Michael Che lashed out at a writer for the entertainment website Uproxx who criticized his “Saturday Night Live” co-star Colin Jost as the “epitome of white-male mediocrity.”
In a series of since-deleted story posts on Instagram that have been screencapped and have spread on social media, Che ripped into Uproxx columnist Steven Hyden whom he bizarrely suggesed has sex with dogs.
Che riffs about reading several fake news stories involving a “regular mediocre ass white dude, probably like a writer or something.”
“I don’t think it’s Steven Hyden, but that name is stuck in my head for some reason,” Che wrote. “But this guy sucks off stray dogs and rescue dogs. And like, nobody knows why.”
Hyden didn’t seem fazed by Che’s oddball outburst. “Dear Michael Che, I don’t feel harassed,” he tweeted. “Your bit about me having sex with dogs was hilarious. Have a nice Easter. Your pal, Steve.”
In his Uproxx piece on Friday –“Why Does Everyone (Still) Hate ‘SNL’s Colin Jost?” — Hyden explored why Jost has become such a divisive figure for some “SNL” viewers despite being championed by “SNL” legends Tina Fey and Lorne Michaels as well as fellow castmates.
The Harvard grad, who became the show’s co-head writer in 2017, has also written for the New Yorker and co-hosted the Emmy Awards with Che.
“The irony of Jost’s polarizing reputation is that he isn’t really a provocateur. (This is also true of the slightly edgier Che, though he’s generally funnier.) Jost never gets in trouble for taking a dangerous position on an important issue — his comedy comes from a place of centrist, dispassionate pragmatism,” Hyden wrote.
Hyden concluded his piece by suggesting that Jost lean into the hate by “owning his jerkiness,” something that Norm Macdonald did during his “Weekend Update” run in the 1990s.