The Daily Show is having a field day with the internet’s outrage over Sydney Sweeney’s nude ad campaign.
Comedian Ronny Chieng, 40, introduced the segment by mocking the country’s obsession with Sweeney’s ad for sports-betting app Novig, where the actress, 28, posed naked in various athletic settings and repeated the word “sports” while covering herself with footballs, tennis rackets, and hockey pads.
Sweeney has received major backlash from female athletes and retaliated by sharing more nudes on Instagram.
“Moving on to... America’s second and third favorite pastime,” Chieng said, transitioning from a bit about football. “Boobs.”
Chieng’s co-host Michael Kosta, 46, then skewered hypocritical men who bandwagon onto the Sweeney hate in public to appear feminist, but who objectify her in private.
“I have one word for this ad: gross,” Kosta said, adopting the affect of a performative male. “It clearly objectifies women and is offensive to female athletes. I didn’t even know female athletes had bodies. When I watch them play, I’m looking at their brains.”
“I mean, Gloria Steinem has been dead for three weeks, and this is what it’s come to?” he continued. “Me putting my browser on incognito mode and quietly sneaking into the guest room while my family sleeps upstairs, then dimming the lights and being offended by this ad three times in a row? The point is, shame on Sydney Sweeney. Apologies, Ms. Steinem. You rest in power, Queen.”
Chieng disagreed, joking that Sweeney’s 2025 movie Christy about the prolific ‘90s boxer Christy Martin was worse for women athletes than her Novig ad. Critics slammed Christy as “lifeless,”“a disservice to its subject,” and “a few rounds too long.”
“This ad wasn’t offensive to female athletes,” Chieng said. “That movie where Sydney Sweeney played a female athlete was offensive to female athletes.”
“Plus, if anybody should be offended, it’s gamblers,” he added. “Conflating sex and gambling is wrong. Those are two separate addictions.”
