Lorne Michaels convinced Dave Chappelle to cut non-binary joke from SNL monologue

A new profile on Michaels revisits the controversy surrounding a writer boycotting Chappelle's 2022 hosting gig.

By Mary Kate Carr | February 11, 2025 | 12:17pm

Screenshots: Saturday Night Live/YouTube

TV News Lorne Michaels

Lorne Michaels convinced Dave Chappelle to cut non-binary joke from SNL monologue

More Lorne Michaels SNL50 hagiography, this time from Vulture. It’s hard to craft a profile around a guy who won’t sit for an interview, much less craft one when there are at least half a dozen other Michaels profiles floating in the ether right now. But while the conclusion of most of these pieces is that Michaels is a demanding boss and a cipher of a man, each usually has a few nuggets of interesting gossip embedded within. Take this one, about Dave Chappelle’s controversial hosting gig on Saturday Night Live in 2022.

You could argue that all of Chappelle’s hosting gigs have been controversial to some degree, but that time around his jokes about transgender people were still quite fresh. A non-binary member of the writing staff decided to sit the week out with Michaels’ blessing, which turned into a tabloid story about writers “boycotting.” Per Vulture, Chappelle made a joke about it during dress rehearsal: “The papers got it wrong,” he said, according to SNL staffers who watched the performance. “Only one person has a problem, but the paper got confused because that person is a they.” This prompted yet more backlash from writers and cast members “who felt betrayed after working hard all week to put on the show with Chappelle,” according to Vulture. And so Michaels gently steered the stand-up out of making the crack, warning him, “You’ll lose the staff.”

Most Popular

Note that it wasn’t the content of the joke Michaels himself objected to, but the internal reception it got. The Vulture profile observes that one of his great talents is being able to gauge an audience: “He and Trump kind of have this superhuman sense for reactions,” one former staffer says. Michaels’ other talent is identifying and cultivating talent. Despite being one of the most powerful people in show business, he’s still a comedy nerd at the end of the day. And though he reportedly “bristled” at Chappelle’s recent monologue jokes claiming the SNL boss “begged” to have him back, Michaels is nevertheless said to “revere” Chappelle, who is on the lineup for the SNL50 anniversary special.

Still, despite being a well-known name-dropper, he didn’t get where he is today by kowtowing to celebrity at every opportunity. The Vulture profile also includes an anecdote about SNL inviting Taylor Swift to be in a sketch comparing her infamous “girl squad” to an apocalyptic cult. The story goes:

“Michaels was in his office when Swift called him directly to say that not only would she not appear in the video but she wanted Michaels to kill the sketch entirely. Michaels heard Swift out, but as he did he picked up a piece of popcorn from the basket on his desk. ‘Taylor, I do not negotiate with terrorists,’ Michaels said before tossing the kernel into the air and catching it with his mouth. The video aired, and on Monday, Michaels found flowers at his office with a note from Swift: ‘I hope there’s no bad blood.'”

And so the legend of Lorne Michaels continues!