Actor Michael Rapaport doesn’t appear ready to end his feud with Spike Lee anytime soon.
The two New Yorkers, both Knicks fans who have sat next to each other courtside at Madison Square Garden, began a war of words in the spring, when Rapaport criticized Lee for being a hypocrite, railing against gentrification in Brooklyn while living on the Upper East Side. Lee responded by calling the actor “stupid.”
Though Rapaport thinks Lee is no longer relevant as a filmmaker, he noted the director’s importance to the Knicks, calling him the team’s unofficial mascot.
“Maybe, he’s gotta take off the orange outfit and just sit down and everybody will be cool,” Rapaport told SI.com. “We don’t have a mascot, so it’s good that we got Spike Lee. He comes, he shows up in the mini-skirt jerseys and all that stuff, and the orange hat, so it’s good because we don’t have a mascot. But I think Spike Lee has anointed himself the team mascot.”
Rapaport, who previously called Lee a “s–t stain” and called on Lee to insult him to his face, said he hasn’t seen him since the feud began.