Humble pie is not on the menu.
Restaurateur Keith McNally brags in his new memoir that James Corden begged him to take down a scathing social media post that called out the TV host for being rude to his staff.
“Corden called me four times the day the post came out, each time asking me to please delete it. On the last call he sounded desperate,” the Balthazar owner, 73, writes in “I Regret Almost Everything,” according to an audiobook excerpt obtained by People on Thursday.
“Relishing my hold over someone so famous, I told him I wouldn’t delete it. Like a little dictator, I was intoxicated with the power I’d received.”
In October 2022, McNally alleged via Instagram that Corden, now 46, was “the most abusive customer” to his Balthazar servers “since the restaurant opened 25 years ago.”
He further claimed he had to “86” — which means ban — the comedian from all of his establishments due to his “treatment” of staff at the iconic French brasserie as well as Cafe Luxembourg.
Corden later insisted to the New York Times that he had done “nothing wrong,” adding, “I feel so zen about the whole thing. Because I think it’s so silly. I just think it’s beneath all of us. It’s beneath you. It’s certainly beneath your publication.”
McNally then blasted the former “Late Late Show” host for “lying” in an additional Instagram post.
“I’ve no wish to kick a man when he’s down. Especially one who’s worth $100 Million, but when James Corden said in yesterday’s NY Times that he hadn’t done ‘anything wrong, on any level,’ was he joking?” he wrote at the time. “Or was he denying being abusive to my servers?”
Although the restaurateur admitted he did not witness Corden’s alleged acts, he added at the time, “I wish James Corden would live up to his Almighty initials and come clean.”
McNally now admits in his new book that he fanned the flames of the feud for clout.
“By exposing Corden’s abuse, it appeared as though I was defending a principle, when all I was doing was seeking the approval of my young Balthazar staff,” he writes.
The very outspoken Pastis owner goes on to admit it seems “monstrous” that he did not consider the “humiliation” he was subjecting Corden to, adding, “Especially as I hadn’t personally seen the incident I so vividly described on Instagram.”
McNally points out, however, “I’m not suggesting Corden didn’t deserve the backlash from my post. (The b—— probably did.) I’m just saying I didn’t see the incident I wrote about that, to some degree, jeopardized his career.”
The businessman confesses he has likely “behaved much worse than Corden” in his own life “but wasn’t man enough to apologize.”
He then jokes, “For this reason, I’m going to lift the ban on Corden and impose one on myself instead.”
Page Six reached out to Corden’s reps for comment but has not heard back.
The comic, as McNally mentioned, did privately apologize despite initially denying his bad behavior.
Corden also publicly owned up to his mistakes on his former show, saying in October 2022, “I made a rude comment. And it was wrong. It was an unnecessary comment. It was ungracious to the server.”
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