Indie pop artist Noelle Denton, also known by her stage name Noelle Sucks, has accused Saturday Night Live of plagiarizing her work for Olivia Rodrigo’s “all-american bitch” performance. While the plagiarism is unconfirmed, this is far from the first time SNL has been accused of stealing creators’ work.
While SNL is often heralded as one of the best sketch comedy shows of all time, its legacy has been tainted by plagiarism accusations dating back to the 1990s. The first known incident occurred in 1995 when cast member and writer Jay Mohr stole an entire standup routine from Rick Shapiro, word for word.
Although he denied it at the time (even in court), Mohr later admitted in his memoir that he had intentionally stolen Shapiro’s work due to his desperation to get some airtime. After this incident was settled, SNL went quite some time with no further allegations. Unfortunately, the accusations started picking up again in recent years and becoming far more frequent.
One notable incident was in 2017, when comedian Louis C. K.’s “Birthday Clown” sketch appeared to be a ripoff of Tig Notaro’s short film Clown Service. Notaro herself accused SNL of plagiarism in this incident, confirming that the show did not get permission from her to do the sketch and alleging that one writer on set definitely knew about her short film.
As recently as last year, SNL was also accused of stealing its “Charmin Bears” sketch from YouTuber Joel Haver, though Haver addressed the situation very cordially and admitted it could have been a “wild coincidence.” However, he noted that the theft would’ve impacted him more if he’d been a smaller creator struggling to break into the industry. That’s why the allegations of SNL stealing from an indie artist are concerning.
Indie artist accuses SNL and Olivia Rodrigo’s team of stealing her work
The latest episode of SNL saw Adam Driver host the show while Rodrigo was the guest singer for the night. One of her performances was her song “all-american bitch.” Her performance was paired with a unique set that saw her sitting at a table that appeared to be set up for a tea party. As the song reached its climax, she jumped onto the table and destroyed a few of the cakes.
The performance received high praise from viewers, as it showed off Rodrigo’s acting skills and also helped illustrate the song’s theme of a woman struggling under society’s standards. However, Denton noticed that the performance was similar to the music video for her song “Your Mom Calls Me.”
The videos aren’t identical, but the concepts are similar. In Denton’s video, she is also seated at a table set for a tea party, with a single teacup in front of her. At the beginning, Denton and her friends around the table lift their teacups in a toast, which Rodrigo also does with the extras on set during her performance. Additionally, partway through her video, Denton climbs up on the table, waving a pie cutter, similar to how Rodrigo climbs on the table with a knife. Both performances end with a cake being destroyed.
Denton took to TikTok to address the situation, noting the similarities between the performances. Upon doing some digging, she found that she had a mutual friend with Tarik Mikou, the creative director behind Rodrigo’s performance. That friend had shared some of her videos publicly, making it possible for Mikou to see them. Denton’s friend also commented on one of Mikou’s posts about the similarities between her work and Rodrigo’s performance, but the comments were deleted. Soon, Denton realized that Mikou had unfriended her friend and limited comments on his social media, as well as the social media of his production company.
Denton wasn’t casting any blame on Rodrigo or even SNL but wanted to chat with Rodrigo’s creative team to understand the similarities and if they were just a “coincidence.” If it were plagiarism, though, it would still reflect poorly on SNL for repeatedly failing to check where the ideas it is hosting on its show come from.
Some commenters on Denton’s video pointed out that the performance also resembled Melanie Martinez’s “Pity Party.” The concept of a messy tea party isn’t new, so it’s not surprising that there are some similarities in all these works. Still, the closeness in the choreography between Denton’s and Rodrigo’s extras is hard to explain, as well as Rodrigo’s creative team allegedly avoiding confrontation.
What’s also concerning is that SNL was accused of another instance of plagiarism in that same episode for using a catchphrase popularized by comedian Yannis Pappas. Whether the accusations are founded or not, they do bring SNL’s history of plagiarism back to the forefront. As these accusations increase in frequency, it raises concern over how authentic SNL is.
One thing we can do in the face of all this is to use these instances also raise awareness for indie artists, reinforcing that they deserve respect and more opportunities. After all, if their work is good enough to appear on or inspire SNL, then perhaps the show should hire more of these creators.
(featured image: NBC)
