Sharon Stone on SNL Experience: 'Offensive' Airport Stripping Sketch, Lorne Michaels 'Saved My Life'

One of those moments got an immediate apology from SNL icon Dana Carvey when the actress dropped by his podcast with fellow alum David Spade, Fly on the Wall. Calling her a "such a good sport" for the sketch, Carvey said, "we would literally be arrested now" if they tried it today.

"I want to apologize publicly for the security check sketch where I played an Indian man and we’re convincing Sharon, her character, or whatever, to take her clothes off to go through the security thing," Carvey said, with Spade chiming in to agree it was "so offensive."

The sketch would be seen as offensive on many levels today, including Carvey's portrayal of a broad Indian stereotype as an airport security guard. The premise was as Carvey described it, with his character -- and others -- having her remove articles of clothing to ensure she wasn't carrying anything dangerous.

"It’s so 1992, you know, it’s from another era," Carvey said, but Stone admitted she was fine with it.

"I know the difference between a misdemeanor and a felony,” she said. “And I think that we were all committing misdemeanors because we didn’t think there was something wrong then. We didn’t have this sense."

"I had much bigger problems than that, you know what I mean? That was funny to me, I didn’t care. I was fine being the butt of the joke," she continued.

Comparing that time to today, Stone said that she feels that this is "a weird and precious time," saying it's because people have spent too much time alone, perhaps referring to the recent pandemic or even the feelings of isolation and loneliness many studies have shown are on the rise despite (or because of) social media and smartphones.

"People don’t know how to be funny and intimate and any of these things with each other," Stone argued. "And everyone is so afraid that they’re putting up such barriers around everything that people can’t be normal with each other anymore. It’s lost all sense of reason."

While there's still video evidence of the controversial airport security sketch, which you can see in all its bawdy humor above, the night's most infamous moment has mostly not been seen since it originally aired.

Stone recalled how things briefly got out of control during her monologue, with her telling Carvey and Spade that SNL creator Lorne Michaels "personally saved my life."

According to SNL lore, angry protesters had infiltrated the studio by posing as members of the production crew. Stone had been facing criticism for the perceived homophobia of her film in portraying a bisexual woman as a killer. Stone herself believes they were protesting her AIDS activism.

In the original aired monologue, which was replaced with dress rehearsal footage in subsequent airings and official releases, voices can be heard chanting, "Fight AIDS, not women" toward the top of Stone's monologue. This is according to media reports at the time and fan recaps of that original airing.

A shout of "Security" is heard a few moments later followed by the voices eventually fading away, as the protesters were presumably led from the set. Fans at the time believed the voice to be Michaels', which Stone all but confirms in her recollection of the scary moment.

"I came out to do the monologue live, which is always super scary, and a bunch of people started storming the stage saying they were going to kill me during the opening monologue," Stone recalled. She said that both police and security that are always there "froze ’cause they’d never seen anything like that happen."

"Lorne started screaming, 'What are you doing? Watching the f--king show?" she continued. "And Lorne started beating them up and pulling these people back from the stage."

Stone said she was then told to "hold for five" as security "beat up and handcuffed" the protesters "right in front of me."

"If you think the monologue is scary to start with, try doing it while people are saying they’re going to kill you and they’re handcuffing them while you’re doing the monologue," she joked.

She explained on the podcast that the protesters, as she understood it, were pushing back against her work as an AIDS activist because "no one understood at the time what was really happening and they didn’t know if amfAR could be trusted or if we were against gay people, they didn’t really know."

"And so instead of waiting for an informative, intelligent conversation, they just decided, ‘Well, we’ll just kill her,'" she added. "And it was, like, it was very intense."

According to AP reports at the time, six people were arrested after attempting to storm the stage during the live broadcast. They were charged with disorderly conduct and harassment, per authorities.

"We are protesting Hollywood's homophobia and misogyny as exemplified in the film," said the group's spokesman James Wagner the following day.