‘Saturday Night Live’ Open Features Tucker Carlson, Trump and Fox News’ Pro-Russia Celebration
Over at Fox News, Laura Ingraham and Tucker Carlson have been among the loudest pro-Russia voices in recent years, and on this week’s “Saturday Night Live” cold open, they celebrated Russia’s Ukrainian invasion with an “all-star” Fox News special.
On the “Fox News Ukrainian Invasion Celebration Spectacular,” from Mar-a-Lago, Ingraham (Kate McKinnon) and Carlson (Alex Moffat) welcomed Donald Trump (James Austin Johnson) — who sang “My Funny Valentine” in tribute to his pal, authoritarian Russian leader Vladimir Putin. Also appearing were Steven Segal (Bowen Yang), and Donald Trump Jr. (Mikey Day) with Kimberly Guilfoyle (Cecily Strong).
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“We got into a little bit of trouble for all the nice things we said about Russia and the main things we said about Ukraine,” “Carlson,” said. “I kept asking why do we hate Putin? Aren’t liberals in America even worse?”
“Ingraham” noted that she called the Ukrainian president “pathetic.”
“I kept saying we should be more worried about our own border getting invaded by Mexico, but in my defense, I am racist,” “Carlson,” said. “So I thought that was true.”
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“Ingraham” added that the special was raising money for “the real victims of this invasion: The oligarchs.”
Added “Carlson”: “So please, open your wallets. And because this is Fox News, you can either send money or take out a reverse mortgage. So far, we’ve raised over 8.3 billion rubles, which comes out to almost $12.
“Don Jr.” and “Kimberly Guilfoyle” were then introduced as the “first couple, the real Prince Harry and Megan Markle, Don Jr. And Kimberly Guilfoyle, who are going to be performing a duet in honor of Russia and Ukraine coming together!”
The duo then performed their version of “Shallow,” from “A Star Is Born.” Then, “Trump” introduced his song for Putin, first with a quote from the movie “The Help”: “Vladimir, I want you to hear this from me. You is smart, you is kind, you is important. And here is a little song from me to you.”
The March 5 episode of “SNL” marks Oscar Isaac’s debut as host on the variety comedy series. Isaac opened up his monologue by saying his full, birth-name— óscar Isaac Hernández Estrada —and immediately the half-Guatemalan, half-Cuban actor cracked a joke about how Hollywood “chose” the “whitest sounding names” to refer to him. He continued to talk about his “ethnic ambiguity” in jest, noting that he can play anyone from a Pharoah to “Timothée Chalamet’s” daddy, as he did on “Dune.” Isaac’s coming off a busy year that included projects such as “Dune,” “Scenes From a Marriage” and “The Card Counter.”
“You know the whole ‘a rabbit, a priest and the minister walk into a bar’? Yeah, I can play anyone in that joke,” Isaac said.
Isaac then went into promoting his entry into the Marvel Universe— “Moon Knight,” headed to Disney Plus on March 30 —by showing clips of himself as a kid in the movie “The Avenger,” a home video he created with his neighbor, Bruce Ferguson, while he was growing up in Miami, Florida. In it, he starred as both the villain and as a “ninja assassin” of the ten-year-olds-made action flick, complete with scenes with his friend Bruce’s dad cleaning the pool in the background and Isaac “stabbing” himself and then licking a “sword” with fake blood.
Isaac noted that he decided to use up his monologue with clips of “The Avenger” because it’s important to encourage kids to “be weirdos.”
“Because every once in a while, one of those weirdos grows up to host SNL!,” he closed.
Also performing on the episode is Charli XCX, back for her second performance on “SNL.” This is a bit of a make-good for Charli XCX, who was originally set to appear on the Dec. 18 episode, hosted by Paul Rudd, but later canceled as the show was downsized due to the surge of the Omicron variant of the COVID-19 pandemic. Charli XCX’s fifth studio album “Crash” is set to be released on March 18.
Before her first musical performance, a rendition of “Beg for You” (sans Rina Sawayama), Charli XCX made a cameo on a musical sketch featuring almost the entirety of the “SNL” cast along with Isaac as “little meatball men” that live on Sarah Sherman’s body and harmonize when exposed. “Don’t give up on some love because of meatballs,” the pop singer and Isaac crooned together. Her second musical act was “Baby,” the fourth single from “Crash.”
Colin Jost and Michael Che talked about Russia, President Biden’s State of the Union address, Governor Ron DeSantis, and Senator Lindsay Graham during “Weekend Update,” and brought on McKinnon to discuss Florida’s controversial “Don’t Say Gay” bill.
Aidy Bryant broke the fourth wall in a skit about tricking Isaac into having a recurring character on the series called “The Sexual Woman,” in which male guest stars swoon over Bryant. Isaac serves Bryant spaghetti, sits on her lap, plays her guitar and tells Bryant that she’s everyone’s cup of tea— including his. Bryant fondly recalled her pattern of “sexual randomness” with male guests that she’s written into “romantic” situations with her, like Ryan Gosling and Drake.
Next up on “SNL” is Zo? Kravitz, who will host the show on March 12, with Spanish artist Rosalía as music guest.
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