Shane Gillis has finally talked about the Saturday Night Live monologue that put him at the center of a month-long argument — and his own review of it is not kind. Appearing on The Joe Rogan Experience on Thursday, November 13, the comedian said he would give the opening set from his October 10 hosting gig a ‘C minus,’ and insisted he went into the night believing there would be nothing to argue about.
The joke at the center of it all was about women’s gym clothes. Gillis told the studio audience he had not been to a gym in so long that he had no idea how women dress to work out now, and he put it in crude, derogatory terms. The line drew gasps in the studio, and within hours it had turned into a full online debate over whether the remark was misogynistic — and whether a joke like that belonged on live network television.
A month later, Gillis is still not apologizing. What he did on Rogan’s show was explain how a monologue like that reaches the air — and why he was genuinely surprised when it blew up.
What Gillis Said On Joe Rogan’s Podcast
“The whole time, I was like, ‘Fellas, I’m giving you a solid C minus of a monologue but I promise there’s no controversy,’” Gillis said on the podcast. “‘I’m calling myself fat for f***ing 10 minutes. That’s it.’”
That promise is the part he kept coming back to. Gillis said he had told the SNL team ahead of time that the set was nothing to worry about, and he clearly expected the night to pass without incident. When Rogan asked whether the show had signed off on the material, Gillis pushed back on the whole idea that SNL vets a host’s monologue.
“Not to defend SNL, they don’t approve it,” he said. “They could shut it down, but you don’t write your set and give it to them. Unless you’re not a comedian. I’m sure non-comics, they write the set for them. They have writers that write the monologue for them.”
The joke itself was not new. Gillis had performed the same bit at the Comedy Cellar about a week before the SNL appearance, and fellow comedian Mark Normand, who was on the Rogan episode with him, said it went over fine. “The funny thing I saw you do that set at The [Comedy] Cellar a week before. Killed. Nobody had a problem with it,” Normand said.
That is a big part of why Gillis says he was caught off guard: the same words that got laughs in a comedy club landed very differently in front of a national television audience. He admitted the scale of the reaction surprised him, and said the backlash “obviously had a lot to do with the climate” at the time. For the record, he also made clear he has no objection to what women wear to the gym. “It’s wonderful,” he said.
The Backlash That Followed The Monologue
The criticism started almost immediately. Schitt’s Creek star Dan Levy posted an Instagram reel the day after the episode, saying he was left speechless that something like that could exist on live national television. SNL alum Ego Nwodim and SNL UK star Ania Magliano also weighed in, as did comedian Kathy Griffin and former Fox Sports personality Joy Taylor.
The response even made it into the show itself. Inde Navarrette, who hosted a later episode, referenced the joke in her own opening monologue. Gillis said he mostly avoided watching the reaction unfold, and this time he deleted his social media accounts while the controversy was playing out. He also revealed he had considered removing the comedians who spoke badly about the bit from his tour, then decided against it.
Gillis And SNL Go Back A Long Way
This is not Gillis’s first run-in with SNL, and that history is part of why the story keeps travelling. In 2019 he was announced as a new cast member — and fired just days later after old podcast clips containing offensive remarks resurfaced. It was one of the shortest SNL tenures ever, over before it began.
He eventually came back as a host instead, and the October 10 episode was his third time hosting the show. That arc — fired before his first episode, then welcomed back as a three-time host — is why his monologue carried more weight than a typical opening set. When the joke landed badly, it reopened a seven-year-old argument about whether he belonged there in the first place, and Gillis has never apologized for the 2019 clips or for the monologue.
THE STORY SO FAR
2019 — Gillis is announced as an SNL cast member, then fired days later after old podcast clips with offensive remarks resurface.
Early October 2026 — Gillis performs the gym-clothing bit at the Comedy Cellar in New York. It gets laughs, and nobody objects.
October 10, 2026 — Gillis hosts Saturday Night Live for the third time. The gym-clothing joke in his opening monologue draws gasps in the studio and a wave of criticism online.
October 11, 2026 — Dan Levy posts an Instagram reel objecting to the joke. Other comedians and actors, including Ego Nwodim, Kathy Griffin and Joy Taylor, add their criticism.
Late October 2026 — SNL host Inde Navarrette references the joke in her own monologue, bringing the argument onto the show’s own stage.
November 13, 2026 — Gillis addresses the backlash for the first time on The Joe Rogan Experience, rating the monologue a ‘C minus’ and saying SNL does not approve hosts’ material in advance.
November 14, 2026 — Coverage spreads across entertainment outlets, and ‘Shane Gillis’ becomes one of the fastest-rising searches in the United States.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT
Gillis has not apologized, and nothing he said on Rogan’s podcast points to one coming. He is continuing to tour, and he has decided against dropping any of his critics from his shows. No new SNL hosting gig has been announced, and nobody involved expects one soon. NBC, which airs SNL, has been asked for comment, while the show itself has said nothing publicly about how monologues are handled.
The bigger question is whether the argument changes anything. SNL has hosted controversial comedians before and will again, and the show’s hands-off approach to monologues is long-standing. What this episode may change is smaller and more practical: the next host who tells the show ‘I promise there’s no controversy’ may find a few more people listening.
