Chloe Fineman Breaks A Cardinal Sin of ‘Saturday Night Live’ During Apartment Tour

Saturday Night Live is the longest-running sketch comedy series in TV history, because you don’t make it into the record books with “skits.”

While the end product may often be irreverent, silly and indulgently stupid, SNL is serious work for the army of creatives involved each hellish production week. Almost all of the biggest stars and most influential writers of the last 50 years in American comedy have spent at least one sleepless night slamming their head against a table in 30 Rockefeller Plaza while trying to come up with the perfect punchline for four-minute sketch about Justin Bieber going to Krispy Kreme or something similarly inane. SNL is more than just a show — it’s a comedy institution, and those who don’t respect it don’t last long.

Then, on the other hand, there’s six-season SNL veteran and master impressionist Chloe Fineman, who has somehow become one of the show’s brightest stars while ignoring its unspoken rules of decorum. In an apartment tour for the popular rent-focused content creator Caleb Simpson over the weekend, Fineman showed off both her $5,500 West Village flat and her flagrant disregard for the fandom’s first commandment: Thou Shalt Not Call a Sketch a “Skit.”

While strolling through her impressive walk-in closet, Fineman uttered the unacceptable term that sounds like Paris Hilton’s nails on a chalkboard to the SNL fandom. “We just did a skit on SNL called ‘Forever 31’ that I’ve had an idea about for a long time, I wrote it with our two head writers,” Fineman said, recalling the hit fake commercial about post-youth fashion from earlier this month. “This is ‘Forever 31,’” Fineman commented on her wardrobe. “I kind of dress like a business lady.”

Officially, SNL is a sketch show, not a skit show, and the classification is very important to its most fanatical followers. “Skits” are short, informal performances usually put on by amateurs, such as a group of theater-ish summer campers during the weekend jamboree. “Sketches” are a much more intensive endeavor, especially at the professional level, and as anyone who has seen SNL can attest, a sketch is much more likely than a skit to go on for so long that it’s practically a one-act play.

The distinction matters to the SNL cast, too — well, at least to some of them. Back in May 2021, then-SNL cast member Chris Redd went viral for roasting the soon-to-be SNL host Elon Musk after the tech magnate tweeted, “Throwing out some skit ideas for SNL: What should I do?” 

Redd replied simply, “First I’d call Em sketches.”

Now, ironically, it’s time for Musk's least-favorite SNL cast member to learn the difference between skits and sketches, as SNL fans on Twitter start to mock her apartment tour gaffe. Maybe, when it comes time for Fineman to finally own a home, she’ll realize her mistake when the architect comes in with some rough skits of the kitchen layout.