Saturday Night Live: Claire Foy & Anderson .Paak

December 1, 2018

BY Vish KhannaPublished Dec 2, 2018

8
Claire Foy was a great, amenable host and Anderson .Paak was an arrestingly dynamic musical guest. Here's everything that happened on Saturday Night Live this week.
 
The cold open 

Cecily Strong's Melania tried to comfort Alex Baldwin's the Donald at the G20 summit. Kate McKinnon turned up as Rudy Giuliani just for the stunt of it, which was followed by an unlikely and amusing phone call between Trump and Ben Stiller's Michael Cohen.


Fred Armisen made a cameo as the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who joined a shirtless Beck Bennett, reprising his scuzzy Putin and both bro'd out by taunting Trump. Baldwin made fun of his recent arrest for fighting a guy over a parking spot in NYC and this busy and fairly amusing sketch ended with an ensemble performance.

The monologue 
 
Claire Foy made a few jokes about England and meeting the Queen, whom she portrayed in The Crown. It was a short, slight monologue that Foy seemed game to tell, but it was forgettable as they get.
 
Netflix
 
A short takedown of how bananas bountiful Netflix is. No human can possibly keep up with the network's constant additions and original content and this fake ad, including varied takes on shoddy programming, went after that with mixed results.

Morning Joe
 
Kate McKinnon and Alex Moffatt reprised their roles as Mika and Joe, who are horny for each other, which gets in the way of their reporting. Harping on their recent wedding ceremony insufferably and coming close to intense PDA, the pair won't even let BBC correspondent Katty Kay, played by Foy, drop a news bombshell, so, to prove the hosts aren't paying attention to her, she instead suggests that Donald Trump is a gay, Mexican werewolf.

The War in Words
 
A PBS documentary series recalling letters between WWI soldiers and their long-lost loves. Mikey Day plays James Merchant and Foy played his wife Margaret, who initially writes him brief, phone text-like letters. As it goes on, Margaret seems to take on a new partner named Henry and becomes embroiled in some vague legal trouble, which, because he has no details about either, further exasperates James. This became funnier and funnier as it went and featured some great performances.
 
Dad Christmas 
 
A funny/sad remote about kids getting a second Christmas because their parents divorced. Foy and Pete Davidson played the kids, Mikey Day played their dad who seems down and out in Florida, and, most significantly, Aidy Bryant played a kind of Dad Christmas coordinator who sold the service with a pretty great song.

Anderson .Paak
 
The already upbeat, joyous soul-pop of "Tints" was chugging along just fine when Kendrick Lamar showed up, took a seat on Anderson .Paak's drum riser, and delivered a cool feature that made the audience roar.

 .Paak is always fun to watch because he sings expressively while drumming and does both rather perfectly. With cool lighting, he returned, this time to step out in front of the kit for another Oxnard track, "Who R U?," showing off cool raps and moves to boot. This was one of the most confident and inspired SNL debuts in recent memory.

Weekend Update 
 
Colin Jost and Michael Che delivered some good jokes about Trump's G20 trip and the media's recent revelations that he may not be an honest person. Leslie Jones did an outlandish desk piece about how she was tired of sex.

Che told a amazing cocaine joke involving Steven Tyler before Beck Bennett appeared as Jules, "who sees things differently," which was a play on annoying rich kids who don't need to do or understand anything.

After a couple more jokes, the show paid tribute to former President George H.W. Bush, who died on a Friday night, by playing old clips of Dana Carvey impersonating him, including the man himself interacting with Carvey.
 
Charlie and the Chocolate Fucktory
 
A strange take on a scene from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, where two sets of grandparents share a bed. What would happen if one couple decided to start going to town on easy other? Well the bed would vibrate so much and the screams of joy and horror would intersect so loudly, Kate McKinnon would barely make it through the sketch without breaking.

Tamara VanBurke's Teeny Adorables
 
A Home Shopping Network appearance goes awry when a salesperson, played by Cecily Strong, forgets her wares in her Uber. Foy and Thompson played the pleasantly patient hosts who try to soothe their increasingly self-immolating guest, whose mother, played by Aidy Bryant, crashes the set to exacerbate the situation further.

Good Morning Goomah
 
Foy did a few American accents tonight but none were as impressive as the one she conjured playing a mafia sidepiece on this talk show. Not sure why this mob premise surfaced now, but it had its funny moments.
 
A Holiday Message from the Women of SNL
 
A cast plea, set to music, that Robert Mueller releases his report before Christmas. "All I want for Christmas Mueller, is you," was the odd chorus to this song where the women of SNL seemed increasingly hysterical that something be done about Trump via the special counsel's investigation. Why were only the women on the show doing this marginally funny song and dance routine? Who knows?


ComedyFilmReviewsTVSaturday Night Live

Latest Coverage

More Latest Coverage