GEORGE CLOONEY - CLOONEY BLASTS 'IDIOT' SPRINGER

Hollywood star GEORGE CLOONEY lost all respect for family friend JERRY SPRINGER when the politician-turned-broadcaster started presenting his controversial TV chat show.

Clooney, whose father NICK was a well-respected TV newsreader, knew Springer when he was growing up but now regards him as an "idiot".

The OCEAN'S ELEVEN star first questioned Springer's character when he was caught visiting a prostitute in 1973, but put his trust in him again when he was elected mayor of Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1977.

But when Springer began presenting the infamous JERRY SPRINGER SHOW in the early 1990s, Clooney and his father were appalled.

Clooney recalls, "We had a mayor; you know Jerry Springer was the mayor for a while.

"I got to tell you something about that idiot: he was a friend of ours. He was sort of this Kennedy-democrat. He was really sharp, he was really articulate. I really liked him, you know? My dad gave him his first broadcasting job on the news.

"And then he wrote a cheque to a hooker, and that's dumb. And he came out in sort of a Kennedy way and said, 'What I just did, that was dumb and I quit'. And he quit and he ran again and he won by a landslide.

"I was like, 'This guy's fantastic.' And then he got into that (TV) show and slowly that show changed and he changed it.

"I saw him not too long ago, and he's like, 'George, come on, say hi.' And I said, 'I'm ashamed of you, my father's ashamed of you, we're ashamed of what you've done and ashamed of what you do. You, more than anyone, know what you're doing'.

"He knows better and that to me is shameful."