In real life, New York State Assemblyman Harvey Epstein is running for a New York City Council seat. But as “SNL” showed, he’s also running from an unsavory association with two notorious characters who each bear his name.
“Saturday Night Live” picked up on the name game, featuring a sketch with John Mulaney portraying Epstein’s determination to make it clear he’s not those guys: Former film producer Harvey Weinstein, incarcerated on multiple sexual assault convictions, and dead financier Jeffrey Epstein, who allegedly died by suicide after a sprawling sex scandal involving minors.
That’s a lot to avoid reminding people of if you have a name that happens to mash up the names of these notorious power brokers. In the “SNL” sketch, Mulaney as Epstein says, “Listen, is my name ideal? Of course not. You think I don’t know that?” He adds, “Harvey’ I can almost handle – but ‘Epstein’? This thing is an albatross.”
Later, Mulaney addresses a gathering with mugshots of Harvey Weinstein and Jeffrey Epstein that read “Not Me” and “Different Guy,” respectively.
“And they certainly didn’t combine to form one person and make me,” Mulaney’s Epstein says.
The “SNL” version of Harvey Epstein stresses that he “loves your children. Not in a creepy way.”
Fortunately, the real-life Harvey Epstein is taking the parody with good humor and grace. Epstein, 57, claims he’s a regular “SNL” viewer and was watching Saturday when his name was mentioned.
“It was a total surprise. Imagine if you were watching SNL and there was a parody about you,” he told The New York Post on Sunday morning.
Epstein termed the bit “hilarious,” down to Mulaney capturing how the real Epstein wears earrings and is bald.
“John Mulaney was funny. It was a fun parody. It was ironic and sarcastic — the skit hit all the right points,” he said. (We’ll forgive Epstein for using the term “skit,” an odious term to comedy nerds.)
On X, Epstein used the attention to ask for support for a charity dedicated to survivors.
He also agreed with the faux Epstein of the sketch, tweeting, “I agree with John @mulaney… let’s not call it Epstein’s Island,” a reference to the notorious island where Epstein allegedly took a wide range of celebrities and sexually trafficked young women.
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