There's no denying that Chris Rock is a comedy legend, but that's not because of his time on “Saturday Night Live” from 1990 to 1993.
The former cast member, who rose to stardom after “SNL” with his gripping comedy, returned this week as host for the fourth time. This time, he made the biggest impact in his biting, topical monologue and a couple of pre-recorded pieces, not in the live sketches, where he seemed to react slowly or have difficulty reading lines on cue cards.
Even with those problems, Rock managed to sell the first lead sketch of the night, about a Christmas mall elf. giving parents the uncomfortable choice between a white Santa (James Austin Johnson) and a black Santa (Devon Walker) for their children. It was similar in vibe to the video”Grandpa's magic car”, about a 1950s Herbie-style car that has human qualities but is also racist. Brief appearance of Rock in a video about a Boring Christmas party at the office. It worked well too.
Less successful: a Secret Santa sketch that revolved around the gift of making Rock look like a character from “The Simpsons”; one over two men from the same building (Rock and Kenan Thompson) accused of sexual harassment of employees; and a late sketch about a man kidnapping someone else's blind date with the character of Ego Nwodim.
The biggest surprise, which livened up an otherwise mixed episode, was that Adam Sandler appeared as the patient. in a surgery sketch. He bleeds for all cast members Emil Wakim, Sarah Sherman, Nwodim and Bowen Yang, as well as Rock, as he breaks the fourth wall and comments on the show. It wasn't clear how much of that was improvised, but it sure looked like Sandler was having fun trying to get Rock to break character.
Musical guest Gracie Abrams gave two strong performances in her “SNL” debut with songs “That's so true” and “I love you, I'm sorry.”
Nancy Grace, the host of YouTube’s “Crime Stories With Nancy Grace,” has been a mainstay of “SNL” since long before YouTube existed. She was previously played by cast members Ana Gasteyer and Amy Poehler, but now Sarah Sherman has taken over the role and given Grace a wildly exaggerated accent and more manic demeanor. Outside the show, he called Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, “Mordoror” and chastised the United States for turning the alleged killer into a sex symbol. Grace mocked Mangione for looking like “Dave Franco with Eugene Levy eyebrows” and revealed that she wants a “ghost gun” like the one allegedly used in the crime because, “Every night I wake up and JonBenet's spirit screams.” : 'You used me! '” Because he's on YouTube, his show kept getting interrupted by ads for supplement pills.
When Chris Rock began his monologue, the comedian sounded out of breath, as if he had run up the flights of stairs at 30 Rock to get to the stage. But he settled in shortly after congratulating producer Lorne Michaels on “25 great years of 'Saturday Night Live',” on the occasion of its 50th anniversary. From there, Rock attacked targets like Mangione (“If he looked like Jonah Hill… they would have given him the chair by now”), Mike Tyson's boxing opponent Jake Paul (“Is this what the fight has come down to?” white man? Who are you going to fight next, Morgan Freeman?”) and the incredible year of President-elect Donald Trump (“It could pass it on to a nicer boy.
The monologue grew thornier as it went on, with Rock speculating about American presidents who might be considered rapists (“Do you know how many rapists are in my wallet right now? A cup of coffee in America costs seven rapists”) and about which Latinos Trump could deport. “J. Lo is going to marry Ben [Affleck] again just so he can stay in the country,” he said. “I know she's not Mexican… but Trump doesn't know that.” While it lacked the thoughtful acuity of his best monologue, the monologue was at least a reminder that when he gets going, Rock takes no prisoners.
Best sketch of the night: The office Christmas party starts at 5:45 pm on a Tuesday
Office holiday limping is well-trodden comedic territory, but this pre-recorded sketch hit all the right notes about why keeping employees who only know each other through after-hours work together is a bad idea. From the laptop music flop to the reveal of Onlyfans accounts and “The soggiest food you've ever seen…so wet,” the video used awkward close-ups and a wide variety of characters to get its point across. , the highlight being Rock and Nwodim playing a married couple who argue about their husband's “work wife.” The best detail? The 45-minute Secret Santa with a giant chalkboard chart that seems to go on forever.
Also good: Surgery is terrible, but stay for the bleeding.
What started out as a sketch about a hapless assistant named Leslie (Sherman) botching a gallbladder procedure turned into something completely different when it was revealed that former “SNL” cast member Sandler was the patient under the sheet. After a few moments of technical difficulties, Sandler was able to get a blood stream going and sprayed everyone else, including his former co-star Rock. It was one of those moments that got funnier as it went on, with Sandler riffing and no one exactly sure what to do next. It's hard to fake that kind of spontaneity, and in Sandler's (damn) hands, the sketch went from a potential flop to something with actual viral potential.
'Weekend Update' Winner: How Many Dumb Jokes Are Too Many Dumb Jokes?
New cast member Jane Wickline performed a smart and fun song about why people don't speculate about pop singer Sabrina Carpenter's sexuality. But as smart as he was, he couldn't shine as bright as Andrew Dismukes's head as he played a hairless man reveling in a months old case from england in which calling a man “bald” could constitute sexual harassment. Dismukes told “Weekend Update” co-host Colin Jost that “My eyes are down here” and recounted the time he was on a jury with 11 other bald men and was described as looking like a carton of eggs. This could have just been a series of cheeky jokes, but Dismukes has a way of playing these types of characters with absolute seriousness. Let's just say he did a good job of getting into the character's headspace.
