If she had to do it over again, Sharon Osbourne says she wouldn’t have invited MTV’s cameras into her home.
At least, that’s what the cancer-stricken matriarch of television’s favorite dysfunctional family told ABC’s Barbara Walters when she talked to her earlier this fall.
Osbourne said, in an interview to air on a special “20/20” edition Wednesday, that she’s calling it quits after an upcoming, 10-episode season is through. “We can’t do it anymore,” she said.
When ABC released those quotes on Monday, an obviously concerned MTV President Van Toffler called Osbourne. He said she told him: “You know you can’t believe everything I say.”
Through MTV, Osbourne then released a statement saying she intends to fulfill her contract, which calls for 20 episodes total.
“I love my MTV,” she said.
MTV’s second season of “The Osbournes” begins Nov. 26. The first set of episodes drew record ratings for the network this spring and made aging heavy-metal star Ozzy Osbourne and his family household names.
Sharon Osbourne, who is fighting colon cancer, told ABC that the show has “changed us all so much.” Her teenage children now have lawyers and business managers, she said.
“Because it’s a moment in time, when we were innocent to it all, we went in feet first and you can’t recreate that,” she said. “Yes, now, this series, people will see what the first series has done to our lives and it will take people to the next stage. But after that, it’s over.”
The family hasn’t exactly shunned the spotlight. ABC said Monday that Ozzy, Sharon, Kelly and Jack Osbourne will be hosts of the American Music Awards on Jan. 13. Daughter Kelly has recorded her own CD that’s due out soon.
Sharon said Ozzy has begun drinking again in response to her cancer.
“We agreed to do the show and so the cameras are here all the time,” she said. “So it’s a little bit invasive right now and we have no privacy. You know when you’re sick, you want to be on your own? I can’t throw up on my own and Ozzy can’t get drunk on his own.”
Toffler said he believed the ABC interview, which was recorded Sept. 28, came at a low moment for Osbourne with her illness.
“She was probably having a difficult time and she was venting in the moment,” he said.
The third, 10-episode season of “The Osbournes” will air sometime next year.
“I’ve developed sort of an iron stomach because of Sharon Osbourne’s volatility,” said Toffler, who was involved in contentious negotiations before the family agreed to more episodes. “I’m accustomed to this, and perhaps the rest of the country isn’t.”
