Saturday Night Live isn’t afraid to make fun of its own. That much proved true during this week’s cold open, in which Kate McKinnon — in the persona of Fox News host Laura Ingraham — took a jab at an SNL regular: Alec Baldwin.
Near the end of the sketch, McKinnon’s Ingraham says, “When we come back, an update from disgraced former actor Alec Baldwin — seen here molesting a young Boy Scout.” Her screen then cuts to a picture of Baldwin and Adam Sandler, which SNL fans would recognize as Baldwin’s Scoutmaster and Sandler’s Canteen Boy from a classic sketch.
The reference to Baldwin comes after his arrest this weekend for allegedly punching a man in New York over a parking spot. Accordingly, Baldwin — who typically impersonates Donald Trump in politically charged SNL segments — was absent from any sketches this week.
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But while referencing Baldwin in the wake of an undoubtedly embarrassing personal incident is arguably a dig, the reference itself clearly had a satiric slant.
Throughout McKinnon’s cold open, she played on the tendency of Fox’s Ingraham (and other conservative political talking heads) to over-dramatize.
For a discussion of the controversy surrounding the current migrant caravan, video examples purporting to show the caravan included a mob of customers storming a shopping center during the holidays, a zombie apocalypse scene from the Brad Pitt film Z Nation and a swarm of fiddler crabs on the beach.
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By having McKinnon’s Ingraham allude to Baldwin as a disgraced former actor accused of molesting a Boy Scout, SNL appears to have been using the sketch to capitalize on certain factions’ talent for hyperbole. Not only is Baldwin a working actor who obviously did not abuse a Boy Scout, after his arrest, he issued a series of tweets in which he accused the media of sensationalizing the incident and denied punching anyone.
1- Normally, I would not comment on something as egregiously misstated as today’s story.
However, the assertion that I punched anyone over a parking spot is false.
I wanted to go on the record stating as much.
I realize that it has become a sport to tag people w as many negative— AlecBaldwin(HABF) (@AlecBaldwin) November 2, 2018
2- negative charges and defaming allegations as possible for the purposes of clickbait entertainment.
Fortunately, no matter how reverberating the echos, it doesn’t make the statements true.
— AlecBaldwin(HABF) (@AlecBaldwin) November 2, 2018
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Although the police have not formally identified the man who Baldwin reportedly punched, Page Six identified him on Saturday as Wojciech Cieszkowski. When asked how he was doing after the altercation, he reportedly told the outlet, “You know, sore, but I’ll be fine. I’m recovering.”
Page Six also reported that Cieszkowski had no visible marks on his face.
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