Saturday Night Live: Dave Chappelle returns for a stellar episode
The controversial comedian makes a plea for empathy from the returning president in a strong week for the show
Saturday Night Live returns from holiday hiatus with MSNBC coverage of the impending presidential inauguration. Rachel Maddow (Sarah Sherman) presides over a panel of liberal pundits – including her doppelganger Chris Hayes (Andrew Dismukes) – essentially “the Avengers for your aunt”.
The panel promises not to let crazy a Trump outburst distract them from the real news like las time around, only to breathlessly report on the president-elect’s incoming comments and tweets, including a plan to trade Kentucky for Italy, sending Don Jr to purchase the Emerald City from Wicked, challenging China’s president to a fight in the UFC octagon, and a declaration of war on sharks.
They cut to footage of Trump (James Austin Johnson) rambling about TikTok (“We used to hate it but it then, in many ways, got me elected”), Mark Zuckerberg (“He looks much cooler in terms of perm and with regard to chain”), his inauguration (“it will be indoors; too many people to fit outside”), and his latest cabinet pick, George Santos (Bowen Yang), who will be serving as Secretary of Fact Checking and Ambassador to Sephora. Things wrap up with Trump live tweeting insults at the MSNBC anchors: “This lineup looks like Scooby Doo: Oops, All Velma.”
A fine, if uninspiring cold open ahead of the dire prospect of Monday’s event. The best bits were the digs on Hayes.
When November’s post-election episode of Saturday Night Live aired without Dave Chappelle at the helm, it seemed as though the show was intentionally breaking with the tradition it started in 2016. No so, according to the comedian, hosting for the fourth time, who informs us that Lorne Michaels indeed asked him to do it, only for Chappelle to pass. Instead, he offered to host in January, hoping to avoid controversy. Alas, “the moment I said yes, LA burst into flames”.
Smoking a cigarette and pulling up a stool, Chappelle reflects on the perfect storm of catastrophe that caused the apocalyptic California fires (“You have to at least consider the possibility that God hates these people … Sodomites … no, that’s not true, West Hollywood was unscathed”), before giving in and turning his attention to Trump.
An Ohio resident, Chappelle was especially upset by Trump’s racist attacks on Haitian immigrants in Springfield, only one town over from where he lives, and decided to make a public show of support for the community: “Every day, I would drive a few miles over to Springfield and eat lunch at the Haitian restaurant … and to be honest with you, I don’t know what that meat was. But whatever it was, it fell right off the bone, I’ll tell you that.”
He also speaks on Diddy’s legal troubles, realizing the only reason he was never at the freak-offs was because he was too ugly to attend: “Can you imagine … everyone in Hollywood had an orgy behind your back … Carl Winslow from Family Matters was there, and I wasn’t invited?”
He then wraps up with a sincerely moving story about the late Jimmy Carter touring Palestine against the warnings of the secret service. This leads him to deliver a message to Donald Trump and viewers at home about showing empathy for others, especially displaced people “whether they’re in the Palisades or Palestine”.
The message itself – the strongest statement on Palestine to appear on SNL yet – is unimpeachable, although it’s rich for Chappelle to dole out moral instruction considering he has spent the last several years publicly disparaging transgender people.
Still, it was a good performance, less a monologue than a mini-standup special. It was certainly funnier than any of his full-length Netflix specials.
The first sketch of the night sees the return of Immigrant Dad Talk Show. Marcello Hernández’s Latino emigree invites his Black neighbor Richard (Chappelle) onto the show. They hold court on their favorite subject: their disappointing sons (“My son diagnosed himself with OCD. I said, Oh? See Deez Nuts!”). Later, they’re joined by fellow neighbor Kevin (Mikey Day), a sensitive dweeb who creepily kisses his son on the mouth Tom Brady-style but shakes his wife’s hand. As with almost every race relations sketch, the writers can’t help but fall back on cringey white liberals as the butt of the joke.
A Los Angeles family in one of the fire zones decide to evacuate, only for the dad to start tearing apart the house (and family dog) to retrieve his hidden stash of cash, forged passports, firearms and secret French family. There’s no real payoff to any of this, but it’s got some good gore and a couple of funny moments between Chappelle and Devon Walker as his “soft like a bitch” son.
Musical guest GloRilla performs her first song of the night, then it’s on to Weekend Update. Colin Jost scores some big laughs with a solid dig at the expense of Mark Zuckerberg (“He flew down to Mar-a-Lago to meet with Trump and boy are his knees tired”) and gets a lot of groans over a joke about the Israel-Palestine ceasefire agreement (“their version of dry January”).
Michael Che invites cast member Michael Longfellow to make one final plea to save TikTok. Longfellow discards concerns over the app’s Chinese ownership (“You know who else was Chinese? Jesus Christ … I saw it on a Tik Tok”) and data stealing (“Oh no, China knows I like thick Latinas – who doesn’t?”), while contemplating how he’ll live without it: “What do I do at work? What do I even watch during a movie?” A very good takedown of the awful social platform and the best Longfellow has been on the show, his vocal patterns and line delivery reminiscent of the late Phil Hartman and Norm McDonald.
Later, Jost welcomes their second guest, the original Nosferatu (Sherman, of course). The OG vampire is not happy with the new film’s redux (“He doesn’t even look like me … the guy is jacked and has a mustache; he looks like shirtless Ned Flanders”), but he spends more time ragging on Jost, a coke-addicted sex fiend who is the bigger monster at the desk. As ever, Jost and Sherman have the best chemistry on the show.
At a police station, a man (Walker) reports his girlfriend missing. He gives a description of her to the cops, only to freeze when asked how much she weighs. An eavesdropping janitor (Kenan Thompson) is sympathetic to his cause, providing him with answers that will keep him out of trouble should his statements ever come to light. Painfully unfunny, it takes forever to peter out.
GloRilla performs her second song, then the show concludes with online dating show Pop the Balloon. A group of single ladies meet a couple single guy contestants before being introduced to Chappelle Show’s resident Playa Haters Silky Johnson and Beautiful, and degenerate gambler Ashy Larry (the latter two played by series regular Donnell Rawlings). Asked if he’s some kind of sex trafficker, Silky retorts: “I don’t do traffic, I take helicopters, bitch.” They all get popped immediately. It’s great to see these classic characters back, especially the ones played by Rawlings, a truly great and perpetually underrated actor. I only wish there had been more of them.
The first two episodes of SNL that Chappelle hosted left behind a sour taste, but these last two have been winners. Even his penchant for preachiness landed here since he was on the right side of history for a change. The rest of the episode was roundly solid as well.
When SNL returns next week, it will be under a second Trump presidency. Expect the mood to be grimmer.