One of Saturday Night Live UK‘s biggest early fans just might reside at 1600 Penn.
On Sunday morning, some 17 hours after SNL UK premiered across the pond on Sky One, President Donald Trump shared on social media a chunk of the sketch comedy series’ very first Cold Open—one that painted him as a “scary, scary, wonderful” world leader.
Trump in sharing the the clip offered no commentary or editorializing. But seeing as he is fantastically quick to gripe about anything and everything (especially when it comes to SNL and late-night TV as a whole), one could thus surmise he was in favor of the portrayal.
The premise for SNL UK‘s first sketch: British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (played by cast member George Fouracres) was dreading making a phone call to Trump, to say that England will not be helping clear the Strait of Hormuz that’s choking the global oil supply and in turn jacking up gas prices.
“What if Donald shouts at me?” Starmer fretted to Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy (Hammed Animashaun).
Starmer forged ahead with the call, only to quickly wilt and hang up upon hearing Trump answer.
“Oh, sod that scary, scary wonderful president,” the PM grumbled. “Why is he so difficult to talk to?”
“I just want to keep him happy, Lammy,” Starmer explained to the Deputy PM. “You don’t understand him like I do. I can change him.”
Lammy, though, opined that President Trump would beg to differ.
Emboldened by the counsel of a Gen Z adviser (Jack Shep), Starmer opted to dodge a direct confrontation and instead send President Trump a voice note.
In said message, Starmer recounted for Trump England’s past successful collaborations with the United States—including D-Day and (the first week of) the war with Iraq—but said that this time, his country needed to sit on the sidelines.
“Remember the [episode of Friends] where Ross and Rachel were on a break?” asked Starmer amidst a series of memories about the must-see NBC sitcom. “I think perhaps that’s what we need. Not forever, just until you’ve got all this war out of your system.
“Listen, we want different things,” the British PM explained. “I know how badly you want to start World War III, and that’s great. You should absolutely do that. But we can’t be a part of it.
“You can, however, use [our] naval bases whenever you want,” Starmer sheepishly added.
Watch the full Cold Open above.
President Trump, however, did not share SNL UK‘s first “Weekend Update,” which opened with a nod to his and Prince Andrew’s associations with the late Jeffrey Epstein (“Coming up tonight, pedophilia! But first, war!”) and included a joke about Prime Minister Starmer giving Trump consent to use British naval bases. “Update” co-anchor Ania Magliano quipped that Trump’s response was, “Consent? Now you’ve taken all the fun out of it.”
The Saturday Night Live UK premiere will stream Stateside on Peacock Sunday at 9 p.m. ET.
“war wItH Iraq” or the ‘invasion of Iraq’?