Featured Image Credit: Dana Edelson/NBCU Photo Bank
Topics: Music, News, Reddit, TikTok, Saturday Night Live, Film and TV, Celebrity
Niamh Shackleton
Topics: Music, News, Reddit, TikTok, Saturday Night Live, Film and TV, Celebrity
Live TV doesn't always go smoothly, and Ashlee Simpson's performance on Saturday Night Live is a prime example.
Back in the 00s, Simpson (the sister of Jessica Simpson) released a series of pop tracks including 'Boyfriend', 'L.O.V.E', and 'Outta My Head'.
Her debut song was 'Pieces of Me' in 2004 and, to plug her new track, the singer bagged a slot of Saturday Night Live (SNL).
Jude Law was hosting the show and shortly after introducing her, things went very wrong very quickly.
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It's believed her band proceeded to start playing the wrong track before a singing voice (that wasn't Simpson's live vocals) started playing 'Pieces of Me'.
Then, adding to the awkwardness of it all, Simpson proceeded to start doing a very unusual dance.
Eventually she walked off stage and SNL producers cut to an ad break.
Post-adverts, Simpson addressed the matter with Law and placed blame on her band.
"I feel so bad,” she said to the camera.
"My band started playing the wrong song, and I didn’t know what to do, so I thought I’d do a hoedown. I’m sorry. It’s live TV. Things happen. I’m sorry."
As to why she was going to lip-sync rather than sing live, Simpson later claimed that she was on vocal rest as per her doctor's orders due to acid reflux.
"It’s so embarrassing because it sucks," Simpson told MTV at the time.
"The total situation was a bummer. I made a complete fool of myself."
This wasn't quite the end for Simpson - she went on to release two more albums in 2005 and 2008, the first of which went to number one.
However, her reputation was arguably tarnished by the incident.
Speaking on E! reality series Ashlee + Evan, she said: "The world hated me for this SNL moment I had.
"For me, it was the most humbling experience of my life, because the whole world thinks everything that you just put your heart and soul into writing is a joke. And that sucked.
"For me I went back in, I made a second record, it was number one.
"And I made a third record and I toured all the amphitheaters…and I don't even think the world knows that I got to that place."
In a Reddit thread about 'Celebrities who've ruined their careers on live TV', one person commented: "The Ashlee Simpson SNL lip-synching debacle is what came to mind instantly.
"I still remember it being the big story all over every entertainment TV show for the next few days."
Another person wrote: "Ashlee Simpson's SNL lip syncing incident and Janet Jackson's unfortunate Superbowl Halftime show come to mind.
"Maybe not fully ruined but definitely very tarnished at least."
Elsewhere someone commented on a TikTok clip of the performance: "I can’t believe how badly this affected her career because I feel like if this happened to someone now ppl wouldn’t care."
"Sucks that if she did that today, it wouldn’t even phase anyone," echoed another.
Others commented that the 'felt so bad' for Simpson, who was around the age of 19 at the time.