This week’s edition of Saturday Night Live, the penultimate episode of Season 42, had something for everybody.
There was Alec Baldwin’s Donald Trump struggling to explain his decision to fire FBI Director James Comey, the very man leading a counterintelligence investigation into his campaign, to Michael Che’s Lester Holt during the cold open; host Melissa McCarthy delivering a cute Mother’s Day monologue, guiding her real-life Mom through the hallowed halls of Studio 8H; and the inimitable McCarthy turning in what may be her last performance ever as Press Secretary Sean Spicer, whose job is reportedly in jeopardy.
Even Weekend Update was razor-sharp, providing amusing commentary on the Comey train wreck.
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“Well, I know most of us think this every week, but this week was crazy,” said co-anchor Colin Jost. “On Tuesday, President Trump fired FBI Director James Comey—then the White House panicked and started blurting out excuses like a husband with glitter on his collar. Finally Trump came forward and he said he decided to fire Comey himself because Comey ‘wasn’t doing a good job’ adding ‘for example, I’m still president.’”
“Trump was also reportedly surprised that people were angry he fired a guy investigating the Trump campaign,” Jost continued. “How did Trump not realize that was suspicious? I mean, if a drug-sniffing dog came up to your bag at the airport and your response was to shoot the dog, people would really wonder: What’s in that bag? Or they would just assume you work for United.”
If the Trump-fires-Comey news wasn’t surreal enough, a report emerged this week in The Washington Post stating that, after the news broke of Comey’s firing, “White House press secretary Sean Spicer wrapped up his brief interview with Fox Business from the White House grounds late Tuesday night and then disappeared into the shadows, huddling with his staff near a clump of bushes and then behind a tall hedge.”
This bizarre scene, naturally, piqued SNL’s interest. The late-night show first addressed it in McCarthy’s Spicer sketch, with her Spicey caught by a reporter hiding in the bushes, and later with a zinger during Weekend Update.
“After the Comey news was made public, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer tried to evade reporters by ducking into some bushes—which is weird because diving into bushes without warning is usually his boss’s thing,” cracked Jost.
Co-anchor Michael Che got in on the fun too, mocking President Trump’s series of distracting, reality-defying tweets in the wake of the Comey firing.
“Trump also tweeted: ‘As a very active President with lots of things happening, it is not possible for my surrogates to stand at podium with perfect accuracy!....’” said Che.
“First of all, ‘very active’ is not how you describe a President,” the comedian added. “That’s how you describe the imagination of a child that draws pictures of his school on fire.”
