Kevin Hart’s Netflix roast opened with a musician, closed with a flute solo and, in between, produced the weekend’s most-clipped olive branch. The Roast of Kevin Hart capped Netflix Is a Joke Fest on Sunday (May 10) at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles, and the special is now streaming. The music guests were a big reason the clips kept traveling.
Usher’s “Burn,” remixed
Usher opened the show with a parody of his Hot 100 No. 1 “Burn,” rewritten to needle the host. “Tell me why I should stay in this fake friendship,” he sang, with a chorus that wound up at “Look at what money does to you,” while Hart, per Billboard and Hot New Hip Hop, shouted at him to explain what he was doing. Hot New Hip Hop called it the least controversial moment of the night.
Lizzo’s Krew of Kevins
Lizzo made a surprise entrance with a flute, leading a procession of little people dressed as Hart characters onto the stage, then played “Blow the Whistle” by Too Short as the “Krew of Kevins” danced, Billboard reported. Her roast was about size. “Kevin and I are both mocked for our size, and we share that pain,” she said. “But, I can lose weight, you can’t get taller!” Teyana Taylor, fresh off a Visionary Award from Billboard Women in Music, took the podium too. “See, I feel like roasting you is kind of beneath me,” she said. “I know it’s kind of a foreign thing, a foreign concept, because there is literally nothing that is beneath you.”
A truce on live television
Katt Williams, who has feuded with Hart for years, showed up as a surprise guest, and Hart used the moment to end it. “Katt, we have an opportunity in real time, this is live television, to put our [expletive] beef behind us,” he said, per Complex. “Can we move on, man?” Williams hugged him. Then Hart made the joke himself, later telling the crowd the handshake was some of the best acting of his career and that he “did not mean one word” of it.
The Knicks jersey
Tom Brady, the subject of Hart’s last Netflix roast in 2024, took the stage with a gift. Rolling Stone reported that he handed Hart a “newborn-sized” jersey of Knicks star Jalen Brunson, hours after the Knicks had swept Hart’s Philadelphia 76ers in the NBA playoffs.
Why it matters
The reaction was mixed. Hot New Hip Hop said the internet chatter over the roast’s harsher jokes, from Tony Hinchcliffe, Pete Davidson and others, had yet to stop, and Rolling Stone called some of Davidson’s among the most vicious of the night. For the music crowd, the takeaways were the guests: Usher’s parody, Lizzo’s flute and a Teyana Taylor line that was about as clean a shot as the night offered.
- Date
- Sunday, May 10, 2026, Kia Forum, Los Angeles
- Where
- Netflix; closing night of Netflix Is a Joke Fest
- Music guests
- Usher, Lizzo, Teyana Taylor
Added to the High Grailed archive on October 12, 2026.
