Saturday Night Live cast member Bowen Yang believes the show’s comedy could benefit from being able to occasionally use curse words like “shit” or “fuck” on-air.
Yang voiced this opinion during the latest “I Don’t Think So, Honey” segment of his Las Culturistas podcast with comedian Matt Rogers. “Standards and Practices, we should be able to say at least five shits and five fucks on SNL per season,” he said (via Entertainment Weekly). “We are so hampered in our comedy at SNL by not being able to say shit and fuck.”
“It’s us, it’s Abbott, it’s Ghosts,” Yang continued. “We’re the last network comedies. Can you give SNL an exception?” He elaborated that even “five shits” and “five fucks” would “bring a sketch to the next level” by making it more reflective of “the real world, not sketch reality.”
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“Shit and fuck are so comedically powerful as words,” he concluded. “I really think it would help us.”
This week’s guest on the podcast, SNL alum Amy Poehler, initially responded by joking that NBC could “monetize” Yang’s idea with an American Idol-like competition in which people could vote for which cast member gets to use curse words.
Getting serious, Poehler offered the opinion that being forced to use clean language can create “comedic tension.” She added, “The air may be let out of that balloon when you do [get to curse], and you might not get the juice. You want it because you can’t have it.”
Despite the curse word restrictions, Yang has earned four Emmy nominations since joining SNL as a staff writer in 2018. The first recognized his writing, while the other three were for his on-screen acting.
Season 50 of SNL will close out with three final episodes in May, hosted by Walton Goggins, Scarlett Johansson, and Quinta Brunson. The musical guests will be Bad Bunny, Benson Boone, and Arcade Fire.