{"id":349673,"date":"2025-11-02T05:39:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-02T05:39:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/349673\/"},"modified":"2025-11-02T05:39:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-02T05:39:11","slug":"snl-cold-open-spotlights-zohran-mamdani-trump-in-cold-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/349673\/","title":{"rendered":"SNL Cold Open Spotlights Zohran Mamdani, Trump In Cold Open"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThe federal government is still shut down, food stamps are being cut off for millions of Americans<\/a>, the Los Angeles Dodgers are still grinding it out with the Toronto Blue Jays in the World Series<\/a> Game 7 and there are big elections in New York City, Virginia and New Jersey on coming this week. So, of course, tonight\u2019s Saturday Night Live<\/a> opened with a fictional Big Apple Mayoral debate.<\/p>\n

\n\tAs the Kenan Thompson-portrayed New York newsman Errol Louis (\u201cthe least famous person to be impersonated on SNL<\/a>\u201d) spoke truth to aspiring power: \u201cWhy would you want the worst job in the word?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tReturning host Miles Teller<\/a> played ex-Empire State governor and alleged sexual harasser Andrew Cuomo (\u201cI know this city like the back of a women\u2019s back\u201d), and the SNL-fired and later host\u00a0Shane Gillis<\/a> put on the red beret to be low-polling Republican candidate and Guardian Angel CEO Curtis Sliwa. Upping the ante, Ramy Youssef<\/a> showed up as front-runner Zohran Mamdani<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tPitching himself to New Yorkers, Youssef\u2019s much mispronounced Mamdani put in bluntly and smoothly in that TikTok kinda way that has characterized the long-shot race that the Assemblyman is almost certain to win: \u201cOnce you vote for me, you know you\u2019ll feel a little less bad about that chicken and rice shop getting turned into a Sweetgreen, so why don\u2019t you hit me up on the ballot box, girl?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSNL being SNL, even in what was ultimately one of the most topical but forgettable cold opens in ages, cast member James Austin Johnson showed up as Donald Trump<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\n\tSwearing that his go-to bagel order is a \u201cBig Mac with a hole in the middle,\u201d the former New York resident cut to the chase and pronounced \u201cthis election is about housing and taxes, but we all know it\u2019s about me, right?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWhich, almost everything in America is nowadays \u2014 sadly. Then, Johnson\u2019s Trump launched into a bit of Phantom of the Opera, with the mask \u2014 and then thankfully the seemingly shorter than usual cold open was over with the traditional \u201cLive from New York, it\u2019s Saturday night!\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe fourth episode of the Lorne Michaels-created NBC<\/a> late-nighter\u2019s 51st season, SNL tonight sees Teller back as host for a second time. The Top Gun: Maverick and Eternity star is actually the SNL rookie this week compared to musical guest Brandi Carlile<\/a>. Back for a third time as a solo performer, the 11-time Grammy winner also showed up on SNL in April for a stint with Elton John.<\/p>\n

\n\tNext week will see returning Golden Globes<\/a> host Nikki Glaser make her SNL host debut. The November 15 show will have Chad Powers star Glen Powell playing frontman for the first time. As Deadline exclusively reported earlier this week,<\/a> SNL will have a double punch of Thanksgiving and Christmas specials later this year too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The federal government is still shut down, food stamps are being cut off for millions of Americans, the…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":349674,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[46855,69,171,31783,69821,45567,1030,22707,1747,26203,1933,173,67,132,68,25454,5301],"class_list":{"0":"post-349673","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-brandi-carlile","9":"tag-donald-trump","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-golden-globes","12":"tag-michael-che","13":"tag-miles-teller","14":"tag-nbc","15":"tag-ramy-youssef","16":"tag-saturday-night-live","17":"tag-shane-gillis","18":"tag-snl","19":"tag-tv","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-unitedstates","22":"tag-us","23":"tag-world-series","24":"tag-zohran-mamdani"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115478499559347127","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349673","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=349673"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349673\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349674"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349673"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349673"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349673"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}