Finally allowed to step onto the stage at NBC’s Studio 8H, comedian Shane Gillis didn’t dwell much on his past dismissal from “Saturday Night Live” after just one episode.
Instead, Gillis, now a thriving standup comedian and podcaster, kicked off his opening monologue hinting that perhaps both he and “S.N.L.” were better off charting their separate paths.
Shane Gillis, known for his standup specials such as “Beautiful Dogs” on Netflix and as a co-host of “Matt and Shane’s Secret Podcast,” was initially announced as a cast member of “Saturday Night Live” in September 2019. However, just days after the announcement, “Saturday Night Live” reversed its decision and removed him from the lineup. This decision came in response to backlash over unearthed podcast segments where Gillis used derogatory language towards Chinese individuals, imitated a caricature accent, and employed homophobic slurs directed at figures like Judd Apatow, Chris Gethard, Andrew Yang, and Senator Bernie Sanders.
At the time, “Saturday Night Live” stated in a release that Gillis’s language was “offensive, hurtful, and unacceptable.” Shane Gillis himself addressed the controversy in a social media post, asserting that he is a comedian who pushes boundaries, acknowledging that in comedy, there are bound to be misfires.
Returning to “Saturday Night Live” nearly five years later as a guest host, Gillis took a more tempered approach in his monologue, contrasting with the scorched-earth style of hosts like Norm Macdonald in 1999 after his firing from the show. Shane Gillis began his monologue with a self-deprecating tone, saying, “Yeah, I’m here. Most of you probably have no idea who I am. I was actually — I was fired from this show a while ago. But if, you know, don’t look that up, please, if you don’t know who I am. Please, don’t Google that. It’s fine. Don’t even worry about it.”
Shane Gillis continued with his self-deprecating humor, quipping that he “probably shouldn’t be up here, honestly,” and suggesting that his inherent nature was better suited to being “a high school football coach.” He playfully poked fun at his father, who was in the audience and whom Gillis claimed was a volunteer assistant girls’ high school basketball coach.
Turning to his mother, Gillis joked about a time in his life when he was particularly close to her, saying, “I was gay for my mom. She would pick me up from school, I would hop in the van. I would be like, ‘Girl, tell me about your day.’”
Shane Gillis then touched on having family members with Down syndrome, saying, “It almost got me,” as he shifted from side to side. “I dodged it, but it nicked me. It nicked me.”
Reacting to the mixed response from his studio audience, Gillis humorously acknowledged, “Look, I don’t have any material that can be on TV, all right? I’m trying my best. Also, this place is extremely well-lit. I can see everyone not enjoying it. This is the most nervous I’ve ever been.”
Shane Gillis acknowledged that discussing Down syndrome can make people uncomfortable, but he pointed out that the individuals he knows who have it are “doing better than everybody I know — they’re the only ones having a good time, pretty consistently. They’re not worried about the election. They’re having a good time.”
He then added humorously, “I thought that was going to get a bigger laugh. I thought we were allowed to have fun here.”
Switching gears, Gillis joked about his sister, who he said had adopted three Black children and has a daughter with Down syndrome. He envisioned a scenario in the future where his niece, who is older, is bullied by a white student.
“And then three Black kids coming flying out of nowhere, start whaling on that cracker,” he said. “It’s, like, a nice moment.”
Gillis also shared about a coffee shop he claimed his family operates where they hire individuals with Down syndrome.
“There’s zero difference between us and them, especially at work,” he said. “You’re like, ‘What’s your problem, dude?’ They’re like, ‘I hate this job so much.’”
The cold open of the week
Even during an election year, “Saturday Night Live” understands that it can’t start every show with Mikey Day impersonating President Biden and James Austin Johnson playing his probable Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump. Some weeks, you might find Johnson portraying Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, and Day as… Senator Jim Risch, Republican of Idaho?
That’s the premise for this week’s opening sketch, where Day and Johnson are seated at a bar table with Marcello Hernández (portraying Senator Marco Rubio) and Devon Walker (playing Senator Tim Scott), lamenting about Trump while still aligning themselves with him. When Hernández teased Walker, suggesting that Trump had coerced him into publicly denouncing Nikki Haley, Walker responded, “He didn’t make me say that I hate her. He said, ‘You must hate her.’ But y’all saw what I did, right? I stepped right up to the mic and I said, ‘No, I just love you.’”
“You showed him,” Johnson replied.
Fake movie trailer of the week
In a brighter glimpse of what Gillis’s “Saturday Night Live” tenure might have looked like if he had stayed on as a cast member, the show parlayed his abilities as a Trump impressionist — along with some recent news about a limited-edition set of high-top sneakers that Trump has been promoting — into this cleverly satirical movie trailer.
In the segment, Gillis plays Gordon Dwyer, an office-bound doofus who is terrible at basketball and life in general — until he receives a magical pair of Trump sneakers that bestow him with a familiar tousled hairdo and an aggressively confident attitude. “You’re saying these Trump shoes made you good at basketball?” Andrew Dismukes asks him skeptically. “No,” Gillis answers. “They give me the power to say I’m good at basketball, and then double down on that until people start to believe it.” Not to be outdone, Johnson appears as Trump as well, for a Donald-a-Donald showdown with Gillis at the trailer’s end.
Weekend Update jokes of the week
At the Weekend Update desk, anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che delved into the 2024 presidential election and the recent ruling by the Alabama Supreme Court regarding frozen embryos in test tubes being classified as children.
Jost began:
At the Weekend Update desk, Colin Jost delivered a humorous take on the 2024 presidential election, highlighting Donald Trump’s recent victory in the South Carolina primary. Jost quipped that Trump’s win solidified his dominance everywhere except in legal matters, suggesting that Trump has effectively secured the nomination. Jost humorously noted Trump’s pivot to a more moderate and unifying tone for the general election, punctuating the commentary with a reference to a speech made by the fictional character Bane from “The Dark Knight Rises.”
Che continued:
Political experts suggest that Nikki Haley might have garnered more support from Black voters in South Carolina, but they have harbored longstanding negative sentiments toward her. This sentiment is often attributed to a phenomenon humorously dubbed “Bitch too skinny.” Despite this, Haley asserted that she isn’t vying to become Donald Trump’s running mate, asserting, “I feel no need to kiss the ring.” In contrast, Tim Scott expressed his willingness to fully embrace Trump’s endorsement, humorously stating, “I’ll suck that ring right off Trump’s finger.”
Jost then resumed:
The Alabama Supreme Court recently declared that embryos conceived through in vitro fertilization (IVF) are to be considered children, even suggesting that Black embryos could be tried as adults. It’s absurd to equate embryos with children. If someone believes an embryo is the same as a baby, they should try telling their spouse, “Hey, honey, I left our baby in the freezer.”
Weekend Update desk character of the week
In a refreshing departure from the political and topical content of the show, Bowen Yang made a surprise appearance at the Weekend Update desk, portraying Truman Capote. Yang’s impersonation seemed to be directly inspired by Tom Hollander’s portrayal of the author in the FX and Hulu series “Feud: Capote vs. The Swans.”
Dressed in a fedora, glasses, and a distinctive scarf, Bowen Yang responded to Jost’s surprise about him discussing Women’s History Month with a playful remark, “Why? I love women. They’re what dolls are based on.” Yang then proceeded to humorously mock historical figures such as Amelia Earhart (referred to as “the great butch of the sky”) and Florence Nightingale (“the reason every nurse is a woman”). When Jost questioned the authenticity of his stories and inquired if he truly loved women, Yang retorted, “No one loves women like a gay man. Who hates women.”