After a three-week hiatus, Saturday Night Live’s weekend update spent most of its segment focusing on Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars, the biggest story of the week and, as Colin Jost put it, “one of the craziest things we’ll see in our lives.”
The weekend update pretended to be brand new by opening with a story about Vladimir Putin, but it only served as a segue into three minutes of Smith jokes.
“Intelligence officials say Vladimir Putin is being misinformed by his advisers about how poorly the Russian military is doing in Ukraine,” Colin Jost said. “It’s like Will Smith’s agent saying, ‘You destroyed the Oscars.'”
Jost, who is married to Scarlett Johansson, personally added to The Slap: “I think [it] was a shameful act that sets a terrible precedent for having to defend your wife at awards shows.
“During his acceptance speech, Will Smith said, ‘Love will make you do crazy things,'” said Michael Che. “You know what else would make you do crazy things? Insane. But I understand where Will is coming from, you can’t expect him to sit and watch another man jump on his wife… without signing a non-disclosure agreement.”
After discussing Smith’s retirement from the academy (“He didn’t want to, but then Jada looked at him like that,” Jost quipped), both co-hosts delivered mini-monologues about the infamous moment Jost shared with “the Super.” Likened bowl wardrobe malfunction but when Janet’s nipple hits Timberlake.”
Defending fellow comedian Rock, Che claimed, “We’re going to stop acting like everyone knows Jada has alopecia.” “As much as we’ve heard about Jada and Will’s personal lives, you can’t expect us to tell you everything.” keep,” said Che. “It’s like Kanye saying, ‘Don’t act like you don’t know I have cirrhosis.”
Jost then criticized the Oscars producers for allowing Smith to remain in the audience after the slap and blaming Rock for whether Smith was kicked out. “So now we just ask the victim after they’ve been hit in the head? “Hey, are you cool if the guy who attacked you hangs around for a while?” You don’t want to make him angry again,'” said Jost. “I can’t believe the academy has a worse concussion record than the NFL.”
Weekend Update then returned to the non-slap news, covering Lindsey Graham’s refusal to back Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, Madison Cawthorn’s claims of drug-filled congressional orgies, and one final Putin joke.
“US officials are concerned that Vladimir Putin is keeping military units near Kyiv despite earlier promises of withdrawal,” Che said. “Putin’s failure to back down has earned him the nickname ‘Nick Cannon.'”
SNL also satirized The Slap during the cold opening, in host Jerrod Carmichael’s opening monologue, and with a sketch of its own in which Chris Redd portrayed the actor King Richard.