Harry Belafonte, the 84-year-old “Banana boat song” singer-turned liberal firebrand, must have skipped his morning Cheerios on Friday. Appearing on a Fox-TV affiliate in Bakersfield, Ca, Belafonte was sound asleep on camera during his scheduled interview, leaving KBFX-TV 58 anchor Leyla Santiago in an awkward situation.
Santiago tried to wake up the King of Calypso saying “Harry, wake up … Harry? Wake up, wake up! This is your wake-up call!”
Ultimately, the morning show’s producers cut back to Santiago and her co-anchor, who joked that he was “meditating,” and that the “daylight hadn’t come yet.”
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The 84-year-old Belafonte, whose signature hit “Day-O” could make this episode hard to live down, was scheduled to promote his memoir “My Song.”