Justin Stephens/Comedy Central(NEW YORK) — That guy whom Amy Schumer says frightened her so badly it made her think twice about taking photos with fans is speaking out — and he says Schumer’s not telling the whole story.
The Inside Amy Schumer star posted a photo to her Instagram Saturday of a man she says ran up to her in Greenville, S.C. demanding she take a photo with him. “This guy in front of his family just ran up next to me scared the s*** out of me,” she wrote, saying he refused her request for him to stop, allegedly declaring, “No, it’s America and we paid for you.”
“I was saying stop and no,” Schumer continued. “Great message to your kid. Yes legally you are allowed to take a picture of me. But I was asking you to stop and saying no.”
That guy is Leslie Brewer. He tells Greenville, SC’s WSPA-TV that yes, Schumer did become upset when he began recording her, but that he stopped recording as soon as he asked her to. He’s also posted a brief video on his own Instagram, showing him saying “Sorry” and Schumer asking him, “Can you delete that?” followed by separate video of Brewer declaring, “And then she got mad at me.”
Brewer tells the TV station Schumer walked away, but then returned to take the photo of him she posted on her own Instagram, telling Brewer she would tell her fans about him. “She gets mad. She’s like ‘that’s disrespectful’,” Brewer says. “ She turns to my daughter and wife and says ‘is this the type of example you want to set for them.”
“I wish I would have finished recording. I wish I would have never stopped to show people what really happened,” Brewer says, noting he’s getting online backlash from Schumer’s fans, and has also been threatened online.
“I’m being looked at as somebody that I’m not,” he says. “You know, at first it was funny but as the days go on, it is kind of like, wow.”
He adds, “I think she’s tried to paint some kind of picture of me that I am an aggressive guy and that I came up to her. If you see my video, you can tell that she wasn’t scared. At the end of the day, I feel as though I did what every other fan would have done if they would have seen one of their celebrities.”
Schumer concluded in her Instagram post, “I will not take picture[s] with people anymore and it’s because of this dude in Greenville.” She was in Greenville to kick off her 10-city comedy tour. She performed Friday night at Bon Secours Wellness Arena.
After many of her social media followers lamented Schumer’s decision to cease taking fan photos, the actress changed positions.
“I’ll still take pictures with nice people when I choose to if it’s a good time for that,” a photo she tweeted read. “But I don’t owe you anything. So don’t take if I say no.”
Schumer later added, in part, “I am grateful to people who like my work and support me but not the ones who think that behavior is ok.”
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