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NEW YORK, Oct. 7 (UPI) -- Comedian Steve Rannazzisi has opened to Howard Stern about his career-damaging lie and how it has affected his life. The League star who was outed by the New York Times for having lied about his narrow escape from the World Trade Center attacks in 2001, appeared on The Howard Stern Show Tuesday to explain his reasoning and how the lie came about after moving to Los Angeles to pursue his career in comedy.
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"It's not like I moved to Los Angeles with this story with the thought of 'I'm going to go out and trick everyone,'" he said. "It wasn't calculated at all. It's as simple as 'Hey you're from New York? Were you just there?' 'Yeah, yeah I was downtown.' 'You worked there?'" he said, recreating the scenario.
Once Rannazzisi started to use the story in order to be more likable, he admitted that things started to get out of control and that eventually there was no turning back.
"You have 15 seconds, I think, to kind of go 'Wait, hold on, stop, I'm sorry, that's not true.' And if you pass that 15 seconds it's sort of like, now it becomes a thing where you become the guy who is very strange and weird and just said I lied about 9/11," he said. "And Howard, when I tell you I truly in all of my heart wish I had that voice that I feel like I have now that said, 'Hey man, take a breath, relax, people are going to like you, people are going to understand who you are when they get to know you. you don't need to lie about that, take that back.'"
The 37-year-old ended his time with Stern admitting his mistake and asking for forgiveness.
"I know what I did was terrible, and I know that I hurt a lot of people -- people that lost people, people that helped people survive," he said. "And those people are the people that I truly am sorry. I feel awful that my dumb mistake created a story that hit a wound that should never have been touched."
Back in September, Rannazzisi admitted his lie and subsequently had his Buffalo Wild Wings ads pulled as a result.
