This week, Saturday Night Live tackled the biggest controversies during its month-long holiday hiatus, taking shots at Gov. Chris Christie (R-N.J.), New York Yankees player Alex Rodriguez and pop star Justin Bieber during the hysterical cold open.
In the spoof of CNN’s Piers Morgan Live, SNL first criticized Morgan’s lack of journalistic integrity.
“My name is Piers Morgan, and what I lack in journalistic integrity — ” actor Taran Killam said, leaving the sentence unfinished while moving on to the next topic.
The faux Morgan went on to discuss the well-known figures accused of misleading the American public. The first of these was Christie and the Bridgegate debacle. The Governor, played by Bobby Moynihan, apologized for the whole incident — but then got slightly heated over the continued media attention.
“It’s over, so shut up!” he said in a very New Jersey tone.
SNL implied Christie’s actual involvement in bridge closure by the defensive stance Moynihan took. The fake Christie implied that he was too busy balancing budgets, yelling at teachers — aka being a bully — and working out “five times a year” to have participated in the bridge closure.
“I can’t keep track of every freakin’ idiot I’m trying to screw over!” Moynihan exclaimed.
When faux Morgan pressed Christie on allegations that he had withheld Hurricane Sandy funding, fake Christie then began threatening Morgan’s commute to work.
Taking aim at A-Rod, played by the show’s host and musical guest, Drake, SNL’s Morgan confronted the slugger on the allegations of his steroid use — allegations that led the actual Rodriguez to file lawsuits against Major League Baseball. But fake A-Rod took it a step further, suing the players’ union for not tricking the MLB well enough, the steroids for being in his body and Jackie Robinson for breaking the professional baseball color barrier and allowing people of color to even play the sport, which led to the situation in the first place.
Faux Morgan then asked Rodriguez about the evidence against him, including hundreds of text messages. Fake A-Rod blamed them on autocorrect.
“It’s messed up, man,” he told the CNN host. “So that’s why I’m suing my iPhone, as well as the dictionary.”
Closing the sketch was Kate McKinnon’s spot-on impression of Justin Bieber, which will surely be one of the must-watch clips from SNL in 2014.
McKinnon mocked Bieber’s snide arrogance and cocky misdemeanor in his handling of the egging allegations as of late. All the while, the actress nailed Bieber’s personal mannerisms, head-dips, look-aways and the other goofy bro poses he does when he gets in front of a camera.
Watch the cold open here:
