After Ariana Grande and Pete Davidson called off their whirlwind engagement last week, the world has been watching closely to see or hear anything from either of the pair directly addressing the break-up.
Now Pete Davidson is the first to break the silence in his first stage appearance since the news broke. Davidson was co-hosting a comedy show on Saturday night, Judd & Pete for America – a show with Judd Apatow to benefit the Swing Left voting campaign.
Davidson took the on stage opportunity to be quite cavalier about his recent break-up, or at least seemingly cavalier. The self-deprecating jokes he filled out his set with are actually pretty heartbreaking.
“Well, as you could tell, I don’t want to be here. There’s a lot going on,” Davidson told the crowd. “Does anybody have any open rooms? Looking for a roommate?”
It’s no secret that the pair were early enthusiasts for tribute tattoos to their relationship, and now they’re left with those permanent reminders of love had and love lost.
“Um, I’ve been covering a bunch of tattoos, that’s fun,” Davidson told the crowd. “I’m f–king 0 for 2 in the tattoo [department]. Yeah, I’m afraid to get my mom tattooed on me, that’s how bad it is.”
His jokes about the break-up and how stupid he was to rush into the relationship are funny, but at his own expense. Bleak humour is definitely one way to cope with the situation, but the jokes are very bittersweet.
“So, obviously you know I, we [Ariana and I] broke up or whatever but when me and her first got engaged we got tattoos,” he later continued. “And it was like in a magazine like, ‘Was Pete Davidson stupid?’ And 93% of it said yes,” Davidson told the audience.
“So my boy, he was like, ‘Don’t listen to that s–t man. They’re literally f**king haters.’ And I’m like, yeah, f**k that. I’m not stupid. And the other day we were in my kitchen and he was like, ‘Yo bro. Turns out you were stupid.’”
He really took black humour to the extreme end of the spectrum in the set.
“I feel like I am America,” Davidson said. “I’m a good guy that just keeps getting kicked in the dick. You’re like, ‘Ah, that f**king poor kid. Hope he doesn’t kill himself.’ That’s America.”
A lot of comedians use their material to work through rough things in their life, so while Pete Davidson is joking about the break-up, it sounds like it’s hit him hard.