Pete Davidson revealed that he was high on ketamine during Aretha Franklin‘s funeral in 2018, which he attended with then fiancée, Ariana Grande. The former Saturday Night Live comedian made the confession during his new Netflix special, Pete Davidson: Turbo Fonzarelli, adding: “It’s embarrassing. I thought it would be a good idea to go up to her family and go, ‘Hey, I’m just here to pay my R-E-S-P-E-C-T…s.'”
Franklin died of pancreatic cancer on August 16th 2018 at the age of 76, and her funeral was held in Detroit, Michigan on August 31st. Grande performed a cover of “(You Make Me Feel Like) a Natural Woman” at the service in honor of the music legend. The Meet Cute actor confessed that he probably wouldn’t have been at the service if he wasn’t engaged to the “7 Rings” singer, and joked: “If she was there, she would probably be like, ‘Hey, who are you? And what the [expletive] are you doing at my funeral?'”
Pete Davidson Opens Up About Using Ketamine
The King of Staten Island star, now 30, opened up about his past ketamine addiction in the Netflix special. Turbo Fonzarelli is the SNL alum's second hour-long special on Netflix, following his 2020 debut: Pete Davidson: Alive in New York.
"It's embarrassing when you're not on ketamine anymore, though… I'm embarrassed," he confessed. "I was out and about like that. That's not cool, you know?"
Kim Kardashian's ex went on to discuss what led to him wanting to battle his addiction, adding: "I had to stop doing hard drugs because [you] can't be a drug addict in your 30s. Doing drugs in your 20s is fine. It's like an excuse. You're like: 'I'm finding myself.' It's cute, you know?"
"I have to live with that."
Pete Davidson explains what went down at Aretha Franklin's funeral in Pete Davidson: Turbo Fonzarelli. pic.twitter.com/gJpSaa83vJ
— Netflix (@netflix) January 11, 2024
Fan Reactions
The internet had a lot of thoughts about Davidson's confession about the funeral, with one fan writing on a Netflix post on X: "Was about to ask why Pete would have been at Aretha's funeral, but I forgot who he was dating at that time."
Another X user wrote: "Drug addictions are the most unfunny of all subjects, huge fail (again.)" "Just watched the whole thing I thought it was pretty funny. Some jokes he openly admits to feeling bad about & that he has to live with it & the honesty was awesome," wrote one supportive fan, followed by the hand praising emoji and the hand clapping emoji.
