PHILADELPHIA _ "It's funny. Now, when I do standup, I feel like I have to talk about it right away," comedian Shane Gillis said at the top of his set on Oct. 24 at Helium Comedy Club. "You've got to address it."
The "it" Gillis was referring to was his high-profile hiring and near-immediate firing from the cast of "Saturday Night Live" last month. The Pennsylvania native had been added to the show's cast for its current 45th season, but "SNL" rescinded its offer to Gillis days later amid outrage over racist and homophobic slurs he had used on episodes of his podcast, "Matt and Shane's Secret Podcast," which he hosts alongside fellow comic Matt McCusker.
That podcast was to do an episode live at Helium at midnight on Oct. 26 _ a show that was to cap a three-day run from Gillis and his cohorts at Helium.
"When I got hired, I knew I was going to get fired for sure," Gillis said during his roughly 50-minute set.
Much of the media coverage over Gillis' termination focused on the use of slurs and stereotypes targeting people of Asian descent. But as Gillis said during the Oct. 24 set, firing him for his material on Asians "is like getting (Al) Capone on tax evasion, because I got way worse."
While that may be true, his set appeared somewhat tame _ or at least more measured _ compared to some of the comic's previously reported comments, even when the material turned to controversial topics like race and racism. Those offended by the slurs that got him fired from "SNL," he said, were mostly "honkies, dirty whites," and that he has not yet been "confronted once" about his material by an Asian person.
"You don't realize how many Asian people there are until you fear all of them," Gillis said. "I don't think they cared. No one cared. Anyway, this is how I have to start every show. I have to come out and be like, 'Hello, I'm not racist.'"
Gillis went on to discuss his firing from "SNL" and its ensuing fallout several times throughout the set between other bits, some of which were previously reported following his post-firing return to standup last month in New York City. A new element he took issue with, however, was the media's practice of attending his shows and recording him _ specifically in reference to a joke he had about Donald Trump being assassinated.
"I told that joke right when the "SNL" thing happened, and some reporter was at the show and recorded it _ which is cool. It's crazy that people do that," he said, adding that the reporter sent the Trump joke to Fox News, which he said caused backlash among Trump supporters.
Gillis is not the first comedian to take issue with the recording of his sets in recent years. Previously, high-profile comedians like Dave Chappelle, Hannibal Buress and Joe Rogan have employed the use of Yondr pouches, which seal phones away from audience members during shows, to keep recording to a minimum.
In the wake of his termination from "SNL," some critics painted Gillis as a conservative comic, which he said during his set is not true, indicating that he "did not vote for Donald Trump" with a joking wink.
"But look at me _ that was tough," he said. "His whole campaign was aimed at me. I was watching TV, and he was like, 'Are you a (expletive) fat idiot?' I was like, 'Yeah, dude. What are we doing? I'll do it.'"
At one point, however, Gillis veered into territory that seemed to make him somewhat uncomfortable, joking that he should "stop getting the boys fired up" with his material, lest he accidentally encourage fans to "leave here and burn down an improv theater."
"Shouldn't have said that, I don't think," Gillis said of his joke. "Please don't do anything. Please."
