On a recent Late Night with Seth Meyers appearance, Zoë Kravitz dropped quite the story about staying at Taylor Swift’s place during January’s devastating Los Angeles wildfires—and it involves her mother Lisa Bonet and a rather destructive pet snake.
Finding Refuge During the Fire Crisis
When the fires forced evacuations across LA, Kravitz found herself needing somewhere safe to stay. Swift stepped up, offering her stunning 1930s mansion as temporary shelter. “Taylor was incredibly generous,” Kravitz explained to Meyers. Concerned about her mother’s safety in fire-prone Topanga Canyon, she invited Lisa to join her—along with an unusual plus-one: Orpheus, Lisa’s pet snake.
When Things Went Sideways
Everything seemed fine until the final day of their stay. While Kravitz was getting ready to leave, her phone rang with Lisa in full panic mode upstairs. “She told me she was in quite the situation,” Kravitz recalled with a laugh. Racing to help, she discovered Orpheus had managed to slither into a gap near some built-in bathroom furniture—specifically, a banquette with drawers that apparently had snake-sized openings.
“That’s definitely a design oversight,” Meyers quipped. “No house should come with built-in snake escape routes.” The scene was tense: Lisa had a death grip on the snake’s tail, but Orpheus kept wriggling deeper into the wall cavity.
The Great Bathroom Demolition
What started as a rescue mission quickly turned into a renovation nightmare. With Lisa’s assistant and Swift’s house manager now involved, panic took over. The frustrated manager grabbed a crowbar and started tearing apart the bathroom—ripping open the banquette, smashing tiles, demolishing sections of wall.
“I’m standing there thinking we’ve got two choices,” Kravitz said. “Either we completely destroy this bathroom, or I have to call Taylor and tell her there’s a loose snake somewhere in her house.” The bathroom lost that battle spectacularly.
When Kravitz finally worked up the courage to call Swift and confess, she discovered the pop star already knew about the chaos. Swift’s response? A wry joke about nearly losing a “stake” in her own home, along with some pointed observations about the bathroom carnage. Kravitz quickly promised to handle all repairs and hoped to keep things quiet until everything was fixed.
An Unforgettable Houseguest Experience
The whole episode perfectly captures the kind of absurd situations that can unfold even when you’re staying with one of the world’s biggest celebrities. It also shows a more relaxed, human side of these high-profile friendships—even when they involve emergency snake extractions and accidental home demolition.
