It didn’t take a jury long to convict Alex Murdaugh of murdering his wife and a son, and “Saturday Night Live” didn’t waste any time before it included the disgraced South Carolina lawyer in a joke.
Double homicide isn’t usually the best source for humor, but NBC’s longtime comedy sketch show found a way to incorporate the Murdaugh murders trial into a punchline.
The start, or cold open, of Saturday’s “SNL” was a spoof of the Fox News morning talk show “Fox & Friends.”
It was focused on another high-profile trial, involving Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News and its parent company.
”SNL” cast members Mikey Day, Heidi Gardner and Bowen Yang portrayed Fox News show hosts Steve Doocy, University of South Carolina alum Ainsley Earhardt, and Brian Kilmeade, respectively.
The faux hosts address the news about the Dominion lawsuit, and testimony from Fox News’ controlling owner Rupert Murdoch.
The embattled media mogul’s last name is pronounced similarly to the convicted killer, “Alec Murdoch,” so the show used that as the key to the spoof.
“This whole trial has been so unfair. They are raking him over the coals. Rupert Murdoch would never murder anyone,” Gardner said in her impersonation of Earhardt. “They sent him away for life. Look how sad he looks. Now where’s that picture I found?”
This was followed by a photo of Alex Murdaugh from the trial shown on the screen.
Day’s Doocy then corrected his co-host.
“Ainsley, that’s not Rupert Murdoch. That’s Alex Murdaugh.”
While that was good enough for a chuckle, Gardner furthered the joke.
“Well we just blew the case wide open. They got the wrong guy.”
Day replied “I’ll explain later,” before transitioning back to the Dominion lawsuit.
On Friday, Murdaugh was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences without parole by Judge Clifton Newman.
Murdaugh was found guilty of two counts of murder for the June 7, 2021, shooting deaths of his wife, Maggie, and son, Paul, on the family’s remote 1,770-acre estate, called Moselle.
It’s not clear when the lawsuit against Murdoch might be resolved.
The Fox News owner and other top network executives, including his son Lachlan, are accused of pushing baseless theories about widespread voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election. According to the lawsuit, they did so in an effort to keep and appease viewers and advertisers who supported Donald Trump and avoid dropping in the ratings, even though they knew the former president’s claims were false.
The March 4 episode of “SNL” was hosted by Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl champ Travis Kelce, and featured musical guest Kelsea Ballerini.
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