Shane Gillis addresses backlash to his 'misogynistic' Saturday Night Live monologue

Shane Gillis has finally responded to the backlash over his controversial Saturday Night Live opening monologue, which was branded 'misogynistic' by critics.

The 38-year-old comedian joked that 'women dress like w****s' at the gym during the October 10 episode, which led to online mobs calling for him to be cancelled. 

On Friday, Gillis broke his silence on The Joe Rogan Experience and explained exactly how the offending joke made it onto live television in the first place. 

'Not to defend SNL, they don’t approve it. I mean, they could shut it down,' he told Rogan.

'They could, 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,' he continued.

Gillis then admitted that he never informed SNL staff of the offending joke and that he even downplayed the monologue to them beforehand.

'The funniest part was, they were like, "What's going on with the monologue?" And I was like, "It's not great but I don't say anything bad."

'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. I'm calling myself fat for f***ing 10 minutes. That's it.' 

Further discussing the fallout with Rogan, Gillis said that he felt like the negative reaction to his monologue 'obviously had a lot to do with the climate' at the time. 

He then addressed his comments about women's gym attire again, saying, 'For the record, I don't have a problem with it.'

Gillis' appearance on Saturday Night Live earned the most live viewers of the three times he has hosted the show, with an average of 4.4 million people watching the episode.

In the monologue, Gillis mocked himself for 'going to the public gym as a fat guy' surrounded by 'the hottest gay guys you've ever seen,' before saying: 'Also, I haven’t been to the gym in so long, I didn’t know women just dress like w****s now.'

He continued with a smile: 'Look, I'm sorry, there's no other way to describe - have you seen it? I've seen it. The shorts? Have you seen the shorts?'

Gillis earned laughs describing the activewear as 'neon' and 'artificial bait-colored' with wrinkles that 'go around the cheeks and all combine at the butthole.'

He quipped: 'And don’t look. You’re not allowed to look. For real, don’t look, because they are filming. I’m in the background of like 10 TikToks right now.'

As a social media furor erupted over the monologue, Gillis was vociferously denounced in an Instagram video by Schitt's Creek star Dan Levy.

'Women wearing short shorts at the gym does not make them w****s. It makes the men calling them w****s misogynists. There’s a difference there,' said Levy. 

'By the way, I've seen more men's nipples at the gym than I've ever seen women showing their bodies off,' he continued.

'But I'm speechless that something like that can exist on live national television. And to be perfectly honest, more men need to be standing up in opposition to this, because it's complacency that has created the environment with which women are sexually assaulted and it's a "conversation" as opposed to a crime.'

Despite the backlash, Gillis was defended by SNL legends David Spade and Dana Carvey.

On their podcast Fly on the Wall, Carvey, who starred on Saturday Night Live from 1986 to 1993, argued that Gillis' wisecrack was not meant to be taken 'literally' and expressed disquiet at those who leap from finding a joke unfunny to believing it 'should not be allowed to be said.'

His co-host Spade, who was in the cast of Saturday Night Live from 1990 to 1996, indicated his exasperation at the public outrage and suggested that 'we just relax.'