Nikki Glaser Reveals the Unexpected Pain Behind Hosting a Roast

Nikki Glaser is known for her sharp wit when teasing celebrities – but it’s not always simple being the target of the jokes.

“If you walk into [a roast] believing, ‘I won’t take this personally, it’s all good,’ you’re likely to be very wrong,” Glaser, 41, confessed during an appearance on SiriusXM’s “Let’s Talk Off Camera With Kelly Ripa” ahead of hosting the 2026 Golden Globes, scheduled for Sunday, January 11. “At these roasts, we deliver remarks that are so harsh that even I sometimes go in thinking nobody will say anything about me that I haven’t already considered. But they frequently do.”

Glaser continued, “They bring up something where you’re like, ‘Oh, I didn’t realize I looked that way. I didn’t know my rear was that flat. I didn’t know that resonated with a crowd of thousands of people – that I resemble Larry Bird or something like that.’ And you’re just like, ‘Oh, shoot.’”

Glaser was among the many stars who participated in the 2019 Comedy Central roast of Alec Baldwin, during which Blake Griffin took the stage and quipped, “Larry Bird is here – I mean, Nikki Glaser is here.”

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The comedian admitted to Ripa that she’s experienced her feelings “deeply wounded by a roast,” but she’s still had “to stand up there and laugh and pretend she’s enjoying herself.”

“At the afterparty, I’m in the restroom crying and texting my cosmetic procedure specialist to be like, ‘Get the bird out of my face,’ ” she joked. “Drain the bird. Free him from his cage.”

When Ripa reassured Glaser that she doesn’t look like Bird, Glaser playfully responded, “No, no, I corrected it.”

According to Glaser, the most difficult aspect isn’t the joke itself, but the audience’s reaction.

“People can deliver jokes,” she explained on Wednesday. “But when the audience receives it in a way where you’re like, ‘Oh dear, this isn’t just one person writing a joke behind the scenes about one photo of me found on Google Images. This is something connecting with the audience seeing me in person.’ That’s when it truly stings. When a joke lands so well that you realize everyone in the culture accepts this idea – that can be genuinely painful.”

Several years after the Baldwin roast, Glaser revealed to Vogue that she isn’t a fan of being roasted. “I still think about some of the jokes that were made about me from roasts six years ago. I still see them when I look in the mirror,” she admitted in January 2025, once again referencing Griffin’s comment. “The audience’s response was so overwhelming; it was such a hit that I couldn’t deny it.”

She added, “That was the first time I ever went and had cosmetic procedures on my face in a way that was like, ‘Let’s reshape things.’”

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Glaser also recalled Pete Davidson making a joke about her physique that stuck with her, though she didn’t specify where or when the roast occurred.

“I believe Pete Davidson had one about how I don’t have a rear end … I mean, I knew I didn’t and I know I don’t, but the fact that he had really considered it, or perhaps someone wrote the joke for him and he didn’t have to think about it at all, but he at least had to be like, ‘That works for her,’ ” she told the outlet.

Glaser spoke to Vogue shortly before hosting the Golden Globes for the first time, and she will return to the awards show on Sunday. Prior to the 2025 ceremony, Glaser was careful about her approach to teasing certain stars who would be present.

“I don’t want to make anyone feel uncomfortable or feel like they were singled out. You know, I watch these monologues and I see the host say, like, ‘Timothée Chalamet is here,’ and then everyone applauds and you just see Timothée in the shot being like, ‘What’s coming next?’ ” she explained. “There are so many factors to consider that I’m not accustomed to with regular stand-up, where it only matters if the audience laughs or not. It’s not based on one person’s reaction who the camera will go to afterwards.”