Brad Pitt’s ‘SNL’ Skit Highlights How Hard It Is To Satirize Donald Trump

Saturday Night Live is still functioning during quarantine, to some degree, as the cast returned for another housebound version of the sketch show. 

This week’s cold open features Brad Pitt, playing Dr. Anthony Fauci, “explaining” President Trump’s recent comments on the coronavirus. The clip is oddly fascinating – it’s a comedy sketch almost completely lacking in comedy. 

It certainly can’t be called satire, because the writers of SNL are not exaggerating the situation (how can they?), but simply playing clips of Trump speaking. In his cameo, Pitt is forced to play the straight man, second fiddle to a comedian who isn’t on the payroll.  

The lack of content, or commentary, reflects how immensely difficult it is to satirize President Trump. Pitt’s presence is hardly necessary – he is simply reacting to the President of the United States suggesting that “medical doctors” inject disinfectant into the human body. 

QAnon conspiracy theorists were reportedly drinking bleach long before the President made his suggestion. Is this even funny anymore? When so many seem to be inhabiting another reality, is there a layer of absurdity left for the satirist? 

At the best of times, SNL’s political “commentary” can hardly be described as such, because there is no commentary; it’s merely a regurgitation of the news cycle, reenacted by performers playing dress-up. That empty recycling of content isn’t entirely the fault of the writers; after all, Trump is writing their material for them.

Single-handedly, Trump supports an entire industry; indeed, without his daily dose of deranged word salad, late-night hosts like Seth Meyers and Stephen Colbert would be lost. Hence the meme, “Orange Man Bad,” a phrase that parodies the lazy parroting of Trump’s nonsensical sentences, the lack of insight blending into meaningless noise, as the professionals embrace the fact that they don’t need to try anymore. 

In fact, TikTok users have proved more inventive than television personalities, reimagining Trump’s slurred speeches as drunken nightclub rants, or the stuttering of a medical student trying to explain something they don’t fully understand.  

Other videos remix Trump’s words as an inept doctor’s diagnosis, or a justification for weight gain during quarantine. Cutting and pasting these audio clips into different contexts emphasizes their absurdity; otherwise, it’s easy to become desensitized, to stop hearing them for what they really are. By simply reacting to Trump, replaying his greatest hits without bothering to hit back, SNL is, to some degree, normalizing him.  

Trump has become a character on the show, a regular; even Alec Baldwin’s impression is a mild exaggeration, slightly more oafish, but almost unchanged. As the cast continues to react to his clownish antics, rather than respond, Trump morphs into a lovable buffoon, rather than a dangerous misinformation peddler. 

If SNL and late night hosts really want to satirize Trump, they might want to learn from the surreal, absurdist humor of the internet; otherwise, they’re just broadcasting his message through a softer lens.