A week after Morgan Wallen caused a stir with an awkward, abrupt exit from Studio 8H at the end of Saturday Night Live, the NBC sketch-comedy show mocked the country singer’s antics in its April 5 episode.
In case you missed it, Wallen started striding off set before the end credits started rolling during SNL’s March 29 taping. He later posted a photo of a private plane and the caption “Get me to God’s country” (and then capitalized on the controversy with merchandise).
In the cold open of this Saturday’s episode, James Austin Johnson quoted Wallen as his Donald Trump character announced his tariffs. “I even put tariffs on an island uninhabited by humans. It’s called Heard and McDonald Island,” Johnson’s Trump said. “McDonald Island. I’d love to visit there, right? McDonald Island. Can you imagine that? A Big Mac and a hula skirt, oh la la … Get me to God’s country, right? Remember that? Wow.”
And during Saturday’s “Weekend Update” sketch, Colin Jost referenced the Wallen flap — again, during a discussion of Trump’s tariffs. “This was the worst week for the stock market since the summer of 2020. But you have to remember — back then, the president was also Trump,” Jost said. “Just in the past two days, investors have lost over $6 trillion. Money is leaving the stock market faster than Morgan Wallen at goodnights.”
Last week, SNL cast member Kenan Thompson told Entertainment Weekly he “definitely saw” Wallen bounce. “I don’t know what goes through people’s minds when they decide to do stuff like that,” he said. “I don’t know if he understood the assignment or not, or if he was really feeling a certain kind of way. … You see somebody before you get a chance to say hi or say good job or anything like that, they just dipping. I thought maybe he had to go to the potty or something.”
Thompson added: “Seems like a complicated individual, I guess. … It just felt so abrupt. And it was already such a small grouping on the stage anyway. So it was just like, oh wow, that was pretty visible.”
Saturday Night Live, Saturdays, 11:30/10:30c, NBC
