The Five Worst ‘SNL’ Monologues, According to Fans
Shane Gillis is supposed to be good at stand-up comedy, but his recent monologue stumble on Saturday Night Live — “The audience didn’t seem to respond well,” wrote Variety in a generous understatement — was all kinds of awkward. To make matters worse, he was accused of stealing lukewarm punchlines.
The swing-and-a-miss got the fans in the r/LiveFromNewYork subreddit thinking: Where did Gillis’ failure rank among the all-time worst monologues in SNL history? Here are five other contenders for the crown, as nominated by the show’s Reddit fans.
Nancy Kerrigan
At least Olympic figure skater Kerrigan has the “Hey, I’m not a comedian” excuse. While she must have been used to high-pressure, live situations as a professional athlete, this was the first time she actually had to talk. It’s hard to watch Kerrigan wring her hands as she delivers wooden readings off the cue cards. As one Redditor noted, “You'd think Tanya Harding took a crowbar to her funny bone instead.”
Martin Lawrence
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Lawrence is a comedian and a funny one, but he made Lorne Michaels’ “banned for life” list after he went rogue during his 1994 monologue. To put it bluntly, it’s the only host open in the show’s history that takes women to task for not washing their asses properly.
Syndicated versions of the episode cut the douche jokes, replacing them with this slyly hilarious disclaimer: “At this point in his monologue, Martin begins a commentary on what he considers the decline in standards of feminine hygiene in this country. Although we at Saturday Night Live take no stand on this issue one way or the other, network policy prevents us from re-broadcasting this portion of his remarks. In summary, Martin feels, or felt at the time, that the failure of many young women to bathe thoroughly is a serious problem that demands our attention. He explores this problem, citing numerous examples from his personal experience, and ends by proposing several imaginative solutions. It was a frank and lively presentation, and nearly cost us all our jobs.”
Elon Musk
For sheer number of upvotes, Elon Musk wins — or more accurately, loses — the Reddit thread about the worst SNL monologues. “Just strange and uncomfortable,” wrote one fan. But it could have been worse. Musk later revealed his own (rejected) ideas for the show, in which he would have held a rooster while Kate McKinnon brought out a cat. “Nice pussy,” he would have told McKinnon, while she would have complimented him on his cock.
Hoo boy.
Jason Patric
Some gave Patric, an actor mostly known for his dramatic work, bonus points for trying something different. But his contemptuous “SNL sucks, and it has always sucked” sermon, delivered in a halting monotone, confused audiences who didn’t get the bit about deconstructing the show’s cliches. It’s an attempt at anti-comedy that ends up being anti-comedy.
Woody Harrelson
Harrelson became a member of the Five-Timers Club on the night he delivered this rambling mess, making the audience audibly uncomfortable with I-got-so-high stories and antivax messages. Was he joking when he insinuated the pandemic was a hoax? The monologue caused an online uproar, but Harrelson didn’t care. “It don’t change my life one bit. Not one bit if the mainstream media wants to have a go at you, right?” Harrelson chirped. “My life is still wonderful.”
