A few hours before the election week episode of Saturday Night Live was set to air, news broke that Kamala Harris had changed her schedule to make an impromptu stop in New York City. The reason for this was clear to everyone even before it was confirmed: she would be appearing in the show’s cold open.
And indeed she does, although before we get to that we’re treated to a brief glimpse at one of Donald Trump’s (James Austin Johnson) final campaign rallies, where the mood is, as always, dire. Playing dress up in “big orange vest”, Trump admits “I’m out of gas, I’m running on fumes here, folks, you can see it, right? I’m exhausted, I’m babbling, I’m doing crazy things with the microphone … the last time I hated a Mike this much I tried to have him killed,” before begging everyone to make it stop.
Just as he turns this over to JD Vance (“speaking of nobody cares”), we cut to the Harris war room, where the Veep (Maya Rudolph), her husband Doug Emhoff (Andy Samberg), and a weepy Tim Walz (Jim Gaffigan) commiserate. Walz exits to play video games with AOC right before a confused, but supportive Joe Biden (Dana Carvey) enters. He’s only there for a second, before he and Emhoff leave Harris alone with her thoughts.
It’s here that the real Harris appears, giving counsel to herself via the mirror. She takes a funny potshot at Trump’s inability to open doors, makes a self-deprecating joke about her weird laugh, and gets in on Rudolph’s wordplay (“Keep calmala and carry on-a-la”).
Given the big energy she brings to most public appearances, it’s no surprise that Harris comes off far less stiff than previous nominees who have appeared on the show. On the one hand, it would have been fun to see her take a few more shots at Trump, or make a stronger plea to voters, but at the same time, both might have backfired, coming off as Trump-like in their pettiness or desperation. This appearance won’t move any votes or drive any discourse, but it showed Harris as the happy warrior she presented herself as at the start of her campaign.
John Mulaney hosts for the sixth time. He uses his monologue to roll out a new stand up set, focused on the various generations of his family: his new baby girl and a young son (“My wife takes care of the five-week-old and I take the two-year-old out … that’s not an equal distribution of labor at all … that’s like saying you take this convict across state lines while I hold a potato”), his aging parents (“[They] picked a bad time to get old; when I was younger I maybe could have helped them, but now I’m 42, I don’t feel good either”), and his grandfather (“a dairy farmer from east Wisconsin who was too old to fight in world war two … he’s was too old for the oldest thing that ever happened”).
The show properly kicks off with the game show What’s That Name, where contestants are shown a person who they must name. Mulaney’s vociferous liberal takes an early lead by naming Doug Emhoff and Special Counsel Jack Smith but trips up when asked to name Hilary Clinton’s running mate from 2016, Tim Kaine. Kaine shows up for himself and is great here, getting in some good jabs at fickle libs – ”At the time, you said it was the most important election in American history and democracy was on the line … you voted for me to be one heartbeat away from the Oval Office in an election more recent than the release of Zootopia … what’s my name?” – while also poking fun at himself as Charlie Brown-like sad sack. Things get even worse for Mulaney’s contestant when he can’t name any of the victims of police violence from 2020 whom he “pre-emptively scold[ed] us for forgetting their names” or Margaret Atwood, the author of his go-to dystopia, The Handmaid’s Tale, who happens be his fellow contestant (Sarah Sherman). Tim Kaine and Margaret Atwood – what an unexpected pair to base this, the best sketch of the young season, around.
Next up is a new Dan Bulla sketch, in which the scientists in a Nasa control room desperately race to save the life of Beppo, the brave and adorable chimp that’s manned the first shuttle flight around earth before his malfunctioning ship blows up. This is a surprising emotional rollercoaster of a sketch, even if the cute chimp character work does most of the heavy lifting. Bulla’s two shorts show a lot of promise thus far, and its nice to have something in the Saturday TV Funhouse vein back on SNL.
Per tradition, Mulaney is joined by a returning Pete Davidson for a new musical extravaganza. They once again find themselves at one of New York’s dingiest locales – this time, the Duane Reade at the Port Authority Bus Terminal. Davidson’s traveler ill-advisedly attempts to buy some milk, which leads to a singing, dancing medley of tunes from The Lion King, Sound of Music, Le Mis, Cabaret, Hamilton and Grease, featuring a cast of opossums, lunatic soldiers and bus drivers, the twinks from the Timothée Chalamet lookalike contest, Eric Adams, and the dead bear cub that RFK Jr. dumped in Central Park. As ever, they go all out with this one and it shows.
Musical guest Chappell Roan performs Pink Pony Club, then its on to Weekend Update. Colin Jost hits at Trump for his series of blunders, debacles and overall weirdness from the past week – stumbling over his feet while trying to open a door (“He looks as drunk as I’m going to be Tuesday night”), his vow to “protect women whether they like it or not”, and pretending to blow his microphone at a rally last night (“even more embarrassing, the microphone immediately tapped him on the back of his head”).
He brings on their first guest, Reba McEntire (Heidi Gardner), ostensibly there to endorse the president. However, she’s still undecided, so instead of backing anyone she rambles about her upbringing (“I come from a little town called McCallister, Oklahoma, and we don’t make up our minds fast … in fact, we got a saying: if you think the milk is spoiled, give it another sip”), before attempting to vote by phone (which leads to her taking a picture of her “red and curlies”). A good, wacky celebrity impersonation in the Celerity Jeopardy mode.
Later, he brings on Grant and Alyssa, “a couple you can’t believe are together,” to discuss unlikely celebrity couples. Grant (Marcello Hernández) is a loud, boorish, jock who teaches Soul Cycle classes at the tarmac of LaGuardia, while Alyssa (Jane Wickline) is a shy, nerdy wallflower currently getting her masters at Barnard in 18th century graveyards. Their characters are just heightened versions of their comedic actual personas, but they play off each other well.
This was a decent enough Weekend Update on its own, but it lacks that big-time pre-election feel. It also seems odd that the biggest piece of election news from the last week – so-called comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s racist insults towards Puerto Ricans (along with Mexicans and Black people) at Trump’s New York rally – brooked only one brief mention. One wonders if this was a case of Che, Jost and the rest of the writers not wanting to go after a fellow comedian.
Next up is a PBS retrospective of classic 90s sitcom Family Bond. We get a clips from the show – about a single dad raising his kids with his sister – featuring appearances from Little Richard (Kenan Thompson), who was only supposed to guest star in one episode but decided to stick around and basically took over the program. Thompson is the best he has been in a long time as the brash, unpredictable, slightly psychotic musical icon. His delivery of the line “I’m sorry your goddamn dog died!” is spit take worthy.
Roan returns to the stage for her second performance, the country-tinged She Gets the Job Done, an appropriate anthem for this episode, and one which hopefully won’t look like hubris come this time next week.
Her performance is followed by a campaign ad for Harvey Epstein (Mulaney), a candidate running for New York City state assembly. He is, unsurprisingly having a very difficult time overcoming his unfortunate name and has to remind voters that “I’m a different guy.” A one-joke sketch, but Mulaney’s affable delivery makes it work. We get a nice and well-deserved card tribute to the late, great Teri Garr, the show wraps up.
This star-studded episode made for a weird mixed bag. Mulaney was excellent as always and it boasted several of the best sketches of the season thus far, with not a single stinker in the bunch. Harris’s cameo gave the night a huge sense of import, even if it didn’t lead to any particularly memorable moment, while Tim Kaine of all people stole the whole show.
With all that said, it still felt like SNL shirked its duty by not devoting more time to the election, and in particular Trump’s disastrous week. There really should have been much more material aimed at that grotesque Madison Square Garden display.
Regardless, come next Saturday, one way or another, we’ll be living in a very different world (assuming the election results are known by then). Hopefully, SNL has something big planned.
