A smug, comedy-compromised Nikki Haley confirmed up on Saturday Night time Stay final evening, the newest clown in a circus parade of political candidates who’ve proven up for compulsory cameos since 2000 or so. It’s a surprisingly massive group that features Rudy Giuliani, Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John McCain, Al Sharpton, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and, after all, Donald Trump. (Whether or not or not you think about all or any of those “dangerous politicians” possible depends upon your ideological stripe.) The truth that Haley wasn’t humorous isn’t the purpose — SNL political cameos appear to be about recognition applause greater than laughs — however she did permit the present to attain one other level within the recreation of “See, we current either side!”
That’s extra essential to Saturday Night time Stay’s inventive workforce than you would possibly assume. “When it’s the political stuff, the very best is when any individual who’s a Democrat goes, ‘Oh, you actually gave it to Bush,’ and any individual who’s a Republican will go, ‘Oh, you actually laid into Gore,’” defined onetime SNL author Steve Higgins in oral historical past Stay From New York. “That’s the response we must be getting.”
Perhaps that’s true now, but it surely wasn’t all the time so. The present’s first political cameo was an unlikely one — Gerald Ford’s press secretary, Ron Nessen, hosted in an try and steadiness the pummeling SNL was giving the president each week. On the very least, Nessen wished to show Ford had a humorousness. However the 1976 model of Lorne Michaels was cautious of Nesson’s look. In accordance with Saturday Night time, A Backstage Historical past of Saturday Night time Stay, “Lorne had by no means appreciated the way in which Bob Hope would make jokes concerning the president sooner or later and play golf with him the following. It led, he was positive, to pulling punches.”
Today, after all, it’s simple to think about Michaels sharing an costly bottle of white wine with Obama. Golf isn’t Michaels’ fashion.
Again then, the present’s writers have been decided, as Michaels himself put it, to “take the president and shove his press secretary up his ass.” Author Rosie Shuster confessed that the writers’ angle might be summed up as, “The president’s watching. Let’s make him cringe and squirm.” They knew Nessen would refuse to do overtly political stuff so as a substitute, they wrote the raunchiest materials within the present’s younger historical past. Emily Littella, as an example, did a tirade in opposition to presidential erections, her hard-of-hearing model of elections. When you can’t criticize ‘em, embarrass them to demise. It labored — a few of Ford’s aides wished Neesen fired for being a part of the sleazefest.
The percentages of any of that taking place immediately are someplace between zero and none. Candidates are savvier about potential embarrassments today, with the potential exception of Palin. However the larger purpose is that Saturday Night time Stay is far more Steve Higgins than Rosie Shuster now, extra involved with the looks of steadiness (and securing buzzworthy friends) than sticking it up anybody’s ass.
In 2024, an upcoming main is rather like the film opening this weekend — not a topic for satire however another occasion for a star to plug on SNL.
