Colin Jost shocks wife Scarlett Johansson with raunchy ‘SNL’ jokes

Another year, another torturous Saturday Night Live episode for Colin Jost. But this time, he didn’t have to suffer alone.

SNL aired its final episode of 2024 this weekend, which meant one of the show’s most beloved traditions was back in full force: Michael Che and Jost’s annual Christmas joke swap, a “Weekend Update” segment in which they are forced to read jokes they have not seen in advance that they have written for each other.

Any true SNL fan will tell you that Che has been known to up the ante in the joke swap. One time, he invited an actual practicing rabbi — and in another instance, a civil rights activist — to witness the offensive jokes he wrote for Jost. This time, he took a much more personal approach, making sure Scarlett Johansson, Jost’s wife, was in the building with a camera pointed right at her to capture her live reaction to the swap. And like Che and Jost, she did not disappoint.

Jost began by announcing, per Che’s instruction, that he would be reading his jokes in “Black voice.” He then delivered a few quips about slavery reparations and, soon enough, turned his attention to his loving wife.

“I want to dedicate this next joke to my boo, Scarlett Johansson,” Jost said. When the camera cut to Johansson backstage watching the segment on a TV, he couldn’t help but laugh. “Oh no. Oh my gosh, she’s so genuinely worried.”

Resuming the joke, he continued, “Hey, boo. Y’all know Scarlett just celebrated her 40th birthday…which means I’m about to get up out of there!”

When Jost dropped his head in defeat, Che chimed in to say, “There’s more.”

So Jost carried on. “Nah, nah, I’m just playing,” he read. “We just had a kid together, and y’all ain’t seen no pictures of him yet… because he’s Black as hell.”

Backstage, Johansson sipped her drink and shook her head in disbelief. But it didn’t end there, as the next quip took a turn towards an R-rating. Reporting Costco’s recent decision to remove the roast beef sandwich from its menu as an image of one appeared on screen next to him, Jost announced that he’s been “eating roast beef every night since my wife had the kid.”

The punchline earned a gasp from the crowd, and even Johansson looked shocked and horrified when the camera cut to her, exclaiming, “Oh my God, holy s—!”

Jost continued through laughter, “Nah, nah, I’m just playin’, baby. You know I don’t go downtown… That’s gay as hell!” 

Jost attempted to get his revenge, forcing Che to jest about the recent allegations against Jay-Z and Sean “Diddy” Combs.

“No, man. No, no, no,” Che said before delivering the Jost-penned joke. “Some people are afraid to talk about it, but not Mikey ‘The Truth Bomb’ Che, so here it is: Jay-Z is innocent. He wasn’t even at those parties, and I know because I was!”

Choking back laughter, Che continued, “And Diddy, if you’re listening, we’re bad boys for life. When it comes to the charges against you, I’ll say the same thing I always said at your parties: I will help get you off.”

“Strange thing to say at a party,” Jost quipped.

Che also had to read a joke about the box office success of Moana 2: “Like me and my good friend Jeffrey Epstein used to say, there’s nothing like an island adventure with a teenage girl.”

He continued, “I’m just kidding. I would never, ever sleep with a girl as dark as Moana.”

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Johansson, who has been married to Jost since 2020, admitted earlier this year that the joke swap is no walk in the park for her either, saying she essentially “blacked out” during the May edition of the segment.

“We need to go into like witness protection after that night,” Johansson joked at the time. “Like, I am absolutely terrified we’re gonna be, like, targeted. It’s so bad. I black out for that period of the night. I don’t — I actually don’t remember it.”

Describing the segment as “brutal,” she added, “I feel like every year it gets worse. It’s just terrible.”

Watch the latest “Weekend Update” joke swap segment above, and decide for yourself if it’s the worst yet.