Donald Glover addressed Kanye West’s Twitter storm when he hosted “Saturday Night Live” last night. In the sketch, Glover and friends hide from a monster who responds to loud sounds, but they have trouble being quiet once they see Kanye’s Twitter activity. Aidy Bryant’s character has an especially strong reaction to Kanye’s lyric “poopity-scoop” from his new song “Lift Yourself.” Watch a snippet below.
Before hosting and performing as musical guest on “SNL,” Glover shared a new song as Childish Gambino, “This is America.” It marked his first new music since 2016’s “Awaken, My Love!” Glover will embark on a tour with Rae Sremmurd and Vince Staples later this fall.
Read Pitchfork’s “The Promising State of the Actor-Musician.”
1/50 5 May 2018 Russian police carrying struggling opposition leader Alexei Navalny at a demonstration against President Vladimir Putin in Moscow. Thousands of demonstrators denouncing Putin's upcoming inauguration into a fourth term gathered in the capital's Pushkin Square. AP
2/50 4 May 2018 Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks at an event to mark Karl Marx’s 200th birthday at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. AP
3/50 3 May 2018 President Vladimir Putin meets with FIFA president Gianni Infantino in Sochi, ahead of the 2018 World Cup in Russia. AFP/Getty
4/50 2 May 2018 Supporters of opposition lawmaker Nikol Pashinyan protest in Republic Square in Yerevan, Armenia. Pashinyan has urged his supporters to block roads, railway stations and airports after the governing Republican Party voted against his election as prime minister. AP
5/50 1 May 2018 Cubans march during the May Day rally at Revolution Square in Havana. AFP/Getty
6/50 30 April 2018 The sky is the limit: A Saudi man and woman fly over the Arabian Sarawat Mountains in the first ever joint wingsuit flight in traditional dress. A symbolic leap of faith towards women’s empowerment in Saudi Arabia. Alwaleed Philanthropies
7/50 29 April 2018 A general view for the damaged railway station in al-Qadam neighborhood, after it was recaptured from Islamic State militants, in the south of Damascus. According to media reports, the Syrian army continued the military offensive it has launched earlier this month against militant groups entrenching in southern Damascus and captured several neighborhoods, including al-Qadam and al-Assali and targeting the remnants of armed groups in al-Hajar al-Aswad and its surrounding in Damascus southern countryside. EPA
8/50 28 April 2018 Comedian Michelle Wolf attends the Celebration After the White House Correspondents' Dinner. Conservatives walked out after Wolf brutally ridiculed President Donald Trump and his aides during her piece. Getty
9/50 27 April 2018 North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in raise their hands after signing on a joint statement North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, left, and South Korean President Moon Jae-in raise their hands after signing on a joint statement at the border village of Panmunjom in the Demilitarized Zone, South Korea. The Korean War will be formally declared over after 65 years, the North and South have said. At a historic summit between leaders Kim Jong-Un and Moon Jae-in, the neighbouring countries agreed they would work towards peace on the peninsula with a formal end to the conflict set to be announced later this year. The pair agreed to bring the two countries together and establish a "peace zone" on the contested border. Korea Summit Press Pool via AP
10/50 26 April 2018 Women hold portraits of their relatives, who are victims of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, during a commemoration ceremony in Kiev, Ukraine. Reuters
11/50 25 April 2018 Rohingya refugees gather in the "no man's land" behind Myanmar's boder lined with barb wire fences in Maungdaw district, Rakhine state bounded by Bangladesh. Myanmar government said on April 15, it repatriated on April 14 the first family of Rohingya out of some 700,000 refugees who have fled a brutal military campaign, a move slammed by a rights group as a PR stunt ignoring UN warnings that a safe return is not yet possible. AFP/Getty
12/50 24 April 2018 President Donald Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron, first lady Melania Trump and Brigitte Macron hold hands on the White House balcony during a State Arrival Ceremony in Washington. AP
13/50 23 April 2018 A boy walks on a pile of garbage covering a drain in New Delhi. Reuters
14/50 22 April 2018 Newly ordained priests lie on the floor as Pope Francis leads a mass in Saint Peter's Basilica at the Vatican. REUTERS
15/50 21 April 2018 South Koreans cheer during the welcoming event for the inter-Korean summit between South Korea and North Korea in Seoul. The inter-Korean summit is scheduled on April 27, 2018 at the Joint Security Area in Panmunjom, agreed by South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un. Getty
16/50 20 April 2018 A Palestinian slings a shot by burning tires on the Israel-Gaza border, following a demonstration calling for the right to return. Palestinian refugees either fled or were expelled from what is now the state of Israel during the 1948 war. AFP/Getty
17/50 19 April 2018 Outgoing Cuban President Raul Castro raising the arm of Cuba's new President Miguel Diaz-Canel after he was formally named by the National Assembly, in Havana. A historic handover ending six decades of rule by the Castro brothers. The 57-year-old Diaz-Canel, who was the only candidate for the presidency, was elected to a five-year term with 603 out of 604 possible votes in the National Assembly. AFP/Getty/www.cubadebate.cu
18/50 18 April 2018 Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announces early presidential and parliamentary elections for June 24, 2018, at the Presidential Palace, in Ankara. Erdogan announced the snap elections, originally scheduled for November 2019, in a move that will usher in a new political system increasing the powers of the president. He said the new system needed to be implemented quickly in order to deal with a slew of challenges ahead, including Turkey's fight against Kurdish insurgents in Syria and Iraq. AP
19/50 17 April 2018 European lawmakers raise placards reading "Stop the War in Syria" in protest against airstrikes launched by the US, Britain and France in Syria last week criticizing the legitimacy of the operation, as French President Emmanuel Macron delivers his speech at the European Parliament in Strasbourg. Macron is expected to outline his vision for the future of Europe to push for deep reforms of the 19-nation eurozone and will launch a drive to seek European citizens' opinions on the European Union's future. AP
20/50 16 April 2018 People participate in a protest against the rape of an eight-year-old girl in Kathua near Jammu, and a teenager in Unnao, Uttar Pradesh state, in Bangalore, India Reuters
21/50 15 April 2018 Fireworks are set off as the final performance takes place during the Closing Ceremony for the 2018 Commonwealth Games. PA
22/50 14 April 2018 The wreckage of the Scientific Studies and Research Centre compound in the Barzeh district, north of Damascus, after the United States, UK and France launched strikes against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime early on April 14 in response to an alleged chemical weapons attack after mulling military action for nearly a week. Syrian state news agency SANA reported several missiles hit a research centre in Barzeh, north of Damascus, "destroying a building that included scientific labs and a training centre" AFP/Getty
23/50 13 April 2018 Indian activists gather to show support for the chairperson of the Delhi Commission for Women Swati Maliwal, who is on a hunger strike against the alleged rapes in Uttar Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, in New Delhi, India. According to news reports Maliwal is sitting on hunger strike demanding that authorities take strict actions against the alleged rapists. EPA
24/50 12 April 2018 Shi'ite pilgrims carry a symbolic casket outside Imam Moussa al-Kadhim's shrine to mark the anniversary of his death in Baghdad, Iraq Reuters
25/50 11 April 2018 Seasonal winds washed tons of debris ashore at Matahari Terbit beach, near Sanur, Bali, Indonesia. Reuters
26/50 10 April 2018 Syrian onlookers gather around rescue teams clearing the rubble at the site of an explosion of unknown origin which wrecked a multi-storey building the previous night in the war-battered country's northwestern city of Idlib. The cause of the explosion in the jihadist-held city, which killed more than a ten people and wounded 80, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group, was not immediately clear. AFP/Getty
27/50 9 April 2018 Protesters try to block French gendarmes during an evacuation operation in the zoned ZAD (Deferred Development Zone) in Notre-Dame-des-Landes, near Nantes, France. Reuters
28/50 8 April 2018 Competitors cross the start line at the annual Pyongyang Marathon. AFP/Getty
29/50 7 April 2018 The body of journalist Yasser Murtaja, 31, is carried during his funeral in Gaza city. He was shot by Israeli troops while reporting on Palestinian protests on the Gaza-Israel border. Reuters
30/50 6 April 2018 Supporters of the former South African president Jacob Zuma rally prior to his appearance in the KwaZulu-Natal High Court on corruption charges in Durban. Zuma, 75, arrived to face corruption charges linked to a multi-billion dollar 1990s arms deal. The graft case against him was postponed until June 8 after a brief 15-minute hearing. AFP/Getty
31/50 5 April 2018 Palestinian protesters run during clashes with Israeli troops at Israel-Gaza border. Reuters
32/50 4 April 2018 Presidents Hassan Rouhani of Iran, Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and Vladimir Putin of Russia pose before their meeting in Ankara. Reuters
33/50 3 April 2018 South African school children pause next to a portrait of the late South African anti-apartheid campaigner Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, wife of African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela, at her house in Soweto. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa paid tribute to Winnie, who died on April 2, saying that Nelson Mandela's former wife was a "voice of defiance" against white-minority rule. AFP/Getty
34/50 2 April 2018 Jewish priests and civilians take part in the Cohanim prayer during the Passover holiday at the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem. AFP/Getty
35/50 1 April 2018 Pope Francis greets the crowd at St Peter's square after the Easter Sunday Mass in the Vatican. Christians around the world are marking the Holy Week, commemorating the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, leading up to his resurrection on Easter. AFP/Getty
36/50 31 March 2018 Mourners hold back a relative of Palestinian Hamdan Abu Amshah, who was killed along the Israel border with Gaza, during his funeral in Beit Hanoun town. Reuters
37/50 30 March 2018 Israeli soldiers shot tear gas grenades towards the Palestinian tent city protest commemorating Land Day. The day marks the killing of six Arab Israelis during 1976 demonstrations against Israeli confiscations of Arab land. AFP/Getty
38/50 29 March 2018 An emotional Steve Smith is comforted by his father Peter as he fronts the media at Sydney International Airport. Steve Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft were flown back to Australia following investigations into alleged ball tampering in South Africa. Getty
39/50 28 March 2018 French gendarmes escort the coffin of the late Lieutenant Colonel Arnaud Beltrame transported by car during a funeral procession leaving the Pantheon as part of a national tribute in Paris. The French President will lead a national commemoration to hostage-swap policeman Arnaud Beltrame killed in jihadist attack. AFP/Getty
40/50 27 March 2018 Russian President Vladimir Putin visits a memorial made for the victims of a fire in a multi-story shopping center in the Siberian city of Kemerovo. Officials say that the fire escapes were blocked and a PA system was turned off during the fire that killed over 50 people. Kremlin Pool Photo via AP
41/50 26 March 2018 At least 64 shoppers have been killed in fire at a shopping centre in Russia. A further 16 people were still missing after flames broke out at the four-storey Winter Cherry mall in the city of Kemerovo in Siberia, according to Russian Emergencies Minister Vladimir Puchkov. The fire was extinguished in the morning after burning through the night. Parts of the building were still smouldering and the floors of the cinema hall had caved in in places, another emergency official said. Russian Emergencies Ministry via Reuters
42/50 25 March 2018 Syrian civilians gathering for their evacuation from the town of Arbin in the Eastern Ghouta region on the outskirts of the capital Damascus, following a deal with the regime. The deal is expected to see some 7,000 people bussed from Arbin and Zamalka towns and the district of Jobar to a rebel-dominated part of northern Syria. AFP/Getty
43/50 24 March 2018 Students attend the ‘March For Our Lives’ in Washington. In the wake of the Florida attack, there has been a widespread effort to ban assault rifle. Getty
44/50 23 March 2018 Police at the scene of a hostage situation in a supermarket in Trebes. An armed man took hostages in a supermarket in southern France, killing three and injuring about a dozen others, police said. A French minister confirmed the gunman had been shot dead by police. Reuters
45/50 22 March 2018 A boy rows his boat in the polluted waters of the Brahmaputra river on World Water Day in Guwahati, India. Reuters
46/50 21 March 2018 Kosovo's opposition lawmakers release a teargas canister inside the country's parliament in before a vote for an agreement to ratify or not a border demarcation deal signed in 2015 with Montenegro. AFP/Getty
47/50 20 March 2018 People carrying luggage leave the Russian Embassy in London and board a van bearing diplomatic plates. Dozens of people including adults with children arrived at the Russian embassy in the morning and then left carrying luggage in vehicles bearing diplomatic registration plates. Britain last week announced the expulsion of 23 Russian diplomats over the spy poisoning row, prompting a tit-for-tat response from Moscow. AFP/Getty
48/50 19 March 2018 The Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft is mounted on the launch pad at the Russian-leased Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan AFP/Getty
49/50 18 March 2018 President Vladimir Putin walks out of a voting booth at a polling station during Russia's presidential election in Moscow. AFP/Getty
Donald Glover is gearing up to make history when he hits the Saturday Night Live stage performing double duty as the host and musical guest for the night. The normally introverted creative joins a short list of double-billed artists who have taken up the challenge in the past, including Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears and more recently Drake, Ariana Grande, Lady Gaga and Miley Cyrus.
The 34-year-old returns to the comedy realm thanks to the network that gave him his start as a writer on 30 Rock back in 2006. What separates Donald from the rest is he will be performing under his alter-ego of Childish Gambino, which he plans to retire after one final heavily anticipated album for the storied moniker.
The hosting gig comes at the perfect time with Glover's largest role to date as Lando Calrissian in Solo: A Star Wars Story hitting theaters later this month (May 25). Atlanta's season two is also in full swing with another ten episodes under the Emmy Award-winning show's belt. An acclaimed SNL appearance should bring on the hat trick of positive exposure on that front.
Here are five things we want to see from Donald Glover on Saturday Night Live.
Perform New Music as Childish Gambino
What better way to kick off the rollout to his final album under Childish Gambino than on the SNL stage? Fans have been clamoring for new music following the success of 2016's triple-platinum Awaken, My Love! After inking a deal with RCA Records at the top of 2018 in which Glover and his creative agency promised new music by year's end, the multi-faceted performer is ready to usher in another career evolution. He's also preparing to head out on an 18-show arena tour this fall supported by Rae Sremmurd and Vince Staples, so the debut of new material would be timely and a great sneak preview of things to come.
Tease His Joint Project With Chance The Rapper
A collaborative effort between the Atlanta creator and Chance The Rapper has long been in the works. Following a couple wins at the 2017 Emmy Awards, the California native hilariously teased a joint project between himself and Chano. "I feel like if I don't make a Chance the Rapper mixtape, like double mixtape, a bunch of 14-year-olds are gonna kick my ass," he claimed last September. "They stop me on the street; it kind of scares me. So I feel like I gotta do something. I probably will."
Could it all come to fruition in 2018? Prior to Chance's own SNL hosting gig of his own last November, he stopped by The Tonight Show and revealed that one of his greenlit pitches for an ci sketch was actually pieced together with the help of Mr. Glover.
"You know, I'm a huge fan of the show, and I know that when they bring guest hosts, they usually come with a few ideas at least, especially if they're into comedy, so I brought a few sketches by," he said. "One of them that made it, I actually gotta give credit to my good friend Donald Glover, who helped me with the idea. He's a great dude, as well."
Preview Role of Lando Calrissian in Honor of Star Wars Day
With Friday (May 4) basically known as National Star Wars Day and Solo just three weeks out from its debut, Glover's Saturday Night Live cameo provides a prime opportunity to give fans a look of what's to come for the sly smuggler. Earlier in the week (May 2), a new Solo trailer saw Glover in character giving a tour of his favorite spots on the Millennium Falcon. SNL's Twitter had some fun with the thought as they redesigned a Solo poster to tease his Glover's upcoming episode.
Implement Kanye West's "Freedom of Thought" Into a Sketch
Kanye West's recent antics have once again made him a polarizing lightning rod in society, a phenomenon that's occurred throughout his illustrious career. The chances that his comments sent waves through the SNL cast and became a popular topic of conversation during pitch meetings this week are pretty likely.
Glover has been a staunch supporter of West's creativity in the past as his actions in life are a true embodiment of exactly what Yeezy preaches when it comes to being a free thinker. He actually touched on Ye's struggle to shatter the glass ceiling of various industries who attempt to box him in as a rapper instead of seeing him as the ultimate creator during his 2013 interview with The Breakfast Club. Let's see if the "Redbone" singer can draw up a way to implement something revolving around the 21-time Grammy Award winner during a sketch.
Have Childish Gambino & Donald Glover in the Same Sketch
This seems like a layup for the Because The Internet artist to have brought to the pitch table this week. I'll leave it to the creative genius to figure out the best way to execute the scene in a hilarious manner. This has potential to be a special episode because Glover isn't your average celebrity guest as he's equally (if not more) capable than full-time members of the Saturday Night Live cast.
The former 30 Rock actor last used himself and his musical alter-ego in the same setting during his cameo on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert back in March. See if you could notice the subtle difference between the two for yourself below.
Donald and Childish? This is heavy. pic.twitter.com/6Apw4gb8S3 — Grand Master Yo'dude (@TheYoDude) April 15, 2018
Be sure to tune in tonight at 11:35 p.m. EST on NBC. Enjoy the show!
Screenshot: Saturday Night Live
“It’s so great to be back here, especially now that I’m rich.”
“I’m not an actor, I’m an [everything, including Star Wars] star!”
Unsurprisingly, Donald Glover is really good on Saturday Night Live. I wasn’t aware—as Glover revealed in his monologue—that the Atlanta/Solo: A Star Wars Story/music (as Childish Gambino)/everything else star tried out for SNL, twice. (And was rejected twice—smooth move, Lorne.) Also in the monologue, Glover, goofing on his polymath status, asks SNL long(est)-timer Kenan Thompson about his audition, to which Kenan replies, “Do you know how long ago that was?” As great and indispensable as Kenan’s become on the show, one wonders how a Donald Glover on Saturday Night Live career would have gone. On the evidence of both Glover’s career track and tonight’s good-but-not-great Saturday Night Live, it’s easy to see either Glover becoming the next Eddie Murphy and taking over the show (before splitting for greener pastures), or splitting for greener pastures a lot sooner after getting frustrated by the show’s historical blindspot when it comes to talented black actors.
Crooning “I really can do anything,” as he cockily screws up all over the backstage area, Glover does the requisite self-deprecating thing just fine in the monologue. (That fall out of camera off of Kyle Mooney’s skateboard is some stellar physical comedy.) But Glover really can do anything. Not to bring in his former bosses to back up what’s readily apparent, but Tina Fey hired him to write for one of the best sitcoms ever when he was still living in the NYU dorms, while Dan Harmon spent the first few seasons’ worth of Community commentaries extolling the found gold that was Glover on that other superlative sitcom while accurately bemoaning the fact that it was inevitable Glover would fly the coop once his talent kicked down door after door. Pulling the rare and coveted double-duty as host and musical guest here, Glover wasn’t out to prove he belonged on a show that twice said he didn’t. And he neither came off as feeling himself above the gig nor awed by it. Donald Glover, simply, was Donald Glover, imbuing his characters with hilariously specific inner life and holding the screen by virtue of being, well, Donald Glover. He was outstanding.
And the sketches weren’t bad. They could have been tighter—the Barbie and Lando sketches had endings that sort of dribbled out after some solid laughs. And even his winning monologue needed some more snap to the writing and the presentation. Still, Glover is, for all his many talents, an innately funny performer. He would have been a star on Saturday Night Live, but it’s probably for the best that he didn’t get pulled into the weekly task of elevating good-but-not-great material.
Advertisement
Weekend Update update
Jost and Che got roasted on their own showcase tonight, as Pete Davidson—under the guise of doing a “Spring in New York” piece—goofed on the Update duo about their recently announced Emmy-hosting gig. Calling Jost and Che “the less entertaining version of Riggs and Murtaugh,” and complaining that awards shows are now handed over to “just cute friends,” Davidson did his kid brother, “kidding on the square” routine perfectly, mixing professional jealously in with a handful of the critiques habitually hurled at Jost and Che’s rise from awkward unwatchability to their hard-won, chummy chemistry.
But Jost and Che do have chemistry now (and it did take a long time to get here), with the Update anchors and co-head writers (along with Kent Sublette and Bryan Tucker) so easy in their odd couple riffing that it’s easy to forget how painful their mismatched sensibilities once were. Here, Che got his usual, thoroughly earned gasp-groans, joking that, if there weren’t two FBI approaches to investigating white and black powerful people, Martin Luther King would have died of old age on top of his mistress. He got another when referring to Donald Trump accuser and tonight’s most surprising guest star, Stormy Daniels. (More on that in a bit.) His joke about her not coming on Update because her price goes down if “she’s seen on camera with a black guy” isn’t a knock on the adult film actress so much as on the racism of the adult film industry and its consumers, but, with Daniels in the house, it got another well-deserved intake of breath from the audience.
Jost, too, has honed his delivery, snapping off his uniformly cutting Trump jokes with a confident hand. The political situation is so off-the-charts ludicrous and self-parodying that finding comic angles on it is nearly futile. Still, Jost came at the Trump-ian shitshow with apt comparisons (leaking Robert Mueller’s supposed interview questions as crowdsourcing legal strategy like Lay’s crowdsources its new flavors), and with appeals for sanity in the form of to-camera broadsides about the insanity. Referring to newest and least-competently duplicitous Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, Jost called Trump’s ill-concealed payouts to Daniels “the loudest hush money in history.”
Leslie Jones came out with a song in her heart. A sweetly soulful, yet deeply disappointed and bitter song, that is, as she ran down her supposedly real list of deeply subpar former boyfriends. Jones’ search for love has taken on a deceptively potent edge in these pieces—her position as a successful, 50-ish black woman lends her comically painful misadventures an immediacy that transcends mere gag-lines. Here, punctuating tales of accidentally dating a homeless guy, a guy still living with his mom, and a part-time rapper with four kids who works at Panera Bread with the genuinely lovely chorus “In the arms of an angel, fly away from here,” Jones’ lament is one of the best things she’s done on the show.
Best/Worst sketch of the night
There weren’t any truly bad sketches in the bunch tonight. The weakest was the pillow talk rehash (see below), with the courtroom sketch a tight second. Glover is very funny in the piece, donning a salt-and-pepper wig as the futilely strutting attorney attempting to derail the lawsuit by a guy whose entire family was devoured at Jurassic Park. There’s funny stuff all through the piece—Glover tries to undo the damage of a bloody film of the plaintiff’s friends being devoured by a T-Rex by appealing to the franchise’s recurring plot twists. (“The T-Rex is a good guy now! It is consistently saving the day!”) But for the first post-monologue sketch, it needed to be stronger.
The Barbie sketch, too, saw Glover taking hold of a weirdly specific character and getting big laughs. As one of a trio of unimpressive Mattel interns tasked with providing captions for Barbie’s inexplicably popular Instagram account, Glover’s rigid-postured applicant spins each innocuous promo photo’s backstory into a twisted narrative of existential ennui and PTSD that, in Glover’s haunted delivery, is very funny, indeed. Pete Davidson and Heidi Gardner get their laughs, too, as a pair of disparate dum-dums who keep picking up on each others’ incorrect answers, and Kenan has a blast as the Matte exec who takes his Barbie job very seriously, indeed.
The music video sketch was another fine showcase for Glover, even if you didn’t have the frame of reference for the joke in your memory bank. Glover’s 80s-era R&B character Raz P. Berry’s song of stalking, betrayal, and increasingly gross and petty revenge takes its inspiration from the song and video “The Rain” from one-hit wonder Oran “Juice” Jones, which is only slightly less bananas than this. I like that the sketch takes its time, only revealing that Glover’s Berry has showered in his own pee and stuffed his cheating girlfriend’s jewelry up his butt because he was following the wrong woman around town. The misogynistic, lunatic abusiveness of Berry’s song might only be a marginally heightened version of Jones’ paternalistic finger-wagging assholery, but the sketch plays on the inherent creepiness of the genre while allowing Glover to show off both his pipes and his comic chops. The sketch is funny enough if you’ve never seen the original video—but watch the original video.
The Lando sketch, calling out the lack of diversity in the Star Wars universe should have been stronger—this is one of the sketches with pacing problems—but any chance to get a sneak peek at the pitch-perfect casting of Glover as Lando Calrissian/Billy Dee Williams is okay with me. Kenan does a funny Forest Whitaker/Saw Gerrera, reading off a list of the late black characters who couldn’t be at the under-attended conference. (“Mace Windu—thank you.”) And Lando smoothly calls out the fact that the SWU is teeming with “lizard men wearing vests—just three black people though.”
The two filmed pieces were the highlight, though. “Friendos” saw the members of Migos segueing from their signature rap braggadocio into their weekly therapy session with Cecily Strong’s Dr. Angel Adelson. Glover, Kenan, and Chris Redd are all great, their cocksure superstars gradually letting loose with their inner insecurities over, for example, just whose idea it was to get that sweet-ass Lambo. I’m a sucker for a piece that takes a high-concept premise (complete with elaborate wigs and facial tattoos) and veers into an unexpected, decidedly low-key and eccentric direction. And the three actors (and Strong’s therapist) are so specific and so strong that the conceit manages to wring some genuine emotion out of the bandmates’ generosity toward each other.
“A Kanye Place” takes the movie parody of A Quiet Place as inspiration to let Glover and the cast give a clever “What the fuck?” to Kanye West’s recent Trump-praising, TMZ-ranting, slave-shaming public meltdown. Lovingly detailed, the parody keeps finding ways for the terrified survivors to inadvertently out themselves to the sound-sensitive monsters lurking in the cornfield. “I need to know if he said ‘poopity-scoop!,’” blurts Aidy Bryant’s formerly sensible survivor, dooming her. As far as non-musical diss tracks go, Glover’s turn here calls out his fellow rapper’s most recent episode with hilarious eloquence.
“What do you call that act?” “The Californians!”—Recurring sketch report
Melissa Villaseñor is a talented impressionist and a funny performer whose search for recurring characters who will stick continues. Here, she brings back her one-joke character of the lady who is really, uniquely bad at dirty talk. Opposite Glover, her strength is in just how specifically terrible her pillow talk role-playing is. (Asked to be mean to him, she smilingly purrs “Your dad’s dead.”) It’s not a bad premise, but the sketch, like a number of them tonight, was slack where it should have crackled. Like the couple’s tentative shoulder-pawing throughout, there was a lack of commitment that left the whole thing sort of—flaccid.
“It was my understanding there would be no math”—Political comedy report
Well, quantity won out in this week’s political cold open. I’ve make my thoughts on Alec Baldwin’s hammily indifferent Donald Trump clear enough by this point, but at least SNL went all-out in addressing this week’s top-of-the-shitheap Trump scandal. (Oh, he totally did pay off adult film star Stormy Daniels, according to new lawyer Rudy Giuliani’s loose, Nosferatu lips.) So we got a return of Ben Stiller’s panicky Michael Cohen, ineptly conferencing in a parade of gust stars and a new Kate McKinnon impression. (She can add a ghoulishly addled Giuliani to her roster of every other member of this misbegotten administration.) Martin Short popped in as former Trump doctor Harold Bornstein, screaming about feeling “raped” by Trump’s goons raiding his office to confiscate Trump’s health records. (Oh, that happened this week, too.)
Scarlett Johansson and Jimmy Fallon played Ivanka and Jared, allowing Fallon to screech in a high-pitched voice. Leslie Jones was Omarosa, Aidy Bryant was Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Cecily Strong rose warily into frame as Melania to ask about wives testifying against husbands, Beck Bennett’s Mike Pence was interrupted surreptitiously calling a gay chat line—all SNL’s standbys. The revelation that Trump’s wires-crossed conversation with Stormy Daniels wouldn’t be played by Kate McKinnon, but by the actual Daniels (aka Stephanie Clifford) herself counts as the biggest coup, though. Sure to send Trump into a Twitter-tizzy (nothing yet as of publish-time), Daniels’ appearance is notable for a number of reasons. For one, it’s a porn star/presidential mistress at the center of a legal battle that could unseat Donald Trump calling for said president’s resignation live on national TV. So, sort of a biggie. For another, it’s part of SNL’s long and storied tradition of allowing a high profile drop-in to dictate the joke, something that always comes off as impressive in booking prestige as it is invariably sort-of lame in execution. Still—eyes on Trump’s Twitter feed should you wish to keep up with the daily, self-regurgitating debasement of American democracy and public discourse in 2018.
Advertisement
I am hip to the musics of today
Childish Gambino has evolved along with Glover, changing from the effortfully clever Camp to Awaken, My Love!’s confidently funk-adelic theatricality. (Although I still listen to Camp on the reg, Pitchfork be damned.) Tonight, playing new songs “Saturday” and “This Is America” (whose startling, disturbing video dropped during the show), Glover/Gambino created synthesis. “Saturday” was a block party carved out in the corner of Studio 8H, Glover’s monologue jokes about not being hired layering his Solo cups, dominoes, and shirt-open groove with added frisson.
And “This Is America” out-Kanye-d Kanye, Gambino again bringing a theatrical flair (laser-lighting, uniformed school-age dancers) to the stage for a mesmerizing few minutes. Each performance unobtrusively introduced by fellow young black entertainment royalty (Zoe Kravitz, Daniel Kaluuya), Gambino simply took over SNL. Gambino may be on the cusp of retirement, but Glover’s musical alter ego has transcended stunt. Childish Gambino has become a formidable outlet for Glover’s artistic expression, and someone whose music is worth waiting for.
Advertisement
Most/Least Valuable (Not Ready For Prime Time) Player
Luke, buddy. I saw your unaired sketch from the Mulaney show, which wasn’t bad at all. Getting on-air, though, is still not working out. Hang in there? I guess?
I’m going to go with Chris Redd for the top spot. He had smaller roles, but he popped in them. And he and Alex Moffat did some fine silent work as a pair of incredulous FBI wiretappers in the cold open.
Advertisement
“What the hell is that thing?”—The Ten-To-Oneland Report
With Chris Redd, Kenan, and Glover playing three hardened cons manning the customer service lines for what sounds like a home shopping company in order to earn “30 cents an hour,” there was the merest hint of edginess to the premise here. (You know, about how for-profit prisons keeping overwhelmingly black prisoners on their pennies-per-day payroll is sort of a, let’s call it, problematic situation.) But the sketch was really about the three actors switching between their tough-talking prison personas and their performatively sunny phone voices, and all three are terrific at it. And the capper that their supervisor is Beck Bennett’s cannibalistic (but white) fellow prisoner brings the edge back on the way out.
Stray observations
In addition to all the other cameos, A$AP Rocky shows up in Dr. Adelson’s waiting room when Migos come out.
Glover notes his work in Community and Solo, “and, if you’re black, I made Atlanta and ‘Redbone.’”
Raz P. Berry has some serious cleaning up to do at home: “I did a lot of things I didn’t get to in the song.”
Che’s guess on the first of Muller’s “trap” questions for Trump: “Colluder says what?”
Pete, on Che and Jost having it all: head writers, Update, Emmy hosts, Harvard, black.
Pete, on his failed “How do [long-ago NBC head] Warren Littlefield’s nuts taste?” burn: “Southwest needs to get some new magazines.”
Lando, on his reaction to seeing naked alien ladies: “Oh, that’s your that. We’ll figure it out.”
