific music video and film director Joseph Kahn.
And the tech overlords tell us robots will make life easier for humans.