One year ago in the 10th episode of Season 48, SNL dropped this “Miss Universe” sketch. It was written by Mike DiCenzo, Chloe Fineman, Heidi Gardner, Jake Nordwind, Ceara O’Sullivan and it’s as fun as it is crazy. There are a few lines that are far better than you’d expect, like Kenan’s opening, “One of several shows still on the air where we rank women,” followed immediately by a joke that no one got that caused Kenan to break for a second. “But it’s not what you think, we do it based off of looks.” I still don’t get what the inferred premise was, but anytime Kenan reacts like that, you know it probably killed in rehearsal and he’s stunned at the crickets in the live show.
There’s a lot to like about this sketch. It opens with an interstitial poking fun at 80 For Brady – “Finally, a movie for your mom your mom won’t like.” Few topics cross tribal boundaries and bring disparate elements of society together more than a universal, treasured, hatred of Tom Brady.
Aubrey Plaza’s understated physical comedy was on point throughout the whole sketch, and she finished with a great “don’t take the vaccine” button. The sketch featured a bonkers-deep Nip/Tuck reference, there was universal, crazy buy-in energy by the players, and Tony Hawk himself low-key stole the show. Comedy is hard, and you never know what will work, so the writers threw everything at the wall to see what would stick.
If you haven’t seen the original that it was based on, here’s footage from the real Miss Universe competition.
Why, pray tell, is everyone yelling?
No one knows.
But in the course of doing it justice, featured player Molly Kearney, in their rookie season, seemed to go off book. For the life of me, I cannot understand why Miss Denmark was somehow also a soldier, and it’s an obscure enough detail in a sketch where beautiful and dangerous Aubrey Plaza is screaming Fraaaaaance over and over again that the reasons seem to be lost in the sands of time.
I don’t know why they salute. I don’t know if the real Miss Denmark was a soldier, but I’m still here for it a year later. It’s weird and crazy and in a sketch full of randomness, it worked.
