Hours after labeling Saturday Night Live’s “White Potus” sketch “mean and unfunny,” Aimee Lou Wood defended the comedian who portrayed her White Lotus character.
Wood took to Instagram late on Sunday, April 13, sharing three Stories that deep dived her disapproval of the parody, which aired throughout the Saturday, April 12, episode. “Not @sarahsquirm’s fault x,” Wood, who portrayed Chelsea in season 3 of The White Lotus, wrote over a photograph of herself gazing into the camera. “Not hating on her, hating on the concept x.”
The actress revealed via the social media platform earlier on Sunday that she was not a fan of the sketch, which saw the episode’s host Jon Hamm, guest star Scarlett Johansson and Sherman — sporting a set of pretend teeth — team up for a political spin on White Lotus characters.
Wood’s initial verdict revealed she thought the sketch was “mean and unfunny” while also claiming that she’d received apologies from the NBC variety show because it aired. “Such a shame cuz I had such a fantastic time watching it a pair weeks ago. Yes, take the piss obviously — that’s what the show is about — but there should be a cleverer, more nuanced, less low-cost way?” Wood wrote earlier on Sunday.
Adding to her defence of Sherman, 32, later, Wood wrote of being “thin skinned.”
“I actually love being taken the piss out of when it’s clever and in good spirits. However the joke was about fluoride,” Wood wrote over one other Story’s selfie. “I actually have big gap teeth not bad teeth. I don’t mind caricature — I understand that’s what SNL is. But the remainder of the skit was punching up and I/Chelsea was the just one punched down on.”
Aimee Lou Wood’s Instagram Story Courtesy of Aimee Lou Wood/Instagram
A 3rd Instagram Story that evening crystallized Wood’s view on the matter. Seemingly screenshotting a comment that agreed along with her stance, Wood shared, “It was a pointy and funny skit until it suddenly took a screeching turn into 1970’s misogyny.”
“This sums up my view x,” Wood wrote over the screenshot.
In the course of the sketch, Hamm, 54, who portrayed Walton Goggins’ Rick as he played Robert F. Kennedy Jr., asked Sherman, “I’ve been having these insane ideas, like what if we took all of the fluoride out of the drinking water? What would that do to people’s teeth?” Sherman responded, “Fluoride? What’s that?”
Aimee Lou Wood’s Instagram Story Courtesy of Aimee Lou Wood/Instagram
(Health and Human Services Secretary Kennedy Jr., 71, has called for the top of community water fluoridation, per CBS News. The news outlet notes that fluoride has been incorporated into public water supplies for a long time as a way to help prevent tooth decay.)
This isn’t the primary time Wood has addressed the eye she receives consequently of her teeth. During an interview with The Sunday Times, published on April 5, Wood said, “It’s, like, cool, and now I need to stop f***ing talking about it. Can I discuss my character? Why am I talking about my gnashers? It’s like now I’m only a pair of front teeth.”
Back in 2020, Wood also spoke to Stylist about them. “I’d all the time be super confident after I went to theater auditions, but when it was a TV thing I’d be so shocked after I got a recall,” she told the outlet on the time. “I sometimes thought, ‘Oh, a Channel 4 thing, I may need a probability on there.’ Then Sex Education got here along and I used to be like, ‘Well, what have I seen on Netflix? Everyone has perfect Hollywood teeth.’”
