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“I Lied Lying About Escaping 9/11” – Actor Steve Rannazzisi Admits

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“I Lied Lying About Escaping 9/11” – Actor Steve Rannazzisi Admits

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Pete Davidson of Saturday Night Live is pleading with upset fans to “take it easy” on his fellow comic Steve Rannazzisi. It all started when Davidson criticized Rannazzisi for making up a tale about escaping 9/11.

The League actor has acknowledged that prior claims he made about nearly surviving the September 11, 2001, assaults on the World Trade Center were untrue.

He began a string of tweets with, “As a young man, I made a mistake that I deeply regret and for which apologies may still not be enough.”

“After I moved with my wife to Los Angeles from New York City in 2001 shortly after 9/11, I told people that I was in one of the World Trade Center towers on 9/11. It wasn’t true. I was in Manhattan but working in a building in midtown and I was not at the Trade Center on that day,” he added.

“I don’t know why I said this. This was inexcusable. I am truly, truly sorry. … (I)t is to the victims of 9/11 and to the people that love them — and the people that love me — that I ask for forgiveness.”

Rannazzisi’s past accounts state that he was working at Merrill Lynch in the south tower when the first plane struck, and fled minutes before the second plane hit. He attributed this experience with inspiring his move to Los Angeles to pursue comedy.

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A video on YouTube shows a 2009 interview on Marc Maron’s WTF Podcast, where Rannazzisi told his false story of his 9/11 experience. The conversation starts around 25 minutes in.

“The first tower got hit, and we were jostled all over the place,” he told Maron. “I went downstairs walked outside, saw all pandemonium, and then five, six minutes later, bang,” he said of the second plane hitting the South Tower.

From that point, he continued, he fled uptown.

Rannazzisi moved to Los Angeles shortly thereafter, where he was plucked from obscurity by Ashton Kutcher and became part of the group on Kutcher’s MTV show, “Punk’d.”

In addition to his public mea culpa, Rannazzisi has also apologized to at least one person privately: Pete Davidson, the Saturday Night Live featured player whose firefighter father died during the 2001 attacks.

After Davidson mocked Rannazzisi on Twitter for his fabrication (“It’s ok @SteveRannazzisi people make mistakes … Can’t wait to meet my dad for lunch later”), the 21-year-old wrote that The League had contacted him to express remorse.

But The League actor didn’t seem to get the joke and replied with a sincere thank-you.

“I think you missed the point ,” Davidson responded. “All kidding aside this @SteveRannazzisi story sucks because he’s actually a funny comic and I love The League. It’s f—– up.”

The stars apparently had an off-line conversation about the controversy, and Davidson took the high road.

“Take it easy on @SteveRannazzisi … He reached out to me and is truly sorry. We all sometimes lie and exaggerate a story to seem cooler,” he tweeted. “Unfortunately this is a very touchy topic n very near n dear 2 peoples hearts.Its years later but he apologized n owned up 2 it like a man.”

In addition to his statement, Rannazzisi tweeted regrets to those who “lost loved ones” during the 9/11 attacks.

“It was profoundly disrespectful to those who perished and those who lost loved ones. The stupidity and guilt I have felt for many years has not abated. It was an early taste of having a public persona, and I made a terrible mistake,” he wrote.

On the FX show “The League,” which premiered in 2009, he plays Kevin, the commissioner of the program’s fantasy football league.

Meanwhile, FX has issued a statement addressing Rannazzisi’s actions.

“We are disappointed to learn that Steve Rannazzisi lied about being in the World Trade Center on 9/11. It is upsetting that he would fabricate a story about having survived that horrible tragedy. It is also unfortunate that he did not admit to the truth sooner. That said, we believe Steve is sincere in his apology and will do everything he can to make amends moving forward,” the statement reads.

Earlier, Davidson got into a tense exchange with actor Elijah Wood about the scandal on SiriusXM’s Opie and Jim Norton show.

“I wonder how many people lied about s— back then and just didn t have a Twitter. We can t really figure it out,” Davidson said.

“The one negative to this – okay, it s great, it s come out. He s apologizing publicly, there s a forum for which he can apologize for it,” Wood said.

“But he’s not sorry,” Davidson insisted. “He’s sorry he got caught.”

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