A few hours before this weekend’s Saturday Night Live episode aired, news broke that Vice President Kamala Harris’s plane was making a stop near New York City. Word spread that Harris would be making a “surprise appearance” on SNL, which begs the question of whether something can truly be a surprise if there’s a New York Times push notification about it hours in advance.
And, sure enough, in the episode’s cold open, Harris showed up opposite Maya Rudolph via a device that recalled the time Mick Jagger shared a scene with Jimmy Fallon doing an impression of, well, Mick Jagger. Harris looked happy to be there and to play opposite Rudolph, which is understandable; Rudolph’s take on Harris is the rare impression that’s at onceflattering and funny.
“I’m gonna vote for us,” Rudolph declared at sketch’s end.
“Great!” Harris replied. “Any chance you are registered in Pennsylvania?”
Harris wasn’t the only high-profile politician to play themselves on the episode, though. And while Harris’s surprise appearance wasn’t all that surprising, this next one was. The occasion was an election edition of What’s That Name, in which contestants played by Sarah Sherman and host John Mulaney were asked questions about the election – and elections past.
There was a lot to like about the sketch, from Michael Longfellow embracing the concept of smarm in his role as the host to an inspired bit about the true identity of Sherman’s character. And the sketch got plenty of laughs out of Mulaney playing a guy whose memory doesn’t quite sync up with his online rhetoric. And then Virgina Senator Tim Kaine showed up.
While Harris’s appearance was fairly affectionate, the tone of Kaine’s was more self-deprectating; the concept behind his appearance was that Mulaney’s character had forgotten Kaine’s name despite him being the Democratic vice presidential nominee in 2016.
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The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee is a wine enthusiast and former member of the Congressional Wine CaucusStill, there’s a long history of politicians showing up on SNL to show that they can, in fact, take a joke. Arguably, this predates SNL, with Richard Nixon’s Laugh-In appearance in 1968 setting the tone for what would follow. And one can only assume Kaine was excited to appear on the same stage that his beloved Replacements had visited many years before.
Politicians’ cameo appearances in the comedy world tend to fall into two categories: earnest and self-deprecating. Harris and Kaine’s SNL work this week offered a little of each. Though perhaps the most salient political moment didn’t come from either real-life elected official, but instead from Andy Samberg’s appearance as a dead bear in the now-traditional musical homage that tends to show up in Mulaney-hosted episodes. Trust us: it makes sense in context.
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