Chloe Fineman is a 37-year-old comedian and actress, best known for being a Saturday Night Live cast member since 2019. She’s also known for her impressions. Well, a few weeks ago, Chloe and several SNL cast members did a Vanity Fair video where they were playing various made-up games. That’s what many magazines are doing now, creating digital/video content as opposed to conducting old-fashion print interviews. Well, this VF video quickly went off the rails as Chloe spoke about why she was fired as a camp-counselor when she was a teenager. It’s not just that Chloe freely admitted a pretty horrifying story about what she did to a six-year-old child, it’s that Vanity Fair then edited the video to remove the worst parts after a week of online backlash.
A Vanity Fair clip featuring the cast of Saturday Night Live has gone viral after it was edited to remove specific details and some awkward cast reactions to Chloe Fineman’s shocking tale of being fired as a camp counselor in her youth.
Vanity Fair’s video features Fineman alongside Mikey Day, Sarah Sherman, Ashley Padilla, Jane Wickline and James Austin Johnson as they test one another in an episode of the mag’s game show series, this one titled “SNL Cast Test How Well They Know Each Other.” One segment finds Fineman polling her colleagues to guess the job she got fired from and later rehired by with a bonus question of “Why was I fired?”
Day jokes it was for “racially insensitive comments” while Sherman guesses that Fineman was sacked from a restaurant for a bad attitude. Padilla asks how old she was at the time, and Fineman offers that she was 16. Then she tells the tale. “I was fired as a camp counselor,” Fineman says. “I pantsed a boy. He would lift my shirt all the time. It was a different time. He would be like, ‘Hey, could I have a hug?’ And then I’d go to hug him and he’d lift my shirt, like a dick. And then I was like, ‘I’m going to get back at you.’ And so we were on a hike and I was like, ‘Hey, Ollie, go look over there. It’s a hawk.’ He looked and then I yanked his pants down, and then I was fired.”
That’s how the clip currently plays out on Vanity Fair’s YouTube channel. However, eagle-eyed viewers noted that it’s not the same clip that was originally posted as that version has Fineman detailing that the young camper was 6 years old and when she pulled his pants down, his “little ding-a-ling was out.” Her colleagues appear floored by the story and in response, Padilla, who looks especially shocked, responds by saying, “Oh, honey, I think you’re on a list somewhere.”
It’s unclear if Vanity Fair responded to online backlash or a publicist’s request to remove the more salacious parts of the story or the awkward cast reactions. The Hollywood Reporter has reached out to a rep for the magazine for comment.
There are so many levels to this controversy. First, there’s the story itself, which Fineman never should have told or presented in such a jokey way. And obviously, she never should have done that to a child! Jesus. Two, why didn’t Vanity Fair immediately see the problem and edit it out before initially posting it? And by going back and re-editing the video after the backlash, VF has just Streisand-Effect’d their mess and Chloe Fineman’s mess. My god. I’m including the original clip below – to their credit, the other SNL cast members seemed absolutely horrified by Fineman’s story. “It was a different time” – girl it was 2005???
For those who haven’t seen the clip: pic.twitter.com/4ND1diftfk
— César (@delicaterocks) April 5, 2026
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.
