How to pick a favorite moment from this terrific episode of Saturday Night Live, an altogether surprise after last week’s hamstrung dud? Was it host Bill Burr’s blistering takedown of white women in his monologue? Maya Rudolph’s blowsy, Lysol double-fisting Kamala Harris dancing onto the Vice-Presidential debate stage? Jack White’s heroic guitar shredding?
For my money, it was Kate McKinnon’s skilled and honest unraveling at the end of her bit on Weekend Update. As resident medical expert Doctor Wayne Wenowdis, a Groucho Marx type sucking on Freud’s pipe, she was brought on to comment on the insanity of our President’s health. It started off as a cute enough bit, with a funnily-named character made winning through McKinnon’s sheer force of swag. But then things turned.
Dr. Wenowdis got a little manic checking Colin Jost’s blood pressure. “Kate, Kate. Are you okay?” Jost asked America’s beloved, in what was clearly a planned break from character. “I obviously am not,” she replied, staring into the camera with such fatigue and deep empathy. She started confessing that it’s been a trying time, and she’s got a lot of wigs and silly costumes on hand, so she made up Dr. Wenowdis in a moment of absurdist self-care. He helped her make light of the same questions that are crashing around all of our heads day and night. “Who will win the election? Wedontnowdis. When will this pandemic end? Wedontnowdis. What will happen to the world? Wedontnowdis.” We are miracles of resilience and also on the verge of a collective nervous breakdown. “But the one thing we do know…”—yes, please, Kate McKinnon, a salve! — “no, we do not know this.” Okay, keeping it real.
In times of crisis, look for the helpers. Especially the one in the Ann Taylor pantsuit who always seems like she’s feeling good as hell, whatever bullshit is before her. Maya Rudolph’s Kamala earned the biggest cheer of the night when she shut down Beck Bennett’s Mike Pence with the two-word reminder that she is a Queen, and when Queens are talking, you better shut your mouth. “While he speaks, I’m going to smile at him like I’m in a TJ Maxx and a white lady asks me if I work here,” she said. (Oh, white ladies—we’ll get to us in a minute.) She went on to give an excellent martini double-dribble when pressed to answer a question on packing the Supreme Court. However one might still pine for Woody Harrelson’s fake Biden choppers, Jim Carrey was at his best hunched over in a ridiculous fly costume, shooting his finger pistol, and slowly morphing into Jeff Goldblum atop Pence’s white steel pad of a head. And Herman Cain’s reincarnation as a fly warning against COVID—as personified by Kenan Thompson—absolutely tracks.
Stand-up comedian Bill Burr walked us right up to the firing line in his monologue. His jokes on the nonsense of cancel culture seemed pretty lame and dated on first viewing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, what can you expect from John Wayne’s old interviews? Let a dead guy be. It was a distracting softball, and also perhaps a wink for people to get their canceling fingers ready at the keyboard. Because then he went in hard. Oof, and his brash disclaimer– “I don’t want to speak ill of my bitches here”–made you wince.
The joke Burr made about white women works because he’d already told us he’s in the top tier when it comes to villains. He’d made it clear that white guys are awful and have oceans of atoning before them. But he also took a minute to remind us white women that we have a habit of hijacking moments that aren’t ours to take, like the woke movement, while willfully ignoring our own mess. “You guys stood by us toxic white males through centuries of our crimes against humanity,” said Burr. “You rolled around in the blood money and, occasionally, when you wanted to sneak off and hook up with a Black dude, if you got caught you said it wasn’t consensual…. So why don’t you shut up, sit down next to me, and take your talking to?” Damn if Twitter didn’t immediately light up with white women asking for his head. (Would that Burr had ended his monologue there, and waited for the clubs to open back up so he could get his weaker Gay Pride month material up to snuff.)
The best sketch of the night, meanwhile, was a group of friends’ first try at a socially distanced backyard hang. Burr and McKinnon played a couple who hadn’t been out of their house in six months, and had already talked themselves up and out of 20 COVID scares. “These are unpresidented times,” the couple sighed. When their friends corrected their wording, the feral duo snapped. “Sorry we don’t have a deck! Sorry we don’t have outdoor lights!” screamed McKinnon as she judo-kicked a tray of chicken wings. “We drink our money, okay?!” said Burr, smashing a wine glass onto the back door.
This is our new normal for now. None of us are well. If you’re lucky enough to have a yard, go out back and breathe air instead of the fumes of Twitter. Drink the stupid pumpkin beer. Resist making shirtless, sotto voce videos and confusing them with social activism. Be grateful that the spirit of Eddie Van Halen lived in the magic Jack White made on his guitar last night. And, as always, keep Kate McKinnon in your prayers.
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