Let’s face it, “Saturday Night Live” nailed it when they chose Alec Baldwin to play Donald Trump on the show, but they missed the mark casting Jim Carrey as Joe Biden. Carrey’s Biden was all-over-the-map, sometimes he was a doddering old man, other times he bounced around, making finger guns and acting like a 1930’s brawler.
This season, Carrey was replaced by cast member Alex Moffat and the results, so far, haven’t been very memorable. In the past, Jason Sudeikis, Woody Harrelson, John Mulaney, and Kevin Nealon have all taken a shot at playing Biden on “SNL.”
He also famously played the Church Lady and Garth on “Wayne’s World.”
“Folks, c’mon. Folks, let’s get real here. You know, we’ve got to do the thing,” Carvey said while squinting his eyes. “We did with Barack, we did the deal. And, you know, my dad, you know, lost his job in Scranton. No joke! No joke, I’m not being a wise guy here. I said, ‘Pops, why did you lose it?’ He said, ‘Joe, I did.’ My mom said, ‘That’s the cookie that crumbles.” People contain multitudes, so the best impersonators seem to focus on one aspect of their subject’s personality. Carvey’s approach is similar to the one taken by master Trump impersonator James Austin Johnson, who focuses on Trump’s behavior at rallies. His initial attempts at impersonating Trump targeted his bigotry, but he soon realized that that’s more bothersome than funny to most. Carvey also did his Dr. Anthony Fauci impersonation on the episode. To Carvey, Fauci comes off as “kind of a tough guy.” Here, he imagines what a conversation between Fauci and Paul McCartney would sound like.
