“SNL” closed down its Oct. 14 episode with a sketch about how Melania Trump just needs someone to listen.
Host Kumail Nanjiani played a customer service operator who found himself fielding a call from Melania, played by Cecily Strong. And suddenly, he found himself conversing regularly with the First Lady.
“Sometimes they would have a hard time understanding me because of my accent, which would fill them with that red, white, and blue rage I had come to fear,” Nanjiani said, narrating the sketch with voiceover. “Every now and then a customer would be calm and even friendly, and sometimes I would hear a longing in their voice, a longing that they had been trying to satisfy with compulsive online shopping, but ultimately just needed to be heard. That was the case with this woman. I will always remember the first time I ever spoke to her. ‘First and last name, please.’
“Melania Trump,” Strong answered in Melania’s accent.
“Excuse me?” Nanjiani returned.
“Trump, like towers in the sky,” she said.
“Very abruptly she told me about her nightmares,” Nanjiani narrated. “She said she dreamt of a blue-eyed panther drinking at a river, looking up at her, and calmly saying –”
“Be careful what you wish for,” Strong put in.
As the sketch continued, Nanjiani explained how he became Melania’s friend and confidant.
“Over the next few months I became her confidant, dream journal, and one true friend,” Nanjiani explained. “She ordered over $400,000 worth of handbags, and purposely put in the wrong address just so she could call and chat.”
“Oh, did I say Red House?” Strong’s Melania asked. “I meant White House.”
Melania also told Nanjiani that her husband’s conduct was causing her to question whether she was doing enough with her anti-bullying initiative.
“If Donald is bully, and I am married to Donald, am I helping bully?” Melania asked over the phone.
The sketch ended with Melania ending her calls to Nanjiani, who struggled with bullying at work. But in a twist, Strong’s Melania appeared at his office to tell off his tormentors.
“Bully. Bully. Stop that. Bully,” Melania scolded, before thanking Nanjiani for being the only person who listened to her.