Pete Davidson is proving that erasing the past is no easy feat. The former Saturday Night Live star, 31, has been undergoing tattoo removal in his quest for a “clean slate.” He opened up about the years-long process of becoming ink-free during an appearance on Today on Friday, January 31. “It’s pretty terrible, so if anybody out there is watching and thinking about getting a tattoo, make sure you really want to get it,” he revealed to Savannah Guthrie and Craig Melvin.
Davidson showed his forearm to the hosts and noted that his many tattoos were “pretty gone.” According to the comedian, he decided to go through the process of lasering off his tattoos after getting sober and taking a long look in the mirror. “I was like, ‘Nah. Who that?’ I was like, ‘I got to change it up a little bit,'” he recalled.
Davidson got more specific about the painful tattoo removal process when he appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on Wednesday, January 30. “I’ve been burning them off,” Davidson told Fallon, describing it as “horrible.” “It’s worse [than getting inked],” he explained. “They have to burn off a layer of your skin and then it has to heal for, like, six to eight weeks and you can’t get in the sunlight. And then you’ve gotta do it, like, 12 more times.” At one point, Davidson estimated he had “probably, like, 200” tattoos. “So yeah, really think about that Game of Thrones tattoo you’re thinking of getting,” he joked.
Davidson has a history of commemorating his relationships with body art. During his five-month romance with Ariana Grande, he got multiple tattoos in her honor, including her last name on his ribs and her initials on his thumb. While briefly dating Kim Kardashian, he inked “KNSCP” on his collarbone — likely a tribute to her and her four children, North, Saint, Chicago, and Psalm — along with the phrase “My girl is a lawyer.” The Dog Man actor admitted he was in a “sad boy” phase when he got a lot of his ink, calling that period in his life “a weird time.”
While most traces of Davidson’s tattoos will soon be gone, he plans to keep “maybe, like, two or three.” “I’m trying to be an adult,” he noted. This journey has been a transformative experience for Pete Davidson, highlighting the emotional weight of his past choices and his determination to move forward with a clearer identity.