This year’s Oscars are a couple weeks away, but this year’s ceremony lives in the shadow of what happened last year. Will someone make like Will Smith and slap another presenter? Probably not! But the Academy board isn’t taking any chances. Last week they announced they had established a “crisis team” that will try to prevent any similar incidents. The move was widely mocked, including on SNL’s most recent Weekend Update.
“Guys, it’s not going to happen again. I’m sure you wish it would, for ratings,” racked co-host Colin Jost about the move. He then speculated on some ways they could advertise a possible assault.
“If anything the promo should be, ‘Who’s going to get slapped this year?’ Can Ana de Armas beat the Tár out of Cate Blanchett? Which Banshee will knock the shoes off Marcel the Shell? And who has what it takes to Whale on Brendan Fraser?”
The Academy’s paranoia was one of many topics touched on during this weekend’s segment. Jost also laid into Donald Trump for his cynical appearance in East Palestine, Ohio, the site of a horrific train derailment, which had been parodied earlier on the show.
“Donald Trump visited East Palestine, the site of the recent train derailment, because Trump usually tries to make himself look better by standing next to a train wreck,” Jost joked. He had a few more jokes on the matter.
“The train that derailed was carrying highly toxic vinyl chloride, which I think is something Trump recommended as a cure for COVID,” Jost told the crowd. He then moved on to Trump handing out bottles of his long-ago-discontinued branded spring water. “Said residents, ‘Thanks, but we’d rather drink the toxic train water.”
Meanwhile, Michael Che took on both Marjorie Taylor Greene, who he called the former “Cocaine Bear,” alongside a picture of her State of the Union get-up, and slammed her call for a “National Divorce” by declaring her “the most divorced-looking woman I have ever seen.”
Che then moved on to Ron DeSantis, whose forthcoming memoir, called The Courage to Be Free, has a title, Che said, “sounds like a Black history book he’s banned.”
You can watch the most recent Weekend Update in the videos above and below.