Comic Shane Gillis will not join the cast of the new season of Saturday Night Life as previously announced. Producers for the show have cited homophobic and racist remarks made by Gillis during a podcast last year.
“After talking with Shane Gillis, we have decided that he will not be joining SNL,” a spokesperson for the show said in a statement. “We want SNL to have a variety of voices and points of view within the show, and we hired Shane on the strength of his talent as comedian and his impressive audition for SNL. We were not aware of his prior remarks that have surfaced over the past few days. The language he used is offensive, hurtful and unacceptable. We are sorry that we did not see these clips earlier, and that our vetting process was not up to our standard.”
Gillis came under fire after comments he made on a Mike and Shane’s Secret Podcast came to light last week. In one video from 2018, the comic quips that “Chinatown’s fu*king nuts. Let the fu*king ch—s live there.” In another broadcast, he refers to comedians like Judd Apatow as “white f*ggot comics” and “fu*king gayer than ISIS.”
Related: Gay comic Bowen Yang joins SNL, becomes its first Asian cast member
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— Shane Gillis (@Shanemgillis) September 13, 2019
Gillis took to Twitter to plead his mea culpa:
“I’m a comedian who pushes boundaries,” he tweeted. “I sometimes miss. If you go through my 10 years of comedy, most of it bad, you’re going to find a lot of bad misses. I’m happy to apologize to anyone who’s actually offended by anything I’ve said. My intention is never to hurt anyone but I am trying to be the best comedian I can be and sometimes that requires risks.”
Gillis is just the latest in a series of comics under fire for a history of homophobic remarks, following in the likes of Kevin Hart, Chelsea Handler and Sarah Silverman. He was slated to make his SNL debut when the show returns for a new season September 28.
ingyaom
Does he think Judd Apatow is gay because he’s married to a woman named Leslie Mann?
Brian
I think it’s because he named his daughter after Bea Arthur.
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Brian
…but his comedy doesn’t push boundaries. Those aren’t even jokes with setups or punchlines. He’s just a bigot. And if he thinks these slurs are fresh and new, then apparently he doesn’t even understand his own industry.
1898
the things he said weren’t comedy. they weren’t funny or amusing or interesting or ironic. they were just lazy, dumb, boring slurs that you’d hear in your typical middle school cafeteria at lunch time. there was no pushing of comedic boundaries
dhmonarch89
Guess who will be getting his own show on Fox News??
Toofie
There was just no way they could sweep it under a rug. And like everyone pointed out, they weren’t even jokes.
Polaro
The only reason to fire him is if he isn’t funny. The one thing I do know is all this PC nonsense isn’t funny – it’s chilling actually.
Brian
It’s not like they dug up something from 15 years ago and are throwing it in his face, this happened less than a year ago. That he was dumb enough to say those things when he had aspirations to get on a broadcast network show is reason enough to fire him.
rustyiam
So is Loren going to be canceling Eddie Murphy’s guest hosting invitation?
Cam
Interesting how all of the same accounts and sites that attack LGBT people and defend bigots come up with the exact same line at the same time.
wikidBSTN
Gillis claims to be a comedian who “takes risks.” Risks with what? MY dignity and self worth? I don’t see any risk taking on HIS part.
Black Pegasus
Good! Now go away and reflect on your mistakes.
Kangol2
Good riddance to a racist creep! Absurdly unfunny and now out of a job.
Chrisk
Agreed with the above comments. The joke was just lame. I’m also but tired of the fake I’m sorry if you were offended BS apology.
Brian
I love that he offered to apologize to anyone that was offended by any of his material, ever. What is more insincere than that?
jorgecruz
SNL has maybe 1 funny sketch a week -maybe. Most of the time it is dumb and pointless. He would fit right in.
The only boundaries he pushed with his comedy was the boundary of how long his listeners could stay awake without blacking out from boredom. His podcast sounded like two whiny angry Trump voters sitting in their basement complaining about why its everyone else’s fault that they are failures.
Apolodorus
Queue in the right wing self victimisation machine crying foul over “chilling” attack on free speech and “damaging PC nonsense” ripping our world apart…
Cam
So bored with lazy comedians claiming that using old racist jokes makes them “Edgy”.
If that’s the case, then Strom Thurman was edgy as hell.
danny
AS IF, SNL was “..not aware of his prior remarks that have surfaced… “!!
Who in the entertainment industry doesn’t have their on-line profile fully vetted before getting hired?
They knew what they were hiring and went for it.