Neil Patrick Harris Served a Meat Platter Shaped Like Amy Winehouse’s Corpse at a Halloween Party, Three Months After She Died
Amy Winehouse was 27 when she died on July 23, 2011. The cause was accidental alcohol poisoning. She had already won five Grammys and reshaped a generation of soul and pop music with Back to Black, and her death made her one of the youngest members of the so-called 27 Club.
That October, roughly three months later, Neil Patrick Harris and his husband David Burtka hosted a Halloween party at their home. Among the food was a platter built to resemble her body after death, complete with her signature beehive, drawn-on tattoos, and a cigarette. A photo of it was posted online in 2011 without much reaction.
The image spread widely in May 2022, and the backlash followed. On May 16, 2022, Harris gave a statement to Entertainment Weekly: “A photo recently resurfaced from a Halloween-themed party my husband and I hosted 11 years ago. It was regrettable then, and it remains regrettable now. Amy Winehouse was a once-in-a-generation talent, and I’m sorry for any hurt this image caused.” Burtka did not release a separate statement.
The party was in 2011. The apology was in 2022. The image resurfaces every so often, pulling the whole thing back into view years after both happened.
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