Colin Jost’s Saturday Night Live tenure has mostly been known for his work on Weekend Update and his work behind the scenes as a writer, but thanks to his impression of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, that’s starting to change. The comedian made yet another appearance as the embattled official on this week’s show, and after another charismatic performance, a lot of us are starting to come to the same conclusion: he needs to appear in more sketches.
The sketch in question was the Cold Open, and it was structured like a press conference. Jost’s Hegseth gave a little opening speech and then answered questions from the press for most of the runtime. As usual, he talked fast, was endlessly combative and gave off the frat house energy we were all looking for before turning it over to James Austin Johnson to do his terrific Trump impression. You can watch the madness below…
You can tell how much trust Loren Michaels and company have in Jost because of the format of the sketch. When SNL doesn’t feel great about an impression or is worried that the person doing the impression won’t be able to pull it off, they always hide it by giving other people more lines and only cut to the impression for the occasional zinger. It’s the show’s way of giving the audience a topical impersonation of someone famous but not letting it get old. The idea is to get in, show they can do it and then bail before anyone realizes it’s not that good.
That’s not the case with Jost’s Hegseth. This sketch was clearly built as a vehicle for him to show off how good he’s gotten at playing the Secretary. After watching the bit, you can see why too. Apart from approximately 3 seconds where it seems like he might break character, he’s completely in control the whole time, delivering really fast and emotionally aggressive dialogue without ever seeming clunky or in over his head.
It naturally begs the question why he doesn't do this more often. That’s not to say Jost never appears in non-Weekend Update sketches, but during his two decade or so tenure with the show, those appearances have been extremely rare. Sometimes they’ve needed a random white guy to portray a famous person in a sketch when other cast members are committed elsewhere. Sometimes it’s been to poke fun at his personal life or his ill-fated ferry boat purchase. Lately, it’s been the occasional appearance as Pete Hegseth.
Mostly, though, he’s only appeared in front of the camera for Weekend Update. Until this season, fans widely assumed that just wasn’t in his skill set, but after showing how good he’s been as Hegsweth, X and other social media platforms are starting to blow up with fans calling for him to be a more regular presence in random sketches. I couldn’t agree more. Sure, he doesn’t have the zany energy or the range most improv players turned cast members have, but that only makes him stand out as a nice contrast. It would be a joy to see him in one or two non-Update sketches every week moving forward.
I probably wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for that to happen though. Most of the stories about Jost the last few years have been rumors claiming he might leave the show. He stepped down as head writer, and there were a lot of whispers he might depart this summer. He eventually returned alongside longtime co-anchor Michael Che. There are already questions swirling about next year.
Personally, I’ll be happy to have him as long as he’s willing to do the show. If he can work in at least a few more non-Weekend Update sketches along the way, I’d consider that a huge bonus.
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