When Ariana Grande appeared as a musical guest on a March episode of “Saturday Night Live,” it wasn’t hard to predict (and we did) that she would be back in the fall to promote the November release of her film “Wicked.” But instead of doing double duty as host and musical act like Bad Bunny did last season, Grande insisted in her opening monologue (in song) that she plans to keep a low profile.
Thank goodness she was joking.
After accurately imitating the voices of Britney Spears, Miley Cryus and Gwen Stefani in the monologue, Grande told Yang, wearing a pink “Wicked”-inspired dress, that their sketch on the film had been cut. Then she joined the dancers and promised not to duet with Nicks (“It’s worth it!”).
Great, who could soon be nominated for Grammy nominationsmay not have been the musical guest, but she had plenty of songs to show off her powerful voice on the show. Additionally, his sketches played to his strengths as a performer with genius comedic timing, who proves to be as talented an impersonator as the show’s cast members.
Guest host expertly spoofed Celine Dion’s recent NFL appearance featuring a UFC-themed version of “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now”, and in a sketch that required Grande to do an impression of Jennifer Coolidge in a Maybelline commercial opposite current “SNL” impressionist Chloe Fineman and “SNL” legend Dana Carvey doing their own takes of Coolidge, the pop star most resembled “The White Lotus”. Emmy winner.
Grande also sang — in a very, very high voice — as a castrated Italian Renaissance boy whose parents (Maya Rudolph and Andy Samberg) explain the concept of “Castrato.” In a pre-recorded video, she sang a song about the smells of her best friend’s house (it takes a dark turn). And in a sketch about a competitive mom meeting son’s boyfriend for the first timeshe fought and kissed fellow “Wicked” cast member Bowen Yang. She also played a double-crossing hotel detective inspector as well as a member of a wedding party sing deliberately false lyrics, inspired by “Espresso”, to denounce bad behavior during the bachelorette party.
The guest host broke character several times, but she always recovered quickly and put in a stellar performance in one episode. it started five minutes late because of college football. Musical guest Stevie Nicks performed her new pro-abortion anthem “The lighthouse” And “Edge of seventeen.” For the third week in a row, no Please Don’t Destroy video, but the boys can be seen in a recent Instagram video filmed in the “SNL” offices and are I’m apparently working on a commercial for Allstate..
‘SNL’ knows when it has struck gold, as it did with the the first episode of the season is cold open starring Rudolph as Vice President Kamala Harris and Dana Carvey as President Biden, which he followed up by bringing back the same guest stars for the vice presidential debate. This week the show returned to a fantastic episode of CNN’s “Family Feud” with the Democrats taking on the Republicans and Steve Harvey (Kenan Thompson) hosting “Feud.”
Kamala referenced her busy week of media appearances – she says she went on Howard Stern’s show to attract horny cab drivers – former President Trump (James Austin Johnson) insisted the fact that immigrants ate Moo Deng and JD Vance (Yang) accused Democrats of turn the Joker “into a gay man obsessed with Lady Gaga.”
The format was fun, but the comedic beats were nearly identical to the previous two cold opens, with a confused Biden, the explosive dad energy of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (Jim Gaffigan) and second gentleman Doug Emhoff (Samberg). The only new twist was including Mikey Day as Donald Trump, Jr., who laments about Vance: “It’s almost like my dad picked me to be vice president…. But he didn’t do it.
The prints were still solid, but the triple dipping took much of the humor out of the piece.
In Grande’s monologue, she pointed out that she last hosted in 2016the country was “about to elect our first female president, so I guess…the second time will be the charm.” »
Best sketch of the evening: Celine Dion makes broken bones beautiful
Following Celine Dion’s strange surprise appearance in an NFL promoGrande imitated the singer in delivering a similar message – this time for the even more brutal sport of UFC. With lyrics such as “There were broken bones / and there were knees in bullets”, this version of “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now” celebrated the violence of UFC, cauliflower ears to 300-pound Bosnian athletes throwing up theirs. teeth. Celine Dion de Grande promised to see you in The Octagon.
Also: Do you like Jennifer Coolidge? And why not three of them?
As mentioned above, Grande passed her entrance exam to the Jennifer Coolidge Academy of Jennifer Coolidge Impressions in a mirror sketch with Fineman, who previously played actress in the series. The two paired things free to talk on a date, like lemons, until they were joined by Carvey as their mirror moved to reveal a third Coolidge. The only surprise was that it was Carvey sitting there instead of the real Coolidge herself.
“Weekend Update” Winner: Amazon Worker Monica Is A Little Overworked
James Austin Johnson and Sarah Sherman played the quarrelsome brothers of OasisNoel and Liam Gallagher, but Ego Nwodim hit harder as Monica, an overworked Amazon employee still recovering from leaving the company. recent two-day trade event. Monica worked eight days in a row – so long that she had to invent a whole new day of the week, “Fluesday.” Monica discussed connecting with a drone at work and at one point fell asleep with her eyes open. “Weekend Update” co-host Michael Che noted that the conditions appear inhumane. But when asked if he would stop ordering products from Amazon, he remained silent. Relatable!