‘SNL’ Alum Melanie Hutsell Addresses Prosthetic ‘Blossom’ Nose After Mayim Bialik Speaks Out
After Mayim Bialik recalled seeing herself parodied with a prosthetic nose on Saturday Night Live, former SNL star Melanie Hutsell offered her recollection of that moment.
In a statement to Entertainment Weekly, Hutsell expressed remorse over the 1994 sketch, in which she donned the prosthetic to spoof the sitcom Blossom, another NBC series.
“When we were preparing to do that sketch all those years ago, I was absolutely horrified that they wanted me to wear a prosthetic nose to play Mayim Bialik’s character, Blossom,” said Hutsell. “I knew it was wrong.”
But the comedian’s job on SNL was at stake, she said. “I remember so clearly that when I expressed that I did not want to wear the prosthetic nose for the sketch, I was told if I refused, I would be fired,” she told EW. “And keep in mind, many of the people who had a hand in creating the sketch were Jewish. Although I had and have always had a strong moral compass, I didn’t have the strength to refuse to do the sketch after I was told I would be fired.”
She went on: “If I could go back and change history, I would have refused to wear the prosthetic nose and taken the risk of losing my job. That would have been the right thing to do.”
Bialik reflected on the sketch in a recent Variety essay. “The actress portraying me was dancing and mugging for the camera and she was hilarious. But. She wore a prosthetic nose,” she wrote. “In order to truly convey that she was ‘Blossom,’ she wore a fake, big nose. I don’t know if it was significantly larger than my real nose and I don’t care to remember. I remember that it struck me as odd. And it confused me. No one else on the show was parodied for their features. … It was just me that was singled out. More specifically, it was my nose.”
The 47-year-old, now a co-host of Jeopardy! continued: “I never thought to talk about it and mostly I tried to forget it. I hoped no one noticed. All of my friends at high school watched SNL. It wasn’t subtle. They would all see it and I felt ashamed. Girls all over the world used to tell me that they had never seen a Jewish girl like me on TV before they saw me on Blossom. Many said they knew I was Jewish and it made them proud to be. … I wonder how those girls felt when they saw an actress playing me with a comically prosthetic nose.”
In her statement to EW, Hutsell remembered running into Bialik at an audition about 10 years after the sketch and apologizing face to face. Bialik replied, “I release you,” Hutsell said.
“I took that to mean that she accepted my apology and that meant more to me than she will ever know,” the SNL vet added.
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