Julia Sweeney Addresses Criticism Of “Pat”, Says ‘SNL’ Character Was Not Trans Or Nonbinary

Julia Sweeney‘s “Pat” was a frequent and popular sketch star during the 1990s era of Saturday Night Live, but in recent years the character of indeterminate gender has come under criticism as a mockery of trans and nonbinary people.

Appearing today on ABC’s The View, Sweeney addressed the criticism, saying she “took it to heart” and has “thought about it a lot.”

“Much later, there was some criticism of it,” she said, “but Pat isn’t trans or non binary. Pat is a man or a woman, but you just don’t know which Pat is. That is the joke, but I did understand the criticism, and I took it to heart and thought about it a lot.”

“But even when we were writing all the sketches ,” she continued, “we were really making fun of the other people [in the sketches] not being able to handle the fact that they couldn’t tell. The laughs all came from that. But then, of course, when you’re defending your joke, as we know, you’ve already lost them.”

Sweeney said a documentary about her and the character has been filmed, and prompted her to revisit the character and the controversy.

“I actually feel very positive about it,” she said. “There’s a documentary that got made, and it’s gonna come out this next year. And there’s a lot of trans comedy writers in LA that were inspired by Pat, that loved Pat. I’ve been interviewed for three years for this documentary, and it was like therapy for me. I was like, yeah, Pat, that was a good idea…I love Pat now.”

Sweeney was on The View, along with other former cast members Laraine Newman and Leslie Jones, to talk about the upcoming SNL50: The Anniversary Special, airing on NBC and Peacock Sunday, February 16.