Comedian Shane Gillis had the perfect snarky response after Chelsea Handler publicly accused him of being “racist” and “sexist” for making jokes.
“This is a big moment for Chelsea. I am glad she’s capitalizing. Good for her. We’re all rooting for her. Anyway, come see me July 17th at the football stadium in Philly,” Gillis told Variety.
The drama started after the Netflix special “The Roast of Kevin Hart,” which caused all kinds of controversy for including edgy jokes. One SNL star dropped out because the joke style annoyed him so much.
Handler was also miffed that political correctness was not properly honored during the event, as she explained during an appearance on the podcast “Funny Knowing You.”
“It’s just everything we know: that they’re racist, that they’re bigots, that they’re sexist,” Handler said of Gillis and comedian Tony Hinchcliffe. “That they think they’re invincible.”
“It was gross. I don’t find those jokes to be funny — jokes about lynching black people,” the former talk show host complained. “Lynching is not a joke. That’s worse than rape. You’re not joking about rape, are you? … You know you can’t do that, but you can say ‘lynching’?”
This was in response to the joke Gillis made, saying Hart is “so short, you’d have to lynch him from a bonsai tree.”
Handler also took issue with Gillis joking about roast participant Sheryl Underwood’s husband, who died by suicide in 1990, despite him clarifying he had cleared the jokes with Underwood ahead of time.
“I found them making fun of Sheryl Underwood’s dead husband who committed suicide [gross],” Handler went on. “If she says she’s fine with that, she’s fine with that. I wasn’t fine with that. I thought that was disgusting, too.”
“There was so much disgustingness. I knew it was going to be such a gross vibe that I would be able to elevate it, no problem,” the comedian insisted. “Kevin didn’t deserve that. He deserved an elevated roast.”
Hours after Handler’s podcast episode aired, Gillis put out a podcast episode of his own with Underwood as a guest. She confirmed that the jokes about her deceased husband were still fine by her.
“Sometimes humor is the thing,” she told Gillis. “It’s the most uncomfortable humor that lessens the tension and the stress.”
Hart was also more than OK with all the jokes. He posted a video on Instagram following the event, saying in part, “That, my friend, is what the f*ck a roast is supposed to be — hard-hitting, relentless jokes.”
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