Shane Gillis, one of three comedians hired last week to join the cast of Saturday Night Live, has been fired from the show after the resurfacing of racist remarks he made last year.

In a statement obtained by Variety, a spokesperson for Saturday Night Live showrunner Lorne Michaels apologised for not knowing Gillis recently used racial slurs.

“We want SNL to have a variety of voices and points of view within the show, and we hired Shane on the strength of his talent as comedian and his impressive audition for SNL,” the statement reads, adding “the language he used is offensive, hurtful and unacceptable.”

Gillis was announced as a new cast member last week, alongside comics Bowen Yang and Chloe Fineman. While the call-up would usually represent a big break in the industry, attention quickly turned to a clip from Matt and Shane’s Secret Podcast, which was posted on Twitter by journalist Seth Simon.

The clip features Gillis using a slur against Chinese people and a heavily-inflected accent, and quickly went viral on the social media platform.

For his own part, Gillis today released a statement on his firing. He did not apologise for the resurfaced footage.

Saturday Night Live returns on September 28, minus a dude who seems to be prepping himself for adoption by people who believe cancel culture has just gone too far.

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Source: Variety
Image: Jeff Kravitz / Getty Images