Watch Pharrell and Ellen DeGeneres Talk Dropping Kim Burrell

Pharrell and Janelle Monáe appeared on today’s episode of “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” in support of Hidden Figures, the new movie in which Monáe stars and Pharrell contributes music. Gospel singer Kim Burrell, who was scheduled to perform alongside Pharrell and Monáe, was dropped after she described homosexuality as “perverted” during a church sermon and posted homophobic follow-up videos on Facebook Live. Below, watch a preview clip of the episode, in which Pharrell and Ellen discuss Burrell’s removal and how to counter prejudice in 2017. Scroll down for Monáe’s interview with Ellen about Hidden Figures, and Pharrell’s performance of “Runnin’” from the film’s soundtrack.

“[Burrell] made a statement, she was doing a Facebook live, and she said some very not-nice things about homosexuals,” Ellen begins. “So I didn’t feel like that was good of me to have her on the show, to give her a platform, after she’s saying things about me.”

Pharrell adds:

There’s no room for any kind of prejudice in 2017, and moving on. [Burrell is] a fantastic singer and I love her, just like I love everybody else. And we all gotta get used to that. We all have to get used to everyone’s differences and understand that this is a big, gigantic, beautiful, colorful world, and it only works with inclusion and empathy. It only works that way.

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