‘We were in that first wave of creative diarrhoea’: Chris O'Dowd says backlash to celebrity 'Imagine' video was ‘justified’

Star cover of John Lennon classic was met with ridicule earlier this year

Chris O’Dowd has called the celebrity cover of John Lennon’s “Imagine” that emerged at the beginning of lockdown a form of “creative diarrhoea”.

A video of stars including O’Dowd, Gal Gadot and Natalie Portman, who sang the famous song in an attempt lift spirits amid the coronavirus outbreak, went viral in March.

It was labelled “cringe” and “out of touch” by many social media users, and Nick Cave even called it “the most panic-inducing version ever recorded”.

O’Dowd has now admitted the backlash to the cover was “justified”.

Speaking on the latest episode of Louis Theroux’s podcast Grounded, O’Dowd said: “In terms of my interpretation of it, I think the backlash was justified."

O'Dowd was asked to be in the video by his friend and Bridesmaids co-star Kristen Wiig, who appeared alongside Gadot in Wonder Woman.

"I'll do anything Kristen asks me to do so of course we just did it," he said. "It took five minutes, didn't think about it. I presumed it was for kids.”

He added: “We were in that first wave of creative diarrhoea that seemed to encase the entire world.”

O’Dowd can next be seen in drama The Starling alongside Melissa McCarthy.