Kim Kardashian's OJ Jokes Didn't Land With One Person

Sister of Nicole Brown Simpson didn't appreciate Kardashian's OJ humor on 'SNL'
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 12, 2021 8:37 AM CDT

Kim Kardashian didn't hold back on the jokes over the weekend during her Saturday Night Live hosting gig, but one set of barbs has the family of Nicole Brown Simpson lashing out. In Kardashian's opening monologue, the 40-year-old TV personality mentioned her late father, Robert Kardashian, who'd served on the defense team of OJ Simpson's double-murder trial in the mid-'90s. She noted that her dad had introduced her to her "first Black person"—and then asked the SNL audience to "take a stab in the dark" at guessing who it was.

She added, "I know it's sort of weird to remember the first Black person you met, but OJ does leave a mark. Or several. Or none at all. I still don't know." Tanya Brown tells TMZ that Kardashian's jokes referencing the 1994 murders of her sister and friend Ron Goldman were "beyond inappropriate and insensitive" and in "poor taste," especially since Kardashian's mother, Kris Jenner, was a close friend of Brown Simpson. Tanya Brown says even if Kardashian didn't come up with the jokes herself, she should've told SNL writers she wouldn't perform them.

BuzzFeed notes that most fans seem to be Team Tanya on this one. "Imagine how Nicole Brown's family must feel, or OJ Simpsons children who lost their mother," one fan cringed. Still, others defended Kardashian's performance overall, and some even defended the OJ jokes, claiming they may have been a tribute to Norm Macdonald, the late ex-SNLer who was known for riffing on the disgraced football player. For what it's worth, Kardashian's appearance didn't hurt the ratings: Deadline notes the show actually got a "ratings bump" that "helped lift NBC's late-night show from the all-time lows posted by the Season 47 premiere" a week earlier. (More Kim Kardashian stories.)

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