During a sketch on “Saturday Night Live” about actors auditioning to voice the audiobook of Britney Spears’ memoir, the writing seemingly ripped off a joke from an X user that went viral on Oct. 16.
“‘Okay, I’m ready, put it in,’ I said and he replied: ‘It is already in.’ My world collapsed,” Brian, user @thehalfbloodlad, posted on X, along with a photo of Spears and her ex-boyfriend, Justin Timberlake.
The user posted the fake excerpt around the same time that news outlets started sharing real excerpts from Spears’ memoir, “The Woman In Me.”
“My tweet comes from a very well known ‘Sex and the City’ Samantha joke,” Brian told HuffPost over X DMs. “You can google it. It was simply a fan joke and I can’t believe it’s been blown out of proportion like this. Britney is a huge ‘SATC’ fan and I’m sure she got the reference immediately, but SNL using it is just weird. That’s all I have to say.”
It’s unclear if the SNL writers thought it was a real part of Spears’ memoir or if they ripped off the joke. Other parts of the sketch include real excerpts from the book. NBC representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
X users were quick to come to Brian’s defense however, asking Brian if SNL has reached out to him and suggesting he be credited as a writer on the sketch.
Actual excerpts from Spears’ memoir have been going viral since the book was released, including a clip of actor Michelle Williams reading a part where Spears recalls Timberlake saying, “Oh yeah. Fo’ shiz. Fo’ shiz. Ginuwine what’s up homie?”