For example, Thompson said, “When you ask your mother what she wants to do for Mother’s Day and she says — ”
Fey: “Just to relax in the backyard, maybe a massage.”
Thompson: “What she’s actually asking is —”
Poehler: “How does one buy weed?”
Or, Thompson said, “When your mother sees what you’re wearing and says — ”
Poehler: “Oh, I like that shirt.”
Thompson: “What she’s trying to say is —”
Fey: “Oh, I think I bought you that shirt.”
In other examples, “You look tired” means “You look bad”; “Can we just not talk about politics?” means “Please don’t ruin Joe Biden for me — he’s what I picture”; and “Son, you know I love you just the way you are” means “I am bored of waiting for you to tell me you’re gay — just do it so I can buy rainbow stuff.”
Fey and Poehler offered examples of regional mom-isms from Philadelphia and Boston, and Thompson said that, to a British mother, “splendid” translates as, “I’m sad. I’m happy. How are you? You embarrass me. I’m crazy. You’re drunk.”
Thompson added, “‘Splendid’ is sort of our ‘aloha.’”
Cold Open of the Week
The bipartisan, politics-free tone that buoyed last week’s Adam Sandler-hosted episode of “SNL” lasted exactly zero seconds into this week, which began with a “Meet the Press” parody featuring Sens. Mitch McConnell (Beck Bennett), Susan Collins (Cecily Strong) and Lindsey Graham (Kate McKinnon) fielding questions from the moderator, Chuck Todd (Kyle Mooney), asking what it would take at this point for President Donald Trump to lose their support.
Posing a hypothetical example, Mooney said, “Robert Mueller testifies before Congress and says he believes Trump committed obstruction of justice.”
McKinnon answered, “The best way to uphold the law is to be above it.”
Another hypothetical from Mooney: “He said Trump colluded with the Russians.”
Strong replied, “I’d have to write a strong worded email and send it straight to my drafts folder.”
And what if the president were to adopt an even more rigid stance against abortion?
Strong answered, “That’d be the most outrageous, ridiculous thing that I’d ever end up definitely voting for.”
Classic Cinema of the Week
A scene from a fictional 1953 movie was really just an excuse for Thompson and McKinnon to chew up the scenery in the guises of two Golden Age movie stars who each had it written into their contracts that they had to receive the last word in all of their scenes. The absurd scenario led to comically awkward exchanges like this one:
Thompson: “I’d better call my lawyer.”
McKinnon: “And your lawyer better call his lawyer.”
Thompson: “Too many lawyers, that makes lawyer soup.”
McKinnon: “Lawyer, lawyer, pants on foyer.”
A special shout-out to the enduring “Saturday Night Live” MVP Kenan Thompson, who made the most of his role as an oblivious PBS host named Reese De’What.
‘Weekend Update’ Jokes of the Week
At the “Weekend Update” desk, anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che riffed on a recent investigation in The New York Times that showed the staggering financial losses of Trump’s businesses in the 1980s and ’90s.
Jost said:
“Well, guys, it turns out that Donald Trump may not be the financial genius that no one ever really thought he was. According to tax documents from 1985 to 1994, Trump appears to have lost ‘more money than any other American taxpayer.’ And I love that during that period, when he was losing $1 billion, he had the audacity to write a book about how great he was at business. It’s like if right now if R. Kelly wrote a book on baby-sitting. But somehow there are still Trump supporters who are trying to spin this as a good thing. Look at this clip from ‘Fox & Friends.’ [plays a clip of the “Fox & Friends” co-host Ainsley Earhardt saying, ‘It’s pretty impressive, all the things that he’s done in his life. It’s beyond what most of us could ever achieve.’] Come on, blonde lady, even you don’t believe that. You said the last part into your hand. It would be like if I said, ‘Oh, Donald Trump, he’s just such a [into hand] hard-working president.’
Che:
“President Trump’s tax documents also showed that his airline — which I didn’t know anything about — launched in 1989 and lost $7 million a month, until it shut down in 1992. And just to give you an idea of how bad his airline was, it lasted 33 years less than Spirit.”
Pete Davidson Routine of the Week
Speaking from the “Weekend Update” desk, Pete Davidson expressed gratitude to his mother, saying, “This year, she’s not just my mom. She’s also my roommate.” Davidson explained that he and his mother live together, adding, “I know what people think: They see you on TV and magazines and stuff and they think, ‘Wow. That guy must have his own place.’ Nope. But, it’s not like I moved into her house. I just bought a house with my mom. Like a winner.”
Davidson said his 21-year-old sister, Casey, also lives with them, making for awkward situations. “I’ll see a strange dude in the house,” he said, “and I don’t know if he’s some dirt bag preying on my sister or the saint who’s going to take my mom off my hands.”
Davidson then brought out his mother, Amy (who wore a pink sweatshirt with caricatures of herself and Pete). When Jost asked if they had plans for Mother’s Day, Davidson replied, “What do you mean? I put her on TV. This is it. You don’t know. Jon Hamm could be single and watching.”
Amy Davidson said, “I’d also settle for James Spader.”
Pete Davidson responded, “You’d settle for a Ninja Turtle. I just need a dad.”
(Sorry, Ninja Turtles: After the show, it turned out, Amy Davidson got her first choice.)
‘Game of Thrones’-Inspired Sketch of the Week
Like just about everyone with a Twitter account, “Saturday Night Live” sought to spin comedy from a recent “Game of Thrones” episode in which a modern-day coffee cup made an accidental appearance on the HBO fantasy series.
The result on “SNL” was a fictional Turner Classic Movies program called “Wait a Second, That Shouldn’t Be There!”, in which the host (Kyle Mooney) led us through other would-be anachronisms in TV shows and movies: a scene from the 2016 remake of “Roots” performed by Kenan Thompson (standing near a case of White Castle hamburgers) and Ego Nwodim (drinking a 7-Eleven Big Gulp); or a clip from “Shakespeare in Love” in which McKinnon disrobes to reveal a Tasmanian Devil “Thug Life” tattoo on her back.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.