Golden Globes host Jo Koy says he wasn’t making fun of Taylor Swift with NFL joke

Golden Globes host Jo Koy has insisted he wasn’t making fun of Taylor Swift during his poorly received opening monologue.

In the speech, Koy made light of Swift’s highly publicised displays of support for her boyfriend, Kansas City Chiefs tight-end Travis Kelce, noting that the pop singer is often pictured at his games.

“The big difference between the Golden Globes and the NFL? On the Golden Globes, we have fewer camera shots of Taylor Swift… there’s just more to go to here.”

The joke seemingly didn’t go down well with Swift, as she awkwardly pursed her lips and took a sip of her drink. Her icy reaction later went viral on social media, with Koy coming under heavy criticism.

“I didn’t understand the Taylor tiff,” the comedian told the Los Angeles Times on Thursday (January 11). “Mind you, that [joke] was just getting rewritten 50 million times, never ran it through, all the way up until we had to walk out. It’s just weird, where do you place it, and we kept hammering it and cutting it down. But the whole intention of that joke was to make fun of the NFL.”

He continued: “It’s like, the cool thing about the Globes is we don’t need to do cutaways for ratings. What hurts the most is me just supporting Taylor. I support her. I love her work. I got nieces that I bought tickets for. There’s no ill intent in that joke. The joke is about the NFL and how they keep using cutaways to [her]. And it’s an obvious reason why. I’m not saying anything that no one’s saying, and it’s obvious what that joke was. It’s about the NFL.”

Koy concluded: “It’s like out of everything that has happened, this is the one you choose to go after. I didn’t understand why because it was fun when I walked out. Robert De Niro was dying, like, and I’m looking at him and his wife was smacking his back and smiling and laughing and he was laughing. And when I did the whole thing about him being 80, he loved it. And that was fun. I was like, man, this guy’s so much fun. And then I did that [Swift] joke and I’m like, what just happened?”

The day after the Globes, Koy himself admitted to being disappointed with his performance, saying he had an “off night”.

“I’d be lying if [I said] it doesn’t hurt,” he told Good Morning America (GMA). “Hosting is just a tough gig. Yes, I’m a stand-up comic but that hosting position it’s a different style.”

Comedy legend Steve Martin has since come to Koy’s defence, saying that awards show hosting is “a very difficult job and not for the squeamish”.

Congratulations to Jo Koy,” he wrote on Threads, “who took on the toughest gig in show business, hit, missed, was light on his feet, and now has twenty minutes of new material for his stand up!”

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