{"id":2308037,"date":"2026-03-02T10:03:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T10:03:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2308037"},"modified":"2026-03-02T10:03:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T10:03:16","slug":"snl-sketch-sees-controversial-celebrities-claim-they-have-tourettes-after-baftas-n-word-incident","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/snl-sketch-sees-controversial-celebrities-claim-they-have-tourettes-after-baftas-n-word-incident\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018SNL\u2019 sketch sees controversial celebrities claim they have Tourette\u2019s after BAFTAs N-word incident"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>A new\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/series\/saturday-night-live\"><i>Saturday Night Live<\/i><\/a><i>\u00a0<\/i>sketch has proved controversial after poking fun at the incident that saw\u00a0Tourette\u2019s campaigner John Davidson suffer an involuntary tic at the <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/tag\/bafta\">BAFTAs<\/a> and shout out a racial slur.<\/p>\n<p>Last Sunday (February 22), Davidson was in attendance at the awards ceremony to support I Swear, a film that tells the story of his life with the condition, and at several points, the involuntary tics associated with it were loudly audible in the Royal Festival Hall.<\/p>\n<p>On one occasion, he was heard shouting the N-word while\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/reviews\/film-reviews\/sinners-review-ryan-coogler-michael-b-jordan-horror-3855510\"><i>Sinners<\/i><\/a>\u00a0stars\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/artists\/michael-b-jordan\">Michael B. Jordan\u00a0<\/a>and Delroy Lindo were presenting the award for Best Visual Effects, while he also said \u201cshut the fuck up\u201d during BAFTA chair\u00a0Sara Putt\u2019s speech, and \u201cfuck you\u201d to the directors of Best Children\u2019s and Family Film winner\u00a0<i>Boong<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p>In the PSA-style skit titled \u2018Tourette\u2019s,\u2019 a host of celebrities notorious for courting their own controversies \u2013 among them <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/artists\/j-k-rowling\">J.K. Rowling<\/a>, <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/artists\/mel-gibson\">Mel Gibson<\/a>, The Real Housewives of New York star Jill Zarin, Armie Hammer, Louis C.K., Bill Cosby and <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/artists\/kanye-west\">Ye<\/a> \u2013 claimed they suffer from the neurological condition in the new sketch.<\/p>\n<div class=\"jeg_video_container jeg_video_content\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Tourette\u2019s - SNL\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fkKb3K8cxss?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m Mel Gibson, and as I probably should have pointed out decades ago, I too suffer from Tourette\u2019s, which explains a lot of the things I\u2019ve said or yelled through the years,\u201d said the Braveheart star, portrayed by Andrew Dismukes.<\/p>\n<p>Actor Hammer, played by the episode\u2019s host, Heated Rivalry star Connor Storrie, said: \u201cNot many people know this, but one of the most common side effects of Tourette\u2019s is cannibalism.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Zarin, played by Sarah Sherman, whose recent video critique of <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/news\/bad-bunnys-halftime-show-ranks-fourth-biggest-in-super-bowl-history-as-star-pulls-in-128-2million-viewers-3928989\">Bad Bunny\u2019s Super Bowl half-time show<\/a> led to her firing from the Real Housewives series, remarked, \u201cI suffer from severe long-winded monologue-style Tourette\u2019s, a condition that affects nine out of 10 people on Long Island.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ashley Padilla\u2019s Rowling added: \u201cTourette\u2019s isn\u2019t just blurting out an offensive word. It can be years-long obsession with something like trans life and a deep anger that someone who was born with a wand in their pants would want that one removed,\u201d while Ye confessed to having \u201cthree different kinds of Tourette\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Harkening back to the BAFTA controversy, the show\u2019s mock Tourette\u2019s PSA was \u201cbrought to you by National Workforce of Rethinking Disabilities, or N.W.O.R.D\u201d, which comes after <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/news\/film\/i-swear-subject-john-davidson-deeply-mortified-by-tourettes-n-word-outburst-at-baftas-3931057\">Davidson said he was \u201cdeeply mortified\u201d by his N-word outburst at last\u00a0weekend\u2019s BAFTA ceremony<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Tourette\u2019s syndrome causes sudden and involuntary sounds or movements, known as tics, and as explained by Tourette\u2019s Action in a statement last week, the tics are \u201cnot a reflection of a person\u2019s beliefs, intentions or character\u201d and are \u201cneurological, not intentional\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Davidson has had Tourette\u2019s since he was 12 years old and as depicted\u00a0in\u00a0<i>I Swear<\/i>, he has become a celebrated campaigner,\u00a0activist\u00a0and educator on the subject.<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/news\/film\/delroy-lindo-wishes-someone-from-bafta-spoke-to-us-after-tourettes-incident-during-show-3931049\">Lindo has since said that he wished someone from BAFTA had spoken to him and Jordan after the N-word\u00a0incident<\/a>, but\u00a0said that they both \u201cdid what we had to do\u201d while delivering their speech.<\/p>\n<p>Attendees at the ceremony have said that they were warned ahead of the show of Davidson\u2019s\u00a0condition, but\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/film\/awards\/bafta-aired-n-word-michael-b-jordan-delroy-lindo-owed-apology-1236669999\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><i>Variety<\/i><\/a>\u00a0have reported that none of the nominees or presenters were contacted by BAFTA ahead of the show.<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nme.com\/news\/film\/bafta-apologises-for-profane-outbursts-from-tourette-syndrome-campaigner-john-davidson-3930907\">BAFTAs host Alan Cumming issued an apology from the stage during the show<\/a>, saying: \u201cTourette\u2019s Syndrome is a disability and the tics you\u2019ve heard tonight are involuntary, which means the person who has Tourette\u2019s Syndrome has no control over their language. We apologize if you are offended tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The show was broadcast by the BBC on a two-hour tape delay, but the use of the N-word was not edited out of the show, for which the BBC have since\u00a0apologised, and it has now been edited out of the version of the show that is streaming on BBC\u00a0iPlayer.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script>\n  !function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s)\n  {if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\n  n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};\n  if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';\n  n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\n  t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];\n  s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window, document,'script',\n  'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n  fbq('consent', 'revoke');\n  fbq('init', '370979561341328');\n  fbq('track', 'PageView');\n<\/script><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.nme.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new\u00a0Saturday Night Live\u00a0sketch has proved controversial after poking fun at the incident that saw\u00a0Tourette\u2019s campaigner John Davidson suffer an involuntary tic at the BAFTAs and shout out a racial slur. Last Sunday (February 22), Davidson was in attendance at the awards ceremony to support I Swear, a film that tells the story of his [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2308038,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25173],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2308037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/\u2018SNL-sketch-sees-controversial-celebrities-claim-they-have-Tourettes-after.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2308037","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2308037"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2308037\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2308039,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2308037\/revisions\/2308039"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2308038"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2308037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2308037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2308037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}