DOG WHISTLE

CNN Star Exposes MAGA-Friendly Host’s Biggest ‘SNL’ Mistake

Shane Gillis was doing something intentional when he chose to tell that “well-worn” joke.

Shane Gillis’ ill-fated joke had a very specific audience, former CNN host W. Kamau Bell explains in a new episode of his podcast.

On Who’s With Me?, Bell said Gillis’ monologue, including the controversial joke about women’s gym attire that has drawn scathing criticism from other comedians and Hollywood at large, was directed at the “Rogan-sphere,” which is why it fell flat.

“Shane likes to sort of pretend like he’s not in the Rogan-sphere, but he’s in the Rogan-sphere,” Bell said, referring to Joe Rogan’s specific brand of anti “woke” humor and the comedians who’ve emerged to capitalize on it.

That group’s rise has been blamed for Trump’s 2024 win, though Gillis has said that he didn’t vote for him in the last election. He did, however, attend Trump’s UFC-themed birthday party at the White House this past summer.

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During Gillis’ third time hosting Saturday Night Live on Saturday, he said in his monologue, “I haven’t been to the gym in so long I didn’t know women just dress like wh---s now? I’m sorry, there’s no other way to describe it.” He went on, “Have you seen it? I’ve seen it. The shorts. Have you seen the shorts? Those neon, they’re like artificial bait-colored. And the wrinkles go around the cheeks and all combined at the butthole. And don’t look; you’re not allowed to look. For real, don’t look because they are filming. I’m in the background of like 10 TikToks right now.”

SNL alums, including Cecily Strong and Ego Nwodim, and other celebrities, like Grammy-winning musician Marren Morris and Schitt’s Creek star Dan Levy, spoke out to condemn the joke. Others turned their ire towards show boss Lorne Michaels for OK-ing it in the first place.

Bell said Gillis’ choice to tell it solidified his place among Rogan acolytes.

Notably, Gillis mocked fellow top-selling comedian Nate Bargatze for posing with MAGA and revealed he didn’t vote for Trump in 2024, on an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience from August.

“At one point, he name-checks Joe Rogan and Theo Von, which just feels like they weren’t necessary to the joke,” Bell, who won multiple Emmy Awards for hosting CNN’s United Shades of America, explained. “He just sort of wants the online fans watching his fans to be like, ‘He said Joe Rogan’... when he said Joe Rogan on SNL in his monologue, he just took a pause… like waiting for the applause of the audience, and they didn’t applaud.”

It wasn’t the first time Gillis bombed on the show either, Bell said. “All three of his SNL monologues have all been notable because they have all not gone great. And the third one he did this weekend was another one that’s getting a lot of pushback. And not just pushback from people online,” he explained. “If you listen, if you watch it on TV, it doesn’t go great. And he’s a comedian who knows how to kill, but there’s something about in those moments, it feels like Shane is playing what we call, in standup comedy, the back of the room.”

Summing up the key problem, Bell said, “He’s not playing the audience in the room, and he’s not playing the audience at home. He’s playing his friends.”

Bell said that the national conversation about the alleged gang rape case at Cornell University wouldn’t have been lost on Gillis—in fact, he posited, it may have been the point.

“Shane often talks about things that happen in the news,” Bell said. “It seems like you’d be like, ‘Is this the time to tell my women dress like w--res joke?’ ‘Cause he’s got a lot of material.”

He concluded, “Maybe he thought it was.”

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Eboni Boykin-PattersonEntertainment Reporter

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