Saturday Night Live departed from its usual cold open with a heartfelt message from Pete Davidson about Israel’s war with Hamas.
Davidson opened by discussing the “horrible images” from Israel and Gaza and related it to his own tragedy, of losing his father when he was a child on 9/11 – Davidson’s father, Scott Davidson, was a New York City firefighter who was killed at the World Trade Center.
“I know what you’re thinking, who better to comment on it than Pete Davidson? Well, in a lot of ways, I am a good person to talk about it because when I was seven years old my dad was killed in a terrorist attack. So, I know something about what that’s like.”
He pointed to the “terrible pictures” of children suffering this week and said “no one in this world deserves to suffer like that”.
He said that comedy was the only thing that got him through, reminiscing about listening to Eddie Murphy’s Delirious special, which she tried to take away before realizing it helped him laugh.
“Sometimes comedy is really the only way forward through tragedy,” he added.
Davidson then pivoted in his monologue, talking about incest and Game of Thrones. He said that he was trying to relate to his sister, who assists brain surgery, while he was a drug addict, so they watched the HBO show to spend time with each other.
“I had no idea how sick everyone was. I thought it was like dragons and stuff and magic. Hardly any dragons. Lots of incest. Tons of incest. So much incest. You can leave the house come back incest’s still happening,” he said.
Saturday Night Live wasn’t going to miss the chance to do a Barbie parody.
Given the show has been off the air since the writers strike started at the beginning of May, the season 49 opener was its first chance and Lorne Michaels let Pete Davidson fly.
Davidson mocked himself, particularly his show Bupkis and his legal battles with Kanye West during the pastiche of the Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling-fronted toy adaptation.
“What’s Pete going to do? He only has like one character,” says Punkie Johnson before Andrew Dismukes asks, “Why is he hosting again? He just left and it’s not like his show was a hit.”
