Variety reports that Tina Fey talked about the very political sketches on Saturday Night Live at a "History Talks" event on Saturday in Philadelphia produced in tandem by the History Channel and Comcast.
She joked on a grandiose note: “One fifth of America’s history has been covered by Saturday Night Live… Which one will last longer?” Fey talked about her Sarah Palin sketches in 2008, when many people thought Palin – and not Fey – said “I can see Russia from my house.” Sketch comedy becomes reality to some people.
“We always worked really hard to make sure they were what we call a ‘fair hit.’ It only felt like it would work if it was based in something that was true. Sometimes people will ask me, ‘Does SNL try to control the narrative of politics?’ And they really do not. You really can’t because if it’s not true, it will not be funny.”
Conservatives could seriously question if “fair hit” is an actual standard. Then there’s the question of “who’s hit.” Fey listed as her favorite impressions Darrell Hammond’s Al Gore, Dana Carvey’s George H.W. Bush, and Matt Damon’s Brett Kavanaugh.
The Kavanaugh confirmation hearings sketch came with the season debut in 2018, and mocked Kavanaugh as seriously unglued. But Fey fondly remembered Damon’s impression. “He came in and just played him so perfectly, it helped alleviate a frustration that many viewers of those hearings had,” Fey said. “It only works if it’s correct.”
As usual, the sketch was therapy for leftists. Variety summarized Damon's game: "His explosive performance poked fun at Kavanaugh’s questionable explanations of yearbook jokes widely interpreted as references to lewd sexual exploits and heavy binge drinking."
This cold-open went on for 13 minutes -- instead of the typical five or six minutes.
Fey could have been asked about how this Kavanaugh sketch compared to their 2022 cold-open kissy-face after Ketanji Brown Jackson was confirmed. Ego Nwodim’s Jackson assured the Commander in Chief that as the first black woman to join the Supreme Court, she had to “work twice as had as a white man my entire life and spend an entire week listening to Ted Cruz call me a pedophile.”
Is that a "fair hit" that works because it's "correct"? No. Sen. Cruz asked Jackson about her sentencing of child pornography suspects. Other cast members in the sketch played Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Thurgood Marshall, Harriet Tubman, and Jackie Robinson.
Later in that show, the mockery of Republican Senators continued, as pro-abortion cast member Cecily Strong mocked Sen. Marsha Blackburn for asking Jackson what is a woman, which shouldn't be a trick question. Jackson's answer -- "I'm not a biologist" -- was begging for satire.
Instead, SNL mocked Sen. Blackburn as somehow a silly Southern bimbo who can't appreciate that gender is "kind of a nuanced, complicated question," as Colin Jost claimed. As Fake Blackburn tried to explain with "stupid" pictures, Jost asked: "Why is defining a woman even relevant to a confirmation hearing?" Fake Blackburn ended the skit with this zinger: “If you don’t know what a woman is, how ya gonna take her rights away?”
Anyone who thinks SNL is a "fair hit" show is drunker than Matt Damon's Kavanaugh.
