Rep: Harry Belafonte meditating in video

A video of Harry Belafonte looking as if he had nodded off on camera as he was about to do a TV satellite interview went viral this week. But it turns out the entertainer-activist wasn't asleep, his rep explained -- he was meditating while a technical glitch occurred.

A split screen showed Belafonte, 84, making the rounds Friday to promote his new memoir "My Song," sitting with his eyes closed as morning news co-anchor Leyla Santiago of KBAK-TV in Bakersfield, Calif., good-naturedly called out, "Harry, wake up. Harry? Wake up, wake up! This is your wake-up call, Harry!" Turning to the camera, she said, "OK, I'll tell you what . . . he's meditating. He's having -- he's taking a little nap. He's OK."

One of her two co-anchors deduced that the audio connection might have gone out. "Obviously, if he could hear us, he wouldn't have been like that. There was some technical [problem]."

Kristin Clifford, director of satellite TV for the publicity firm handling the book, told USA Today that the audio indeed had "dropped out." Referring to the anchors' laughter and banter over the aborted interview, she said she was upset that "their technical difficulty was used to embarrass Mr. Belafonte. This was 100 percent their error."

Belafonte spokesman Ken Sunshine said in a statement: "His earpiece wasn't working, so he decided to take the time to meditate before the rest of his Day-O," alluding to Belafonte's signature song. Sunshine added, "Mr. Belafonte is . . . sharper and more awake than most who have been interviewing him. Maybe the world would be a better place if more people took a moment to meditate."

KBAK reported it was trying to arrange a new interview.