Saturday’s cold open on the latest episode of Saturday Night Live saw Kate McKinnon swap her Rudy Giuliani impression for one of a much more trustworthy member of Donald Trump’s orbit: Dr. Anthony Fauci. The sketch detailed the country’s forthcoming vaccine rollout and reflected on the way two administration scientists have been portrayed publicly in a year where the very health of the nation has been severely politicized.
“We’re doing this vaccine World War II style. We made England go in first, see what’s what. Then we swoop in there at the end and steal the spotlight,” Fauci said. “Tom Hanks will make 10 movies about it, and when it’s all over you can kiss any nurse you want.”
The sketch is framed as Fauci and Deborah Birx addressing the public on Wolf Blitzer’s CNN program. Blitzer, describing himself as “an inside man with an outside name,” threw it to the doctors to go through who will get the vaccine based on priority. First would be frontline workers, of course, followed by anyone named “Mildred, Horace, Blanche, Mabel or Walter” according to Birx.
Fauci also had to deal with the adoration of his adoring fans, much to the contrast of Birx, who never quite seemed to live down the press conference earlier in the year where Trump suggested people inject themselves with bleach to cure coronavirus.
“Remember when Trump said to inject bleach and I did a stanky little face?” Birx, played by Heidi Gardner, said. “And I almost whispered ‘no.’”
Fauci, meanwhile, explained that simply being an adult and stating basic medical information clearly has made 2020 a very interesting year for him to say the least.
“Any other year I’m a two,” Fauci said between catching bras apparently thrown by lustful women. “This year, I’m a 10. I don’t know.”
Perhaps the most fitting joke of the sketch is that once the vaccine gets to the majority of Americans, Fauci hopes to go back to being much less of a household name. In a year where many Americans have had to learn plenty about disease and healthcare and preventative hygiene, getting all of this behind us and not having to think about Fauci and Birx as notable figures worth parody is as good a pitch as any for a vaccine rollout.