'Saturday Night Live's' best election-themed sketches
Say what you want about Saturday Night Live's diminishing jokes three out of every four years, but come election season, the sketch comedy show is reliably fun, clever and topical.
In no year has that been more apparent than this one, with its nonstop flood of negative campaign news from the hot microphones of Donald Trump to the lost emails of Hillary Clinton, and debates that make moderators look like substitute teachers trying to control a noisy classroom.
So, before final votes are cast for president, we're naming our picks for best election sketches on SNL this 2015-16 election season.
1. Trump v. Clinton Town Hall Debate
All of the cold open debate sketches this year have been on point, but SNL's skewering of the Trump/Clinton Town Hall probably had the highest jokes-per-minute count. Alec Baldwin's Trump and Kate McKinnon's Clinton skewered everything from Trump's lurking to Clinton's over-preparedness and unlikely hero Ken Bone's appearance.
2. Bern Your Enthusiasm
Larry David playing Bernie Sanders is some brilliant casting. In the Curb Your Enthusiasm parody, David-as-Sanders gets into trouble when he doesn't want to shake the hand of a voter who coughed into her hand. The music is so good.
3. Hillary Clinton Bar Talk
McKinnon-as-Clinton has a drink with "Val the bartender," aka the real Hillary Clinton, and the two talk about how Clinton supports gay marriage and believes the Keystone pipeline will destroy the environment... and argue about how long it took the real presidential candidate to reach those opinions.
4. A Hillary Christmas
Here's the set-up: Hillary Clinton of today (Kate McKinnon) does some "productive dreaming," and meets Poehler's Clinton of 2008 ("Who's Benghazi?"), and Fey's Palin of 2008 ("Oh, you poor thing. I hear that after you lost you had to become a secretary."). 2015 Hillary has to explain to the ladies from 2008 that things have changed.
5. George W. Bush Cold Open
In a laugh-out-monologue, George W. Bush (Will Ferrell) went on to explain why he thinks he deserves to be commander-in-chief again, with disses for each candidate. "The field of Republicans out there is so messed up, it makes you miss me," he said. On Trump, he says, "Whenever I get in a bad mood, I just picture his big, fat, orange Oompa Loompa face and I just piss my pants."