If you’re “Saturday Night Live” and you need someone to play Alexander Hamilton in an opening sketch about the Founding Fathers, there’s only one person you can turn to: Lin-Manuel Miranda.
And then you make him stand there in silence for most of the sketch.
This weekend’s “S.N.L.” (which featured Timothée Chalamet as both its host and musical guest) seemed like it was going to begin with a sketch about the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Most of the cast was onstage in waistcoats and wigs, with Mikey Day playing John Hancock and Andrew Dismukes as Benjamin Franklin.
“What say you, Alexander Hamilton?” asked Michael Longfellow. And there, in his “Hamilton” garb, was Miranda, the decorated creator and star of that Broadway musical.
“What do I say?” Miranda answered. “I say our lives matter not if we lose them in the cause of liberty. What matters is the nation we build.”
And sure enough, he began to rap.
‘Cause in America, all men are created equal,
America not England; we’re doing the sequel,
And we will have leaders, but know one thing:
In America, we will never have a king.
But then he and the cast members froze in place as James Austin Johnson strode onstage in his recurring role as Donald Trump.
“Never say never,” Johnson said. “Kidding, of course, though in many ways I’m not. I’m in my king era.” And like the Founding Fathers, Johnson said, “I am creating a new country as well. And just like them, we’re doing it very whitely.” He declared that “D.E.I. is over,” adding: “Workplaces must go back to looking like the TV show ‘The Office.’ Mostly white people with one funny Black guy who’s having a really bad time.”
Having returned to the White House, Johnson said that things were largely the same as before except “my new favorite son is Barron.”
“And he is smacking his head on every doorframe,” he said. “Oh, it’s bad. It’s like when Gandalf goes to Bilbo’s house.”
He also praised Elon Musk: “We love Elon,” Johnson said. “But to quote some of his own children, I do not want him in my life.”
“They say he did the Nazi salute,” Johnson continued. “Not true, OK? He simply was creating a new greeting. A cross between hi and hello. We’re calling it a ‘heil.’”
While they were frozen in place, Johnson took potshots at the rest of the “S.N.L.” cast. “Who’s going to play Hegseth?” he asked “I mean look at these guys back here. None of them got the build. Nobody has the jaw. Got plenty of Zuckerberg options though; that’s going to be a fight.”
He also teased Miranda, who he said “wrote a whole rap and he doesn’t get to do it — oh, the audience would have eaten that right up.”
As he concluded, Johnson said thank you for the “generous anonymous $1 million donation to my campaign,” and, turning to Miranda, he said, “I know that was you, Lin.”
Miranda finally came unstuck: “No it was not!” he said.
“Your word against mine,” Johnson replied.
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