Melissa McCarthy Was Back as Sean Spicer on SNL – But the Cold Open Had The Most Brutal Trump Takedown

After building the hype with some wonderful, weird promos, Melissa McCarthy returned as Sean Spicer for Saturday Night Live, and she did not disappoint.

In the skit, she reads out her bank routing number, hides in the bushes, illustrates the Russia investigation using matryoshka dolls, and, of course, throws props and insults at the press corps. The skit culminates with Spicey on a soul-searching roadtrip to find Trump, after the journalists’ questions hit too close to home.

“I am being straight with you!” Spicey tells the press corps. “I’m telling you exactly what President Trump told me.”

“But what if he’s lying to you?” asks one of the journalists.

“He…B-but he wouldn’t do that,” sputters McCarthy, choking up. “He’s my friend.”

While I didn’t love the skit’s treatment of mental health (The “he’s crazy” jokes aren’t funny!), I’ll never get tired of McCarthy’s amazing physical comedy. She just embodies Spicer’s smallness, frustration, and bluster with every line and gesture.

However, the Cold Open featuring Alec Baldwin as Trump and Michael Che as Lester Holt, took home the prize for this night’s most brutal skit. Trump can’t remember Holt’s name, a chipper Paul Ryan comes in to serve Trump ice cream, and Baldwin’s Trump says, “Do you think I care about optics? I sit on every chair like it’s a toilet.”

However, the skit really gets really…let’s say, honest when they hit the topic of James Comey. Che’s Holt says, “Your staff has been insisting all week that you didn’t fire him because of his Russian investigation.”

“No, I did,” says Baldwin’s Trump.

“Wait, what?”

“I fired him because of Russia. I thought, ‘He’s investigating Russia, I don’t like that, I should fire him’.”

“And you’re just admitting that? But that’s obstruction of justice.”

“Sure, okay.”

Then Che’s Holt, shocked, asks into his headpiece: “Wait, so, did I get him? Is this all over? Oh…no, I didn’t? Nothing matters? Absolutely nothing matters anymore? Fine.”

When it comes to this administration’s routine ethical violations, “absolutely nothing matters anymore” just about sums it up, doesn’t it?

(Via Pajiba and The Hollywood Reporter; image via screengrab)

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