SNL Keeps It Queer with LGBTQ Forum

It hasn’t take long for the folks at Saturday Night Live (SNL) to latch onto the sparkling gem that is the 2020 presidential race. From policies to personalities, and now queer issues, the SNL cast embodies the most eccentric quirks and bends them in a way that is endearingly alarming and sometimes downright eye-rolling.

Not inconsequentially, the team of Season 45 are also addressing queer issues in addition to their general political satire. The best medicine from the damage that was done from the 2016 election truly is laughter, and as LGBTQ folks, we have learned to laugh it off, a lot.

Cast members Chris Redd (Cory Booker), Colin Jost (Pete Buttigieg), Kate McKinnon (Elizabeth Warren), Lin-Manuel Miranda (Julian Castro), and Woody Harrelson (Joe Biden) put on their best impressions as they reenacted moments from the LGBTQ Town Hall.

Here are some of our favorite lines from the episode:

“He may live in the projects, but ladies, he ain’t no project!” said the real-deal, queer icon Billy Porter introducing the first candidate, Cory Booker.

“There’s no wrong way to be gay,” said Jost as Buttigieg, “unless you’re Ellen this week.” He was referencing some recent flack that the mid-day talk show host received after a jovial interaction with President George W. Bush at a sporting event was caught by photographers. Jost presented a Ken-doll like, stiff Buttigieg, poking at the uptight Mayor Pete from Indiana.

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“Y’all know I’m not a lesbian, but all the ingredients are there,” the queer McKinnon said in her husky impression of Warren.

“Oh snap, the library is open and Miss. Thang is about to get reeaaad,” Porter said in preparation of Warren tackling a question about same-gender marriage.

“When people say gay and trans people shouldn’t be included in Civil Rights Act protections, why, I wish their parents used protection,” said McKinnon as she broke in dance.

“As a democrat, I want to apologize for not being gay,” said Miranda as Castro, “but I promise to do better in the future.”

“Let me answer by telling you a false memory,” said Harrelson as Biden, concocting a tale in defense of his vote against banning the military policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

As host Anderson Cooper and Biden close their interaction with a kiss, all jokes aside, it’s nothing less than a spotlight of the progress that queer folks continue to see their stories more commonly reflected in mainstream media.

Through LGBTQ forums and Town Halls presenting questions and challenging candidates in their blatant support for or disregard of this community, and via means of cultural satire like what played out on the October 12 episode of SNL, LGBTQ issues are being discussed and faced head on.

While it may be mind-bending how each of the presidential candidates plan to get to the end-goal of the White House, we can celebrate that they are all after one common goal: getting that seat of United States president away from the Trump administration.

*Feature photo by Mike Coppola/NBC