Shane Gillis hosted 'Saturday Night Live' for the third time on the weekend of October 10-11, and Variety reports his opening monologue about women at the gym — including him calling them 'whores' and describing their shorts — generated 'heated backlash.'

PhillyVoice adds that Gillis then mimed ogling a woman onstage. The response from fellow comedians and actors came fast, and it is that wave of rebuttals, not the monologue itself, that has become the story since the feed's earlier coverage of the rocky opener.

According to Variety, 'Schitt's Creek' star Dan Levy posted an Instagram Reel on Sunday night saying he was 'speechless that something like that can exist on live national television.' Levy argued that women wearing short shorts at the gym 'does not make them whores.

It makes the men calling them whores misogynists,' and said 'more men need to be standing up in opposition to it because it's complacency that has created the environment in which women are sexually assaulted.'

PhillyVoice reports his video drew more than 1 million likes, including one from Reese Witherspoon, with Elizabeth Banks commenting 'Nailed it.'

The Hollywood Reporter says former 'SNL' castmember Ego Nwodim, who left the show ahead of season 51 after seven seasons, took the sharpest satirical swing: on her Instagram Story she posted a gym photo captioned 'Whore reporting for duty,' then followed with a post-workout meal captioned 'Getting my 30 grams of protein in after heauxing.'

PhillyVoice notes Phoebe Robinson, co-creator of '2 Dope Queens,' also blasted the bit as 'misogynistic, lazy' comedy, asking 'Aren't we tired?' and 'Don't we want better?'

The backlash came on a chaotic night for Gillis overall. Deadline reports he accidentally dropped an f-bomb live in a 'Green Eggs and Ham'-inspired sketch opposite Mikey Day and Andrew Dismukes' Sam-I-Am, covered his mouth, and later told the audience 'sorry about earlier' at the curtain call.

Deadline says censors did not catch it on the live broadcast, and 'SNL' muted the word when it posted the sketch to social media, though the expletive remains audible on Peacock.

PhillyVoice frames the pushback as part of a larger critique: Moms Demand Action founder Shannon Watts accused 'SNL' on X of a 'decades-long history of sexism,' while author Jessica Valenti tied Gillis' timing to the national conversation around the Cornell University rape case, arguing per the outlet that 'this is his contribution to that conversation.'

Levy and Robinson both pointed to a double standard — no mention of shirtless men at the gym. The stakes, per these commentators, are what such jokes normalize on live network television.

Gillis has made no public comments about the monologue itself, according to PhillyVoice, and Variety reports representatives for 'SNL' and Gillis did not immediately respond to its request for comment; the FCC did not immediately clarify whether complaints were received.

The history lingers, too: both Variety and Deadline recount that Gillis was hired as a featured player in 2019 and fired days later over resurfaced podcast clips, before returning to host in 2024, 2025 and now 2026. Whether 'SNL' or Gillis responds to the criticism remains an open question.