Pete Davidson says his ‘BDE’ reputation, sexualization in media took an emotional toll
- Share via
See more from the L.A. Times in Google Search. Set us as preferred
It turns out the amount of objectifying Pete Davidson received from the tabloids took a toll on his “BDE.”
The “Saturday Night Live” alumnus told “The Breakfast Club” on Wednesday that he was “embarrassed” by the way his personal life crowded out his work.
Pete Davidson is expecting his first child with girlfriend Elsie Hewitt, the model announced with cheeky photos on Instagram.
“I brought a lot of pop culture into [SNL], like, I made it sort of like tabloid-y, like trendy thing unintentionally. … No one talked about any work I was doing,” the 31-year-old father-to-be said. “They were just like, ‘Oh, that’s the f— stick.”
The “Bupkis” star began his “SNL” career in 2014, when he was only 20, then spent eight seasons on the late-night sketch comedy show. After leaving in 2022, he came back a year later to host the show.
His dating life dominated the headlines during his time on “SNL.” Davidson dated singer Ariana Grande, actor Kate Beckinsale, model Kaia Gerber, actor Madelyn Cline and reality TV star Kim Kardashian.
The Grande and Kardashian periods attracted the most attention of course, with the singer hinting at Davidson’s alleged “BDE” and the reality mogul saying later that she was up for some of that amid her divorce from Ye — then known as Kanye West. The rapper, by the way, was not pleased with his ex’s rebound entanglement. (BDE is short for “big d— energy.”)
The claymation video for Kanye West’s ‘Eazy’ depicts the rapper kidnapping and beheading a figure resembling Pete Davidson, who’s dating Kim Kardashian.
“I don’t want to victimize myself in any way because I’m cool, but the sexualization of me, if that was a girl, you know, [there would] be a march for it,” Davidson said.
He said the attention his track record brought affected his dating life and made him “sad.”
In July, the “King of Staten Island” star revealed that his current girlfriend, British model and actor Elsie Hewitt, is expecting their first child. She posted a series of pictures of the two of them on social media, including a shot of an ultrasound and video of her getting the scan done.
Her caption: “welp now everyone knows we had sex.”
