Tan France issued a statement denying that he tried to get Bobby Berk to leave Queer Eye.
For context, Bobby announced his departure from the hit Netflix reality show in November 2023. Bobby's replacement, designer Jeremiah Brent, was announced by Netflix last month. Bobby later told Vanity Fair that he decided not to renew his contract for the show because he thought that Season 8 would collectively be the group's last, and was somewhat surprised that the other cast members decided to go ahead with Season 9.
In the same interview, Bobby confirmed amid rampant speculation — garnered from the pair's social media behavior — that something had happened on set with Tan. “Tan and I had a moment,” he told the publication. “There was a situation, and that’s between Tan and I, and it has nothing to do with the show. It was something personal that had been brewing — and nothing romantic, just to clarify that."
Then, earlier this week, Rolling Stone released a report on Queer Eye based on interviews with production sources. They claimed that Bobby was "butting heads" with both Tan and Jonathan Van Ness. Three sources further claimed that Tan and Antoni Porowski "campaigned to replace Berk with interior designer and friend Jeremiah Brent," with one source calling it "mean girl antics."
Earlier this morning, Tan posted a video onto his Instagram captioned, "And that’s all I wanna say on this matter."
"Yes, I've heard what's going on," he began. "I just want to address one point real quick. My former colleague getting fired had nothing to do with me trying to get my friend hired. Netflix and the production companies did a full-on casting. I didn't put my friend up for the job. They ended up getting it because they were the best person for the job."
"Am I so happy that they have the job? Uh-huh. I really am. I think they're going to be incredible on the show, but I didn't get them hired by getting rid of somebody else," he continued. "And this all started because of a comment on a gossip blog that just got reposted, reposted, and then it's almost become gospel. So from the horse's mouth: I'm telling you that that's not at all how it went down. And that's all I'll say on the matter. If you need to dig deeper, if you still don't believe me, so be it — but that's it."
The video was quickly "liked" by Jonathan and Antoni.
We'll keep you posted with any updates.
Representatives for Bobby declined to comment.