Saturday Night Live has been known to get pretty political with some of its sketches for a long time, even back before stars were winning Emmys for their portrayals of politicians, as Alec Baldwin and Maya Rudolph did in recent years. Back in the day, Mike Myers and Dana Carvey had a fan-favorite ongoing Wayne's World segment as Wayne and Garth, to do and talk just about anything. In a Season 18 episode dating all the way back to 1992, a then-12-year-old Chelsea Clinton found herself as a hot topic.
In the episode’s sketch, the guys talked about “President-elect” Bill Clinton and named the top ten things they love about him. The #2 item on the list was Chelsea Clinton, and they talked about how she looks. Due to it being inappropriate, SNL cut out that part of the sketch from any future reruns and the official YouTube video, and Clinton herself didn’t find the sketch funny.
In the premiere episode of the Apple TV+ series Gutsy, which she co-hosts with mother Hillary Clinton, Chelsea opened up about what it was like when that SNL sketch dropped. She and her mother talked to some comedians, and one asked Chelsea if she’d ever do stand-up. And she opened up about the harsh realities of being the child of well-known figures:
I had a different experience with comedy in some ways than a lot of people because I was made fun of so much as a child by people who were professional comics.
While it’s not uncommon for a celebrity/political figure, or, unfortunately, the child of one, to be the target of jokes, hearing it from Chelsea Clinton is definitely sad, just to know what she went through when she was so young. Hillary Clinton mentioned that her daughter also was the center of jokes for political commentators such as Rush Limbaugh, but that didn’t faze her as much because she knew he hated them and what her parents stood for.
When it came to SNL and the fact that these were grown adults and comics making fun of her, that was a different story. Especially knowing that nobody thought it wasn’t a good idea before and after the sketch got approved:
But when SNL made fun of me, I was like, 'Wow, a group of adults sat in a room, all decided this was a good idea, nobody thought maybe we shouldn't make fun of children. I was like, 'Oh, I just don't think that's funny or OK, so I just don't think comedy's funny or OK.
Saturday Night Live has had its fair share of controversial moments, but since they did cut Clinton’s part in the Wayne’s World sketch however long ago, at least somebody realized that it should be removed. Though to make fun of a child is not okay, and it makes me wonder just what was going on in the writers’ room at the time. Take a look at the edited version of sketch currently available on YouTube:
Meanwhile, Clinton has remained a prominent figure despite the hate she has received over the years. She has become a writer, and global health advocate, and was even a special correspondent for NBC News for three years. Obviously, the Clintons have still been the center of more than a few sketches on SNL (with Kate McKinnon famously playing Hillary Clinton), but it sounds like that one Wayne’s World sketch has stuck in Chelsea Clinton’s mind and not in a good way.
All eight episodes of Gutsy are streaming now on Apple TV+ with a subscription!
