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This is the third time Lorne Michaels has turned to Dave Chappelle to speak to Saturday Night Live viewers in the wake of an election. In 2016, most everyone was still in shock (good or bad) over Donald Trump’s upset over Hillary Clinton that Tuesday. In 2020, vote counting only put Joe Biden far enough ahead of Trump to call that presidential election earlier that Saturday. This time around, it’s midterms, and Democrats maintained a hold on the U.S. Senate while who’ll have majority control of the House of Representatives remained up in the air at 11:30 p.m. Saturday. So a different mission for Chappelle this time around.
Besides, there’s still so much to talk about. Elon Musk’s epic fail whale at Twitter. Kyrie Irving’s epic fail of a non-apology for linking to anti-Semitic media. And rumors circulating that some of the writers or even cast of SNL might boycott Chappelle since he hasn’t managed to stop antagonizing the LGBTQ+ community (and the show now counts multiple LGBTQ+ members in their ranks). Would anyone no-show? Would Dave address any of it?
In short: Yes to Kyrie (and Kanye) but no to pretty much everything else. And everyone from the cast appeared at least once in some form during the episode.
What’s The Deal For The SNL Cold Open For Last Night (11/12/22)?
The show opened on FOX & Friends morning hosts Steve Doocy (Mikey Day), Ainsley Earhardt (Heidi Gardner) and Brian Kilmeade (Bowen Yang) wondering what happened to the “red wave” election they’d kept promising viewers. Cecily Strong showed up as Kari Lake, the GOP’s Arizona gubernatorial candidate who still clung to longshot hopes of winning her race, and flip-flopping her opinions based on every new batch of votes reported during the sketch. Trump (James Austin Johnson) phoned in from his daughter Tiffany’s wedding. No worries, she’s only delivering her vows. Besides, JAJ remains clutch for a nonsensical riff rant, including his new nickname for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as DeSanctimonious. “I know. I’m surprised I know that word, too,” Trump admits. The program eventually pushes Trump’s shot out of the split-screen. But as they report, do you really think any of these politicians will go away?
How Did The SNL Guest Host Dave Chappelle Do?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_m-gO0HSCYk
The SNL house band segued out of their regular theme music to play the opening horns from Otis Redding’s “Try A Little Tenderness.” Hmmm. Could Chappelle try tenderness?
Although you could easily find parallels between Chappelle’s mockery of Kanye West’s tirades against “the Jews” (two words Chappelle says even he knows never to utter in sequence) and the comedian’s own scuffles with the trans community. Such when he says he grew up around Jewish kids, so “I’m not freaked out by your culture.” Other viewers were quick via social media to find fault with Chappelle’s own observations about Jewish culture, though, and in a 15-minute monologue, he offered plenty, as well as thoughts on Herschel Walker’s Senate campaign (“I don’t want to speak badly of him because he’s Black, but he’s observedly stupid”), and how he understood Trump’s popularity but not his hoarding of classified documents, considering the former president famously couldn’t be bothered to read his briefings. By the time he asked us to “stick around, we’ve got a great show,” it was already 11:54 p.m. Eastern!
So what did that leave room for, then? A second TV news spoof, this one a fictional local news program anchored by Heidi and Andrew Dismukes, who along with the meterologist (Chloe Fineman) and sportscaster (Michael Longfellow) couldn’t stop themselves from repeating “potato hole” as a euphemism for many sexual innuendos, once they learned their musical guest, Willie T. Hawkins (Chappelle), had titled his album, “Mr. Potato Hole.” The true definition, however, made all the whites go yikes, and sadly, “potato hole” will not join this season’s “dress like Joker” in the Season 48 hall of infamy.
Kenan Thompson and Ego Nwodim joined Chappelle for a barbershop sketch, which hinged on a fourth barber played by Michael Longfellow who was clearly out of place. That’s all you need to know.
After Update, Chappelle, cigarette in hand, reminded us: “Smoking is not cool. Smokers are!” He then announced he couldn’t participate in the Black Heaven sketch so another cast member would take his place, leaving Mikey to hem and haw his way through the line readings purposely meant NOT to be said by a white person. The funniest bit came when Kenan ribbed Mikey by reminding him he was on the very first season of Nick Cannon’s Wild ‘n Out!
How Relevant Was The Musical Guest Black Star?
Black Star, the hip-hop duo of yasiin bey and Talib Kweli, also form a trio with Chappelle for their podcast series, “The Midnight Miracle,” so they’re highly relevant to the host’s interests and participation! For their first song, they did “So be it,” off of their second album, which came out this year via their podcasting platform, Luminary.
Their second song also came off the new album, and it was “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.”
Which Sketch Will We Be Sharing: “House of the Dragon”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TybjwLS1VtA
Chappelle brought even more of his signature Chappelle’s Show elements to the episode, from his onstage sketch introductions to including three of his old characters in this pre-taped parody pretending to show scenes from season 2 of HBO’s House of the Dragon. Tyrone Biggums, Rick James and Silky Johnson all showed up. As did Donnell Rawlings and Ice-T! With Chloe as Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen, Michael as Prince Daemon Targaryen, Kenan as Lord Corlys, and JAJ as King Viserys.
Who Stopped By Weekend Update?
Two guests to the desk this week:
Marcello Hernandez got invited back, this time as a character: Jose Suarez, a young Latino voter inspired to run for president himself someday. What’s his platform? “Everything is basically fine.” Plus, every mother gets one chancleta. For intimidation purposes, naturally!
Sarah Sherman also made a big splash in her return to the Update desk to take on Colin Jost once more, this time bringing her own set and backdrop for “Sarah News.” Why? “Because yours looks ugly,” she said. When she started to confess her horniness for Pennsylvania’s Senator-elect John Fetterman, you could feel the temperature inside the studio go up several degrees, even if you were thousands of miles from 30 Rock.
What Sketch Filled The “10-to-1” Slot?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ta1Volfoob8
At 12:54 a.m. Eastern, the “please don’t destroy” boys returned with an election-themed video based on Molly Kearney’s frantic worries about how her offhanded Tweet went viral and won her the election for Ohio’s attorney general. JAJ plays the news anchor, while NBC’s Steve Kornacki played himself in a surprise cameo, and the boys whip up an instant makeover for Kearney to assume her new duties. But first, a speech? Speech! Life comes at you pretty fast, huh.
Who Was The Episode’s MVP?
Looked like Bowen and Cecily dipped after the cold open, and Molly only appeared in a pre-tape (Cecily showed up for good-nights but Bowen and Molly did not, FWIW), but it’s not as if the full cast really needed to show up for Chappelle, considering this week featured the fewest live sketches in recent memory. Can Kornacki pull up the stats to find us the record low? There were only four live sketches requiring most hands on deck, plus Update. Considering the circumstances, the most memorable and valuable contribution came from Sarah Sherman, who showed us with “Sarah News” that she can continue to bring new ideas to the table. Or the Update desk.
The show’s on hiatus for the next two weeks, through Thanksgiving, and not back until Dec. 3, 2022, with host Keke Palmer and musical guest SZA. Could be fun? Should be fun!
Sean L. McCarthy works the comedy beat for his own digital newspaper, The Comic’s Comic; before that, for actual newspapers. Based in NYC but will travel anywhere for the scoop: Ice cream or news. He also tweets @thecomicscomic and podcasts half-hour episodes with comedians revealing origin stories: The Comic’s Comic Presents Last Things First.
