Arj Barker says he wants to set the record straight and had no idea the mum he kicked out of his show was breastfeeding her baby.
The mother and seven-month-old were publicly asked to leave by the US comedian mid show. She said she was "humiliated" and "intimidated" by him.
But Barker — who appeared on the Flight of the Conchords as the band's indifferent friend Dave — defended his decision to remove them from his show on the weekend. He said his priority was the enjoyment of other audience members.
Speaking on The Today Show, Barker said, “What happened was unfortunate, but I want to set the record straight”.
"I have nothing against babies — number one, the breastfeeding thing is a non-issue, it should be inadmissible. I had no idea if she was breastfeeding or not because I was on a lit stage," he said.
"All I could see was a woman likely holding a baby — the breastfeeding was never part of it. If it were the father, I would have acted the exact same way — it had to do with the baby making noise."
The mother, Trish Faranda, was in the crowd with her child at the Athanaeum theatre, which tickets specified were for people aged 15 and above.
Speaking to A Current Affair, Faranda said she was heckled as she walked out with some people booing her. However, others took her lead in walking out of the show in protest too.
Barker said his actions were "purely an audio issue, it had nothing to do with her being a mum”.
"I have nothing against mums," he said.
"If you're trying to watch something and there's a noise over here, or a phone rings over there, it takes you out of it, so that's the only reason I said the baby's going to disrupt the show but it wasn't anything to do with me not being able to perform — it was on behalf of the audience.”
"I'm a gentle person and I would never wish, harm on anyone," he added.
The mother contested Barker’s version of events, and said he was not "gentle" about asking her to leave and did not explain that noise was the issue.
"That's not what he did, it's not what I felt and it's not what other people have witnessed either —he came over and he was using the mic and his position on the stage to intimidate me," she told The Today Show.
"He did that in front of all those people and then he called on the crowd to support him in it and as we left the crowd was yelling out abuse. Hhe just stood there and all he said was, 'I'll give you a refund'."
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