The women of Saturday Night Live are using their comedic talents to clap back at a TikToker’s claim that the show doesn’t hire “hot women.”
“Am I the only person who’s ever noticed that ‘SNL’ has never hired, like, hot women?” TikTok user @jahelis said in a viral video posted to the platform on March 21. The video has racked up over half a million views and over 10,000 likes.
In typical Sarah Sherman fashion, the comedian shared her sarcastic reaction to the TikTok via X.
“Just found out i’m not hot,” Sherman, 31, who joined the show in 2021, wrote. “Please give me and my family space to grieve privately and uglily at this time.”
Newcomer Chloe Troast, who joined the cast last year, shared her comedic reaction by stitching the TikTok. Troast, 26, can be seen singing Christina Aguilera’s “Beautiful” and flipping off the camera in the video posted via TikTok.
“I am beautiful no matter what they say,” she sang. “Your words can’t bring me down.”
The original TikTok creator says she was prompted to post the video after watching Palm Royale on Apple TV+ starring Kristen Wiig, whom she calls “pretty conventionally attractive,” but “there’s still something about [her] look-wise that doesn’t work.”
The user also criticized the appearance of cast member Heidi Gardner, questioning if there is an “SNL Effect” of not hiring “hot women.”
“I’m wondering if it’s the ‘SNL Effect,’ like is it the choices that ‘SNL’ is purposely [making] because it knows its audience?” the user said in the video. “Or is it that once we see women as super funny we have a hard time seeing them as also both sexy and attractive? Is that my own personal biases and maybe a little bit of internalized misogyny that’s getting to me?”
Users in the comments vehemently disagreed with the video’s analysis. “I just hope this reaches the cast of ‘SNL’ and they make a skit about it,” one user wrote, while another added, “This is so random and mean.” Other users chimed in citing counter-examples of “hot” women throughout SNL’s history, including Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Chloe Fineman, Kate McKinnon, Ego Nwodim and Amy Poehler.
Attention from the women of SNL prompted the original creator Jahelis to post a response video.
“I never expected that video to go viral,” the creator said, reading an “official apology” that was sent to Newsweek. “Had I known, I would’ve maybe articulated myself a little bit better. I was expecting to have a dialogue with my community, who is used to my unfiltered opinions that rarely come from a place of malice. In return for being brave enough to share a peek into what is the magical, colorful wonderland that I call my mind, I have received comments calling me ugly, fat, a trunk full of racially charged insults, etc.”
Jahelis continued: “Unfortunately for everyone involved, bullying and racial insults have not swayed me, and instead I would love to double down. … So in conclusion, I would like to apologize to no one and will go on living in a world where apparently Tina Fey looks like Megan Fox.”
Wiig will host SNL for the fifth time for the show’s episode on Saturday, April 6.
Saturday Night Live airs on NBC Saturdays at 11:20 p.m. ET.
