What Snoop Really Thinks About Martha Stewart

You're probably familiar with the odd-couple magic Snoop Dogg and Martha Stewart brought to Martha & Snoop's Potluck Dinner Party along with the general on-screen chemistry the pair have developed together over the last decade or so. But there's a lot to keep track of from over the years that the two have shared the screen together. 

The Emmy-nominated Potluck Dinner Party ran for two seasons from 2016 to 2018 and returned for a Potluck Party Challenge third-season spinoff in 2019 in which Martha and Snoop teamed up with celebrity friends and competed for the "Potluck Party Platter." The series in general tends to lean more toward an old school variety show than educational cooking, with celebrity guest appearances and funny quips between the hosts in the kitchen.

And as natural as Snoop and Martha appear together on screen, it's really not a stretch to believe the pair are actually friends that think highly of one another.

Technically, Martha Stewart and Snoop first met backstage on The David Letterman show in the mid 2000s, according to the episode of Martha from 2008 that Snoop first guested on. And before bringing the Doggfather out to make some creamy mashed potatoes together, Martha read a few emails he sent her in advance, as he seemingly blew up her inbox before finally being invited onto the show.

While it's a funny peek into private celebrity encounters, one email in particular shines some light on Snoop's genuine excitement to potentially appear on Martha, as Martha read on-air: "I would love to hang out with you whenever time permits. I dig your style, MS. For real, for reals. So hit me back when you are free for me..."

Right out of the gate, the pair brought a unique flair to the somewhat bland world of daytime television as Snoop educated Martha about his jewelry and gave her a vocabulary lesson on the proper uses of -izzle as a suffix. The segment was so successful he returned again a year later to create "green" holiday brownies, baked at 420 degrees, of course.

After lighting up the screen together on two episodes of Martha, the budding friendship of Snoop and Martha Stewart went quiet for a few years. Aside from a reddit AMA in 2014 where Martha expressed that she wished she was "closer friends with Snoop Dogg," it wouldn't be until Comedy Central's Roast of Justin Bieber in 2015 that we would finally see their paths cross again. And honestly, is there a better way to bring two people together than making harsh jokes at another celebrity's expense?

Martha shocked the audience with her eviscerations of fellow roasters including Shaquille O'Neal, Kevin Hart, Natasha Leggero, Snoop himself, and of course Bieber, who she quipped wouldn't last a week in lockup. And her performance certainly caught Snoop's eye, who could be seen literally falling out of his on-stage seat in laughter.

"She sat next to me, and she stole the show," he told NBC's Today Show in 2019. "She was the funniest roaster that night. In that moment I knew I wanted to be alongside this lady for the rest of my life."

Of course, it might seem easy to create the look of on-screen chemistry in a manufactured way, especially with two veteran entertainers and performers like Snoop and Martha. And as much as they've claimed that their friendship is very real, it's still heartwarming to learn that they actually do spend time together outside of television productions.

In fact, Martha Stewart shared details of an intimate family luncheon with Snoop at her Bedford, New York, farm in 2018. She posted a few photos on Instagram, where Snoop and some of his friends stopped by to spend time with Martha, her daughter Alexis, as well as her children on their way to New York City for an event. They enjoyed farm-raised turkey meatloaf, spinach quiche, and fried chicken in a Cinco de Mayo-themed lunch.

"We all had such a lovely time," Stewart wrote on her personal blog. "It was a perfect spring day – the gardens were bursting with color and Chef Pierre Schaedelin, from PS Tailored Events, and I planned a delicious 'Cinco de Mayo' meal for everyone."

What says friendship like an impromptu hang when you're just passing through town?

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Martha's prison time is not something Snoop looks down on or judges her for at all. Quite the opposite, as she told CBS Sunday Morning "In Snoop's world, it gave me the street cred I was lacking."

If you don't remember, in 2004, Martha served a five-month stint in prison for insider trading charges that included securities fraud, obstruction of justice, and conspiracy. And in a 2018 appearance on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, Snoop recalled Martha's funniest prison story.

"She told me that when she went in there they told her to put some newspapers on her to protect herself from getting stabbed," he told Cohen. "And she was like, 'Why not use my magazines? They're a little bit thicker!'"

He also chastised rapper Tekashi 69 in a 2019 Instagram meme for cooperating with authorities to reduce his sentence on racketeering and drug charges that included testifying against members of his inner circle and naming other big names in the recording industry. In the post, Snoop compares Tekashi 69 with Martha Stewart, who "snitched on NOT ONE soul during her trial. Baby girl kept it 10 toes down and ate that prison sentence by herself, like the true baddie she is," he wrote.

If she thought she lacked the proper street cred before, Martha's certainly getting it now. 

The old "opposites attract" adage can sometimes be a little played out. But it's such an integral factor in what makes the pairing of Snoop and Martha as real-life friends so interesting. Obviously, Martha and Snoop are different. Snoop rose to "Gin And Juice" fame as a rapper in the early '90s with Dr. Dre and Tupac while Martha has long been the queen of domesticity and daytime TV. But when the two get together in the kitchen, none of that matters, and they connect on a normal, human level.

According to Snoop himself, cooking became a medium to actually connect and communicate. He told NBC's Today Show in 2019 that, "This shows you that people can get along, people can work together, people can love each other no matter where they come from or how they were brought up."

It seems like Martha Stewart agrees that their relationship can be an example of how to bridge certain cultural divides and upend any preconceived notions about anyone. "The melding of cultures is really what I want to see happen in the United States and so does Snoop," Stewart told The Hollywood Reporter in 2018. "There shouldn't be any divides. There shouldn't be any question that we can all get together and get along. There shouldn't be any discrimination."

Looking back on his 2008 appearance on Martha, Snoop notes that Stewart really put herself out there to bring on interesting guests who may not have fit the normal conventions and tropes of her domestic daytime television show.

"Martha kind of pioneered this as far as like letting rappers become a part of daytime television because we were not actually accepted," Snoop said on NBC's Today Show. "We fit right in. Cooking with Martha just seemed like the right space to be in."

With an audience that probably skewed more toward older people looking for home and cooking tips, bringing in younger artists with a completely different point of view is actually a pretty savvy way to inject some fresh life into a stagnant format. Not to mention, it brings a whole new generation of audience. But the desire to genuinely brush shoulders with unique individuals separates Stewart's efforts from just an empty marketing gesture. Along with Snoop, Martha Stewart had also cooked with A Tribe Called Quest's Q-Tip, Ludacris, and LL Cool J, not to mention the string of artists that later appear on Potluck Dinner Party.

Of course, the internet can never just appreciate a platonic relationship between two celebrities. But just to put it to rest, Snoop and Martha are just really good friends. For starters, Snoop is married, and at 48, he is nearly a decade younger than Martha's daughter. Plus, Martha is a decade older than his mom!

However, Martha Stewart did tell Good Day New York in 2017 that she finds Snoop attractive. "Everybody likes him," she said. "It's so nice that he's popular, and the guests really enjoy him and respond to him nicely. And he has a great sense of humor. He's fast!"

All jokes aside, it's pretty apparent that the love is real. From the fun they share on-screen to how affectionate they are in photos and interviews, it's clearly not manufactured. Snoop even dubbed Martha a "double G" for "grandmother and good lady" in a Nardwuar interview at SXSW a few years ago. 

"I've never met anyone like Martha Stewart," Snoop told Rolling Stone in 2016. "When we come together, it's a natural combination of love, peace, and harmony."

Again, what makes the dynamic between Snoop Dogg and Martha Stewart so interesting and entertaining is the fact that it really does come across as genuine. These are two people who organically developed a friendship in entertainment and found a way to work together on-screen in critically acclaimed, Emmy-nominated fashion. Talk about a win-win.

But the real win seems to be how the relationship has carried outside of show business. It seems like Snoop really sees Martha as a mentor and an important figure in his life who goes well beyond creamy mashed potatoes, green holiday brownies, and competitive cooking with other celebrities. "She's like the big sister I never had," he told NBC's Today Show. "Being able to correct me, to teach me, to show me how to be better. To give me something to inspire to be like. We need that in life, and this is what I didn't have."

Obviously, Snoop Dogg and Martha Stewart come from different worlds, and there's even a bit of a generational divide with there being 31 years separating the two. But the "gangster rapper meets suburban homemaker" worlds-colliding marketing grab feels pretty cheap and shallow at this point.

"She different, ya know, than what I'm accustomed to," Snoop said in a 2017 LA Weekly interview. "But then again she's so what I'm accustomed to. 'Cause she people. She just look different and she was born in a different era, but if you hang out with her and chill with her, she just like anybody else."

People are people, and oftentimes what makes individuals different from one another is exactly what makes a connection make sense — both parties can appreciate the other for what they bring to the table. And it's no different for Snoop and Martha. "That's why it works, because she never says nothing that's crazy in my ears," he continued. "It's always like ... 'I thought you would say that. OK.' That's why we get down, that's why we connected, Martha. 'Cause it feels like holy matrimony, and not holy macaroni."