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Tom Arnold hits back after ‘Roseanne’ producer Chuck Lorre’s book drop

Actor Tom Arnold unleashed on Chuck Lorre on X in response to the former “Roseanne” writer-producer’s claims in his new memoir, “Sitcom.”

“He thinks he’s brilliant & beloved like Norman Lear but Chuck ‘Chuckles’ Lorre’s a terrible human, an angry dry drunk who lies every time he opens his mouth,” Arnold wrote Tuesday.

Arnold and the ’90s sitcom’s co-creator and titular star, Roseanne Barr, were married Jan. 20, 1990, four months after he first appeared on the show as a poker pal of Barr’s TV husband and four days after Barr’s real-life divorce from her husband of 14 years, William Pentland, was finalized.

Barr and Arnold were hostile to their writing and producing colleagues on the show and the network, Lorre told the Los Angeles Times’ culture critic Mary McNamara in an interview published Tuesday, the day of the book’s release.

“We were punished, the writers,” Lorre told The Times. “The word ‘cruelty’ comes to mind. And I still don’t know why, why so much cruelty. It wasn’t like we didn’t want to make a great show. We were proud to be on that show.”

Hired in 1990 after Barr fired all of the show’s writers, Lorre recalls in the book that he had a rude awakening when he took the job.

“I was now the co–executive producer on the number one show on television. I swaggered into the office assigned to me and met Danny Jacobson (a world-class comedy writer who would go on to cocreate ‘Mad About You’ with, sorry, Paul — ‘My Two Dads’ — Reiser),” Lorre writes in “Sitcom.”

Chuck Lorre poses for a portrait in 2024

Chuck Lorre, pictured in 2024, related several anecdotes in his book “Sitcom” that didn’t sit well with Tom Arnold.

(Willy Sanjuan / Invision / Associated Press)

“Danny, having been fired by Roseanne for being talented, was packing up his stuff when I walked in. He showed me a sloppy, hand-scribbled couple of pages and explained this was a ‘script’ by the show’s new executive producer, Tom Arnold. It had been part of Danny’s job to write real scripts and put Tom’s name on the front page — as if Tom had written them,” Lorre continues. “Bob, myself, and several other staff writers would be ordered to do this on many occasions…. Was it a portent of bad things to come? You tell me.”

For her part, Barr admitted after the 1990 firings, “Yeah, I probably was difficult to work with, now looking back.”

“I don’t think I was as especially clear as I could have been,” Barr told former Times television writer Rick Du Brow in a November 1990 article. “It’s like being a woman and an administrator — I never had any background like that. I didn’t know how, like I do now, to go in and say, ‘This is what I want you to do.’ I think that’s common with women in business. I would go in there and try to get them to agree with me rather than tell them what I want to do.”

Arnold’s social media screed doesn’t directly address any of Lorre’s claims in the book but resorts to name-calling and his own claims against the producer, who went on to create or co-create sitcom hits including “Cybill,” “Dharma & Greg,” the Charlie Sheen-starring “Two and a Half Men” and “The Big Bang Theory” and its offshoots.

“He trashes Trump but he is Trump & he’s a bitter hack who actually believes his lame vanity cards at the end of his lame shows are Paddy Chayefsky worthy,” Arnold wrote, invoking the three-time Oscar-winning writer of “Network.” “Chuckle’s made $800,000,000 off the backs of very talented women & a naive cracked up Charlie Sheen (clean & sober since he’s not under Lorre’s strange, abusive tutelage) then trashes them all to make him feel cool but don’t worry, Chuck hates himself more than we ever could.”

Lorre’s accounts of Arnold in “Sitcom” included several other anecdotes, including one seemingly questioning the “True Lies” and “The Stupids” star’s trustworthiness.

“Executive Producer Tom was angrily explaining to Bob [Myer] and me that some bastard had stolen Roseanne’s love letters to him and sold them to the National Enquirer. His plan was to hire a private detective and get to the bottom of this treachery. And he did. It took one day. The detective found a cashed check for twenty-five grand from the National Enquirer made out to Tom Arnold. Mystery solved.”

Lorre was famously fired after two years on the show, which Arnold recalled in concluding his X post: “I wish everyone could’ve seen his arrogant, sad clown face the day Roseanne made me fire him.”

Barr later fired Arnold from “Roseanne” in 1994 amid their divorce. In 2018, after posting a racist tweet, Barr was fired from the “Roseanne” reboot, which was resurrected as spinoff “The Conners.”

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Sean Combs release delayed after posh prison lifestyle allegations

Sean “Diddy” Combs’ release date has been pushed back following allegations of a plush prison lifestyle.

The disgraced music mogul is currently serving a 50-month sentence after he was convicted of transporting prostitutes across state lines for drug-fueled sex performances known as “freak-offs.”

While earlier October reports indicated that the artist and producer would be released on Jan. 21, 2028 — which shaved months off his original June 2028 discharge — an updated search on the Federal Bureau of Prisons inmate database reveals his new revised date as March 2, 2028.

News of his release date comes as the “Bad Boy for Life” singer was reportedly placed and remained in solitary confinement at FCI Fort Dix, a low-security federal prison in New Jersey, following allegations of a pampered prison lifestyle.

On Sept. 29, an NBC report detailed the accounts of four anonymous inmates who claim that the 56-year-old had been paying men for special services.

Sources told NBC News that Combs paid inmates to clean and cook special meals for him, including curry chicken, pizza and empanadas, and that the hip-hop and R&B music producer also receives Chinese-style massages.

To pay for the labor, inmates allege that individuals outside of the prison are depositing thousands of dollars into the commissary accounts of those waiting on the “Satisfy You” singer.

The news outlet also published an image of Combs using a contraband phone, a prohibited item across state and federal prisons; multiple inmates said that he uses it to scroll Instagram and view explicit nude content shared by an old girlfriend.

Two sources also shared that Diddy has access to a “jailbroken” tablet where he watches movies and documentaries, including “Sean Combs: The Reckoning,” the Netflix docuseries produced by his adversary Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson.

Sources also allege that Combs is smuggling an illegal stash of alcohol and purchasing an antidepressant drug known as Remeron, or “rem-roms,” from other inmates.

“This is not some normal s— you see in jail. This is some rich s—. It looks crazy, but again, it’s Diddy,” one source told NBC.

The Times reached out to Combs’ representatives, but did not hear back.

A representative from the Federal Bureau of Prisons said they “do not comment on the conditions of confinement for any incarcerated individuals, including quarters assignment, release plans, or whether a particular individual is the subject of allegations, investigations, or sanctions.”

Legal troubles hit a high note last year for Combs when he was involved in a lengthy and public trial involving allegations of sexual assault and other violence. His former girlfriend Casandra “Cassie” Ventura and producer Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones lodged civil complaints against the music tycoon.

In July 2025, Combs was found guilty on two counts of a prostitution-related charge, but not guilty of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking, which carried heavier penalties, including a maximum sentence of life in prison.

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