The Shady Side Of Colin Jost
Colin Jost might not be one of the shadiest comedians in showbiz — he's not making a regular habit of misbehaving a la Matt Rife — but the "Saturday Night Live" star has crossed the line a few times in the pursuit of laughs. He's committed most of these comedy offenses while delivering the news with a smirk and a heaping helping of snark on "Weekend Update."
Jost believes that his mug makes him appear more malicious than he actually is; it's why he titled his 2020 memoir "A Very Punchable Face." In it, he writes, "Some of you think you know me, but you're actually just thinking of the villain from an '80s movie who tries to steal the hero's girlfriend by challenging him to a ski race." The Harvard grad also admits to engaging in some behavior befitting such a villain, such as upsetting a Danish woman by making out with her and her sister during a wild night in Copenhagen. And it's not hard to imagine a scoundrel of the slopes penning a slap-happy piece for The New Yorker titled "I Will Slap You."
In a 2019 essay, Uproxx critic Steven Hyden remarks on Jost's seeming inability to empathize with the marginalized, a trait that his "Weekend Update" predecessor Seth Meyers possessed. Hyden also suggests that Jost would be a more entertaining fake news anchor if he would just go full-on villain. (Then perhaps this list would be a bit longer.)
The angry response to his Amazon enthusiasm
In 2018, Colin Jost weighed in on a major business decision from his "Weekend Update" perch: Amazon's polarizing plan to build a secondary headquarters in Long Island City. The global conglomerate chose the location in exchange for a $3 billion tax break, and Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez spearheaded the progressive campaign against the move. On X, formerly known as Twitter, she argued that citizens would be better served if the billions being used as Amazon bait went toward infrastructure and other community improvements. Gentrification was another concern.
Jost made the controversial choice to take Amazon's side. "Only New Yorkers could complain about getting 25,000 new jobs," he said. "All the cities who lost out must be like, 'Shut up you whiny b***es.'" Out slammed his stance in an opinion piece titled "Colin Jost Is a Douchebag," and he got blasted on social media. "If Colin Jost is so down for Amazon coming here he should go work there and give his job to someone who can actually write a joke," tweeted one critic.
Amid the public outcry, Amazon nixed the deal, and Jost conceded that its critics had some valid points in a 2020 Chicago Tribune interview. But he's still a fan of Jeff Bezos' behemoth brand. After Jost poured slime on his outraged wife, Scarlett Johansson, during her virtual 2021 MTV Movie and TV Awards acceptance speech, she asked him where he got the green goo. "Amazon," he said.
He fed the election false equivalence narrative
During Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, Colin Jost gave his comedic muscles a workout by punching up at both Trump and his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton, on "Weekend Update." Jost's objective was seemingly to land equally impactful jabs on both presidential hopefuls, which was easiest to achieve by making ye olde "South Park" argument about politicians: both sides are equally terrible. In 2016, Pajiba called attention to some examples of Jost's unfair and unbalanced jokes about one of the presidential debates.
In addition to suggesting that Trump and Clinton were both behaving as if they "were on drugs," he said, "The first debate is over, and it's official. We still have to choose between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump." Writer Dustin Rowles opined that Jost and his co-anchor Michael Che's material fed into the media's controversial false equivalency narrative, making the comedians a poor fit for co-anchoring "Weekend Update" during Trump's campaign to become the leader of the free world.
Jost also had a change of heart about Trump hosting "SNL" in 2015. He originally defended the decision; in a 2017 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, he argued that criticism of the show for humanizing Trump through humor was unfair. "He's been on the cover of every tabloid consistently for 30 years," he pointed out. But in "A Very Punchable Face," he writes, "He was a uniquely divisive and dangerous candidate. And that episode of 'SNL' has not aged well, politically or comedically."
His joke made light of right-wing hatred over gender identity politics
After the 2016 presidential election was over, Colin Jost was among those who conducted a post-mortem of what went wrong for the Democratic Party. "The dating app Tinder announced a new feature this week, which gives users 37 different gender identity options. It's called, 'Why Democrats lost the election,'" he said on "Weekend Update." So, the implication was that any move to embrace gender inclusivity was risky for the Democratic Party because it was something that fired up Trump voters. On X, an editor for the right-wing website NewsBusters celebrated Jost's joke for being "anti-liberal," while Deadspin reacted to it with an article titled "Colin Jost Is A Dumba**." One critic tweeted, "This isn't punching up, it's punching all the way to the bottom, the most vulnerable of us."
Instead of apologizing for the joke, Jost responded to the social media backlash by doubling down. He tweeted a link to an op-ed published by The New York Times that essentially chided liberal voters for caring so much about diversity. By sharing the article, Jost seemed to endorse the idea that Democrats should focus more on wooing the white, straight, Christian voters who supported Trump and who find any acknowledgment of minorities' problems off-putting, which would leave the marginalized with no major political party to advocate for them. "You wish you had a point," read one response to his tweet. "Instead it's just tired old LGBT-shaming disguised as edgy commentary."
Colin Jost's FIFA World Cup joke fell flat
During the 2022 FIFA World Cup quarterfinals, Morocco toppled Portugal in a major upset. The big win made the "Weekend Update" news rundown the Saturday after, but some members of the "Saturday Night Live" audience didn't exactly celebrate the way Colin Jost gave Morocco's national soccer team a shoutout. "It is the best World Cup performance by a team of Africans since the unpaid workers who built the stadiums," he quipped. His joke was met with loud groans from the live crowd, and Rolling Stone deemed it "ugly."
Perhaps the "SNL" fans felt moved to voice their distaste because they found the joke somewhat insensitive; some of those workers Jost invoked in hopes of getting a chuckle did lose their lives, after all. The World Cup's host country that year, the tiny but affluent country of Qatar, became a target of international outrage when The Guardian reported that upwards of 6,500 migrants died while working there in the 10 years preceding the event. Many of them were working on construction projects related to the World Cup. The Qatari government was also criticized for allowing companies to exploit the laborers in various ways, including by paying them dismal wages and withholding pay. Successfully landing a lighthearted joke about such heavy subject matter is tricky, and Jost's response to his joke landing like a lead soccer ball was to say, "I didn't do it!" and smile.
He thought dashing high schoolers' dreams would be funny
Colin Jost had a very "Legally Blonde" experience when it came to getting into Harvard. In "A Very Punchable Face," he doesn't go full-on Elle Woods by telling readers that it's as easy as performing a bend and snap. However, he does write, "If you got into Harvard, you weren't special or spectacular." While it wasn't his dream school, he applied anyway and got accepted, presumably without filming an admissions essay in a sparkly bikini. Perhaps his collegiate experience explains why he once failed to see that dangling someone's college dream in front of them and snatching it away was a terrible idea for a prank show; he never had to experience the sting of being rejected by a prestigious Ivy League institution.
Jost wrote for the humor magazine "The Harvard Lampoon" in college, and he and a fellow writer came up with an idea for a hidden camera show called "Admissions Impossible" after they graduated. He shares the pitch for the show in his memoir: "We set up fake college interviews under the guise of real, ultra-competitive universities. Instead of chatting with alumni, students will meet actors posing with representatives. It is a prime opportunity to screw with these kids." While Jost reveals that he still thinks it's a great concept, he also writes, "Man, we were monsters." The only person he pitched the show to was Meghan Markle's ex-husband, Trevor Engelson. Unsurprisingly, he passed on the idea.
The Beyoncé joke backlash
Every year, Colin Jost and his co-anchor Michael Che celebrate their own special holiday tradition: swapping jokes on "Weekend Update." They write material for each other and try to make it as outrageous as possible. Their 2023 swap earned the approval of the live "SNL" audience, who rewarded the segment with roaring laughter. However, the Beyhive wasn't laughing when Che read a joke about their idol. Here's what Jost made his co-anchor say about a photo of Queen Bey rocking a platinum wig: "Beyoncé looked so white that I was finally attracted to her."
The look in question had previously caused a huge fuss on social media, earning the trolls accusing Beyoncé of trying to look white a savage Instagram scolding from the singer's mother, Tina Knowles. She pointed out that it's not uncommon for Black female performers to rock blond hair and called her daughter's critics "racist." On X, some Beyoncé fans complained that Jost's joke was feeding the same mean-spirited narrative. "Seriously, do they really think racist jokes are funny? Boundaries were crossed yesterday on #SNL and they were extremely disrespectful to Beyoncé," read a tweet from a fan account. Another person wrote, "This misogynoir toward Beyoncé is disgusting." Che insists that his co-anchor is not racist but did tell The New York Times, "I guess if you look at Colin and you don't know him, if someone told you that he was a racist, you'd be like, yeah, maybe."
How he erred ahead of the Emmys
The #MeToo movement swept through Hollywood in 2018, the same year two men and zero women were invited to host the Emmys. Those men were Colin Jost and Michael Che, and Jost told Vanity Fair they weren't interested in participating in the conversation about sexual harassment and sexism. He even cracked a joke about the sensitive topic, saying, "I think that by [the Emmys], people are going to be desperate to give men a chance, finally. It'll probably be #HeToo by then." Again, he was saying this as a man who had been chosen over female comics to host a major awards show. "What we don't really need right now is men in positions of power belittling the #MeToo movement regardless of whether they're doing it facetiously," read one tweet about his apparent eagerness to move on from the movement.
To make the situation even more infuriating for any female star who would have enjoyed the hosting gig, Jost was apathetic about it, admitting that he's no fan of awards shows. "I think most of the time they're way too self-serious and focused on things that 99% of the country doesn't care about," he told the Los Angeles Times. "At the end of the day, it's adults getting trophies. Why should that be taken seriously?" As The Mary Sue pointed out, this wasn't the best way to convince viewers that he was going to be enjoyable to watch as a host.
He defended Michael Che's bad behavior
Michael Che had a history of controversial conduct before he and Colin Jost were asked to host the Emmys. Jezebel published a piece documenting instances of Che lashing out at women on social media in response to their criticisms of his material. One especially egregious example was the comedian sharing the email address of Daily Beast writer Samantha Allen with his Instagram followers. Allen had called Che out for using a transgender slur, so the comedian was seemingly inviting his most hardcore, outraged fans to retaliate on his behalf. He made certain his fans knew how he felt about Allen by sharing a draft of the angry email he purportedly planned to send to her.
Ahead of the Emmys, Vanity Fair asked Jost to weigh in on his co-anchor's questionable behavior, and he downplayed its seriousness by arguing that Che wasn't trying to cause his targets harm. Apparently, he does what he does simply because he gets a kick out of it. "Most of what [Che] is doing is just in a [way] pure comedy. It's hilarious to him that these things exist, and he's not trying to make a real important point," Jost said. "That's the misconception, I think — is that there's this big social point that he's trying to make." So, Jost missed the opportunity to make his own big social point by saying that it's not okay to engage in online harassment and use transgender slurs.