In its 45 seasons, Saturday Night Live has seen its fair share of controversy. After all, who can’t recall Ashlee Simpson and her infamous lip-synching debacle, complete with ill-timed jig, or Sinead O’Connor ripping up a picture of Pope John Paul II on live TV, or the current president snagging a hosting gig despite protests right outside the studio doors?
Airing live means that many things can go wrong, but sometimes, SNL manages to court controversy in its pre-taped segments! That means music videos, satirical commercials, and film trailers all pass through plenty of edits and watchful eyes who deem them acceptable, only for the public to declare them anything but. Aside from the monologues and musical guests, these 15 controversial SNL sketches actually managed to make it to air – even if they were later pulled from repeat broadcasts.
15 Chevy Chase’s Word Association Was Racially Charged
1975 was a different time, and it saw actor Chevy Chase spew the n-word in a sketch that saw the comedian interviewing legend Richard Pryor for a janitorial job. It was heralded as groundbreaking by Rolling Stone in a retrospective, but the response would certainly be a lot different if it aired today!
14 Cast Members Stripped Down In ‘88
You know that childish game where you yell out a certain part of the male anatomy louder and louder? That was basically this sketch from 1988 called “Nude Beach”. Alongside host Matthew Broderick, the cast managed to utter the offending word no less than 40 times as they were covertly covered by a cane fence.
13 Chippendales Wasn’t Beloved By Cast Members
While “Chippendales” may be an iconic sketch in SNL history, it wasn’t a fave among cast members. In 1996, six years after it aired, Chris Farley said, “Although I love this kind of comedy, sometimes I feel trapped by always having to be the most outrageous guy in the room.” Chris Rock also admitted to hating the sketch, and the body-shaming hasn’t aged well.
12 Wayne’s World Mocked Chelsea Clinton
In 1992, Chelsea Clinton was all of 12 years old, but that didn’t stop Dana Carvey and Mike Myers from going in on her as their “Wayne’s World” characters. Wayne (Myers) announced that “adolescence has thus far been unkind” to Clinton. The Clintons' disapproval of the joke saw the sketch removed from subsequent broadcasts, and an apology letter sent to the White House.
11 1994’s Canteen Boy Goes Camping Made People Turn Off The TV
The “Canteen Boy” sketch saw Adam Sandler’s juvenile character receive unwanted advances from his older, hairy scoutmaster, played by Alec Baldwin. Chicago Times critic Richard Roeper received several complaints about the sketch from viewers, including the Boy Scouts of America. SNL reruns added a disclaimer stating that Sandler was 27 years old.
10 Jenny Slate’s Potty Mouth Came Out
It was Jenny Slate’s first-ever episode on Saturday Night Live and she went out with a bang – or, rather, and F-word. Alongside Kristen Wiig and Megan Fox, the trio were repeatedly saying 'frickin' until Slate let the real thing slip. She was pulled from shows and fired before her year was up.
9 Andy Samberg And Justin Timberlake Got In Trouble With A Music Video
While an iconic song now, Samberg And Timberlake’s holiday ditty from 2006 earned the network and the FCC a huge number of complaints upon airing! One viewer from Florida wrote that the sketch was offensive to children, men, women, and Christmas. It may not be to everyone’s taste, but the tongue-in-cheek song is a classic!
8 Rainn Wilson And Co. Angered Down’s Syndrome Advocates
In 2007, The Office’s Rainn Wilson was getting his first try at the NBC stage, and all went well until the sketch called “Danny’s Song”. In it, a bar patron is discussing his father, only for the punchline to be that he has Down’s Syndrome. Jon Colman, CEO of the National Down Syndrome Society criticized the sketch, which led to the words being bleeped in later broadcasts.
7 Tiger Woods’ Accident Made Light Of Domestic Violence
2009 saw Blake Lively as Elin Nordegren and Kenan Thompson as Tiger Woods in a sketch that saw a battered Thompson give a press conference alongside his golf club-wielding wife. Thompson was repeatedly beaten off-camera, and the sketch prompted the executive director of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence to say she was “horrified” at the “mockery of abuse”.
6 Blind People Were Teased On Weekend Update
Between 2008 and 2010, Fred Armisen decided it would be extra funny to roast New York Governor David Paterson, who is legally blind. His appearances on “Weekend Update” saw such comedy gems as having him run into furniture. Paterson wasn’t amused, and his office stated that the show, “imply that disabled people are incapable of having jobs with serious responsibilities.”
5 Thailand’s Government Was Upset About The Rosetta Stone Ad
The fake Rosetta Stone ad in which a group of middle-aged men are learning to speak Thai so they can “go do a thing” implies a whole bunch of ickiness that Thailand’s government was not on board with. In fact, the cultural minister demanded that the sketch be taken off the Internet, for fear of it ruining their cultural image.
4 Religious Groups Weren’t Fans Of Christoph Waltz’s Jesus
A movie trailer that spoofed Jesus’ resurrection by having Christoph Waltz play him as a machine-gun-wielding, one-liner-spouting Son of God, unsurprisingly, wasn’t well-received. Despite the fact that Christianity is filled with loads of violent imagery, many religious groups were offended and Sears even yanked their ad spots following the airing.
3 A Starbucks Ad Was Called Out For Racism
The ongoing joke that Starbucks employees purposely misspell customers’ names is an old chestnut, but SNL decided to revisit it – and inject race into it. In their “Starbucks Verismo” sketch, a hoop-earringed machine with a stereotypical “black accent” calls out the wrong name and spells with stereotypical pronunciation – they even named this machine “Verquonica!” Unsurprisingly, Twitter erupted in anger.
2 Father Daughter Ad Wasn’t Quite So Lighthearted
A commercial parody that was meant to be skewer sappy storylines for consumer goods, this 2015 sketch was met with outrage. While a tearful father drops his daughter off at the airport, we then learn that she’s actually joining ISIS. Twitter was peeved at the lighthearted tone of the ad, and many considered it inappropriate.
1 A Branded Sketch Made People Feel Icky
In recent years, SNL has moved into using real products and brands as the backdrop of their sketches. One such example was the 2017 “Safelite Autoglass” sketch that saw cast member Beck Bennett repeatedly break a woman’s window to get closer to her underage daughter. Safelite Autoglass wasn’t pleased, tweeting that they were “disappointed”. The sketch was pulled from later airings.