ABOVE: Watch Bobby Moynihan portray Rob Ford in the opening sketch on SNL.
This post has been updated.
TORONTO — It’s the sketch everyone is talking about — Toronto’s embattled mayor Rob Ford parodied on this week’s Saturday Night Live.
“Saturday Night Live had a field day with the antics of Toronto’s crack-smoking mayor Rob Ford … with Bobby Moynihan pitch perfect as Ford,” declared Radar.
The NBC comedy show, which airs in Canada on Global, opened with a spoof of Ford being interviewed on CBC.
Moynihan, a SNL regular, portrayed the mayor at a press conference cursing at reporters, receiving a crack delivery and dancing with a beer can in his hand before falling onto the podium.
“What do you have to say to the voters after this tumultuous week?,” asked the news anchor (Taran Killam).
“Just that I goofed up, eh,” Ford replied. “My face is as red as a Boxing Day ham.”
Asked if he’s worried about his public image, Ford said: “I feel like my public image is suffering because I don’t have any good photos so every time I’m in the news they show one where I’m all sweaty or red-faced or my neck is missing.”
The show then poked fun at 60 Minutes — which recently aired a bogus account of the Benghazi attack — by showing Ford interviewed by Lara Logan (played by Kate McKinnon) after saying he wanted to go on a show where people would believe everything he said.
Moynihan, as Ford, then delivered SNL‘s famous opening line: “Live from New York, it’s Saturday Night!”
Not everyone saw the humour in the sketch.
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“In a word: Lame. Full of ‘eh’s’ and other Canadian stereotypes. Should have been a killer,” tweeted J. Whitey of Halifax.
“Very sad #toronto – if it wasn’t already clear it is certainly now. The world is not laughing with us but at us,” tweeted Chad Nuttall.
David DeNardis tweeted: “So the mayor is a fat, alcoholic, p**** eating, drunk driving, crack head. What’s funny about that?”
Ford also featured prominently in the Weekend Update segment later in the show.
“This week we finally found out what happens when a Canadian stops being polite and starts getting real,” said Cicely Strong.
ABOVE: Watch Cicely Strong and Seth Myers joke about Rob Ford on Weekend Update.
Seth Meyers mentioned the bobble head dolls Ford sold earlier in the week. “Interesting fact,” he said, “bobble head is one of the side effects of smoking crack.”
On Thursday, Myers poked fun at the mayor during an appearance on Live! with Kelly and Michael.
“I’ve been in drunken stupors,” he joked, “but I’ve never woken up the next day and been like, ‘Oh, I did crack.'”
The creator and executive producer of SNL is Toronto-born Lorne Michaels (who turned 69 during Saturday’s broadcast).
The last political Ford to be skewered on SNL was U.S. president Gerald Ford, who was famously portrayed by Chevy Chase in the mid-‘70s.
Leading up to Saturday’s show, many people opined on Twitter that former SNL star Chris Farley, who died in 1997 of a cocaine overdose, would have been the ideal Ford.
“The fact that Chris Farley is not around to play Toronto’s crack smoking mayor Rob Ford on #SNL is a tragedy,” tweeted Ken Blackenship.
Others suggested a Canadian ex-SNL cast member portray Toronto’s troubled mayor.
“gawd I hope SNL opens with Danny Aykroyd playing Rob Ford,” Chris Finn tweeted.
For the past two weeks, the Ford debacle has provided plenty of fodder for late night TV hosts Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, David Letterman, Jay Leno, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon and Conan O’Brien.
On Friday night, Real Time host Bill Maher brought up Ford’s name during his opening monologue.
Referring to the problem-plagued Obamacare website, Maher said:
“I don’t blame Obama for being fed up. Today he said, ‘I’m taking a page out of Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s playbook.’ He said: ‘This is not my fault, I was in one of my drunken stupors.’”
Maher didn’t stop there.
“This guy Rob Ford — he is a once-in-a-generation train wreck, where every set-up to a joke sounds like the punchline but it’s not. It’s the reality.”
Referring to allegations that have not been proven in court, Maher added: “Toronto City Council yesterday stripped him of his powers — whatever they are besides staying fat while smoking crack — because they found out that he was at a party recently where he did cocaine, vodka, OxyContin and apparently was cavorting with a prostitute.
The Real Time host also brought up the crude references to oral sex Ford made during a scrum outside his office on Nov. 14.
“What an appeal to the female demographic, huh? She’s the soup that feels like a meal.”
Also on Friday, talk show host Arsenio Hall suggested titles for Ford’s new show on Sun TV.
“How about 30 Rocks? How about 2 Broke Crack Pipes? Big Bong Theory? How could they pass this up — How I Met Your Hooker.”
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