Devastating. His career will never recover. Fatal in the eyes of his boss.



These were some of the verdicts last week on Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary. But they were not based on cable news reports or newspaper stories. They were based on Melissa McCarthy.

“You like that, dork?” yelled the actor and comedian, playing Spicer as a scowling, demented bully as she picked up the famed White House lectern and rammed it into reporters in the briefing room. The Saturday Night Live sketch was so funny because it was almost true. Standup comedian Andy Kindler observed: “I think it’s the most brilliant thing I’ve ever seen.”

Donald Trump’s presidency is a galvanising moment not only for protest and journalism but also political satire. From his haze of hair to his erratic tweets to the colourful characters who surround him, Trump is the gift that keeps on giving.

Promotional ads for Britain’s John Oliver, who returns for a new series on Sunday on cable network HBO, depict him cowering behind a desk with the tagline, “Scary times call for a scared man.” Late-night TV hosts Samantha Bee, Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers and Trevor Noah are relishing a White House suddenly swollen with comedy gold. Satire is booming online, from the Onion to countless parody accounts and social media memes.

But it is NBC’s Saturday Night Live – due to be hosted on Saturday by Alec Baldwin, now the definitive Trump impersonator – that has shown how wit can be weaponised. The president watches the show and reveals his thin skin by frequently firing back on Twitter.

Sidney Blumenthal, who was assistant and senior adviser to Bill Clinton when he was president, said: “Saturday Night Live is the vanguard of the opposition party, which is the media. There’s a desperate race for satire to keep in front of the reality, or surreality.”

Spicer is a prime example. The Guardian witnessed up close his first, blistering performance in the White House briefing room, when he ranted false claims about the size of the crowd at Trump’s inauguration and stormed out without taking questions. Much has been written since about his combative style, but it was McCarthy who pinned it wriggling on the wall as only satire can.

The Bridesmaids and Ghostbusters star, in a fittingly ill-fitting suit, captured Spicer’s gum-chewing scorn and penchant for hyperbole about his boss. Describing a recent Trump appearance, she proclaimed: “The crowd greeted him with a standing ovation, which lasted a full 15 minutes. And you can check the tape on that. Everyone was smiling. Everyone was happy. The men all had erections, and every single one of the women was ovulating left and right. And no one, no one was sad. Those are the facts forever.”

McCarthy’s caustic performance has been viewed on YouTube more than 20m times. Spicer himself said she “could dial it back” but Trump remained unusually and ominously silent. Politico reported: “More than being lampooned as a press secretary who makes up facts, it was Spicer’s portrayal by a woman that was most problematic in the president’s eyes, according to sources close to him … ‘Trump doesn’t like his people to look weak,’ added a top Trump donor.”

Every time you look at him, you’ll think of Melissa McCarthy. That he was played by a woman made it even more stunning Frank Luntz on Sean Spicer

Just as British politicians and royals found themselves framed by Spitting Image, and John Major by Steve Bell’s cartoons of him wearing his underpants over his trousers, Spicer may now always be seen through the prism of McCarthy’s caricature.

Frank Luntz, a Republican consultant and pollster, said the impression was “devastating. People who know him and work with him will never see him in the same light again. Every time you look at him, you’ll think of Melissa McCarthy. She looked like him and the fact he was played by a woman made it even more stunning.”

From the other side of the aisle, Bob Shrum, a Democratic consultant and strategist, reached for the same word: “Devastating.” He continued: “Forever after he will be Melissa McCarthy. You watch the daily briefing and you see Melissa McCarthy.”

Other senior Trump aides include Kellyanne Conway, notorious for statements about “alternative facts”, and Steve Bannon, an alleged white nationalist who has spoken admiringly of Darth Vader and Satan and is portrayed on SNL as the Grim Reaper. This week comedian and Trump foe Rosie O’Donnell changed her Twitter profile picture to look like him and offered to play the part.

Shrum said: “There’s so much here to satirise. Imagine trying to do same kind of satire to the same comic effect on the Barack Obama administration. People would laugh but it would not create that indelible impression of the president and those around him. Trump creates the opportunity for satirists that no president has done: not even Nixon.”

He added: “Saturday Night Live is very powerful. It’s become a cultural phenomenon in a way it hasn’t been for years. It’s got a whole art form in taking our politics and showing them through a different lens.”

According to Variety, the show’s ratings have increased by 22%, its strongest start to a season in more than two decades. Launched in 1975, SNL is an American institution with alumni including Dan Aykroyd, John Belushi, Chevy Chase, Will Ferrell, Tina Fey, Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy, Mike Myers, Amy Poehler and Kristen Wiig.

Saturday Night Live is what Roman satirists were in the ancient world. From cycle to cycle to cycle they hit it right Jon Meacham

After lean years it enjoyed a renaissance during last year’s election. Trump himself hosted one episode, drawing protests, but then he was mercilessly lampooned by Baldwin, while Kate McKinnon earned plaudits as Hillary Clinton in memorable spoofs of the presidential debates.

After Trump’s shock victory, McKinnon’s Clinton turned up on the doorstep of an electoral college member, silently working through handwritten cards in a pitch-perfect imitation of the film Love Actually. Baldwin’s Trump was confronted at a press conference by bare-chested Russian president Vladimir Putin brandishing a “Pee Pee Tape” – an example of how satire can cut through the fog of media rumour, denial and innuendo with a simple message.

Jon Meacham, a presidential historian, said: “Saturday Night Live is what the Roman satirists were in the ancient world. From cycle to cycle to cycle they hit it right. Remember Tina Fey as [former vice-presidential candidate] Sarah Palin. Now it looks as though we may be entering a golden age. The Trump presidency is a full employment act for political satire, both professional and amateur. If he passes no other stimulus bill, he has created a lot of work there.”

It is evident from Trump’s tweets that he devours cable TV news: sometimes he responds to an item that appeared minutes earlier on Fox News, or takes a swipe at CNN. He regularly lambasts the “failing” New York Times. But it is clear from his outbursts that, despite the heavy burdens of state, the most powerful man in the world also finds time to monitor Saturday Night Live.

Bill Burton, a former deputy press secretary who has stood at the lectern in the west wing, said: “What’s remarkable about how Saturday Night Live has treated the Trump administration is how the Trump administration has reacted to it. It’s effective in that it’s getting under the skin in a way it shouldn’t be getting under their skin.

“When you’re in the White House, you’re at the absolute pinnacle of global power. So to spend any time at all talking about a Saturday night TV show is remarkable.”

At its best, satire can speak to deeper truths than the news of the day. The Onion, founded by two students in 1988, has seen presidents come and go but never one like this. “Steve Bannon Mixes Discarded Climate Change Report With Saliva To Build Final Wall Of Nest,” read a headline last week, with a picture of an alien-like nest in the White House. Far newer on the scene is “Donaeld The Unready”, a Twitter account that casts the president as a medieval king: “Canute. What a loser. Can’t even hold back the sea. It’s just water. We’re going to be so tough on the sea. Canute was too soft. Sad.”

And when Spicer asserted last week, “I don’t think the president owns a bathrobe. He definitely doesn’t wear one,” pictures of Trump in that garment inevitably raced across social media. Dark humour has also been manifest on many of the placards carried by protesters in Washington and other cities. They have included “#FreeMelania” and “Super Callous Fragile Ego, Trump You Are Atrocious”.

For years, Comedy Central’s The Daily Show with Jon Stewart – a “fake news” show before the term went from benign to malignant – skewered the powerful and punctured the 24-hour news cycle. With spectacularly bad timing, Stewart quit the show soon after Trump launched his election campaign. “America’s id is running for president!” the host declared in June 2015. “Thank you, Donald Trump, for making my last six weeks my best six weeks.”

The court had lost its jester but Stewart was succeeded by South African Trevor Noah, who has compared Trump to African dictators such as Idi Amin and Muammar Gaddafi. The comedy is seldom closer to the bone than when Daily Show correspondent Hasan Minhaj, a Muslim, ponders what Trump’s attitude to the religion means for him. Former Daily Show correspondents Bee, Colbert and Oliver and SNL graduate Meyers have also run riot against the president.

Bee recently announced plans for a Trump-free alternative to this year’s White House correspondents dinner, an annual media gathering attended by the president, officials and celebrities. Whereas Obama proved a gifted speaker with comic timing, Trump’s first dinner is likely to be a more awkward affair. Michael Steele, former chair of the Republican National Committee, said: “That’s a test. When you have your first White House correspondents dinner, you have to make fun of yourself. It’ll be interesting to see how he does.”

Along with the courts, civil society and media, satire is arguably a vital sign of democratic life and a check on authoritarianism. Steele, who was once turned into a Muppet by the Daily Show, said: “There is a long tradition; we get it from our cousins in Great Britain. I learned more about British government members through Monty Python than anything else. In one sense it’s showing respect but in another it’s not showing respect and that’s what makes it work.

“No one is calling for the overthrow of the government but we are getting you to look at your own foibles and showing that we are listening, we are taking you seriously and, when you screw up, we are going to tell you and tell the world.”

Poking fun at presidents … and Palin

Dana Carvey as George Bush and Will Ferrell as George W Bush in an SNL skit from October 2000. Photograph: NBC/NBC via Getty Images

Thomas Jefferson

Under the title “A Philosophic Cock”, America’s third president was depicted in a cartoon as a preening rooster courting a hen, alias Jefferson’s slave Sally Hemings, with whom he fathered a child when she was 17. Political opponents sought to destroy Jefferson’s presidency with accusations of promiscuous behaviour and his ownership of slaves.

Andrew Johnson

Thomas Nast, a German immigrant dubbed the “father of the American cartoon”, supported Abraham Lincoln but opposed Johnson’s Reconstruction policy, depicting him as a brutal autocrat and portraying southerners as ruthlessly exploiting African Americans.

John F Kennedy

Vaughn Meader, a standup comedian, gained instant celebrity in 1962 with his record The First Family, an impeccable voice impression of John F Kennedy and those close to him. But when Kennedy was assassinated, clubs and TV shows canceled Meader’s appearances. He turned to drink and drugs and often referred to 22 November 1963 as “the day I died”.

Gerald Ford

Chevy Chase of Saturday Night Live played Ford as bumbling and prone to falling over. Asked an economics question during a spoof debate, Chase’s Ford replied: “I’m sorry, but I was told there would be no math on the exam.” Comedian Andy Kindler draws a contrast with Trump: “When you go back to Chevy Chase making fun of Gerald Ford falling down, I wasn’t afraid of Gerald Ford blowing the world up.”

George HW Bush

Regularly played by Dana Carvey on Saturday Night Live. Carvey essayed the roles of both Bush and Ross Perot in a three-way debate with Bill Clinton, played by Phil Hartman, in 1992. Bush eventually invited him to the White House. A blogpost on Slate.com in 2015 was headlined: “Why Dana Carvey’s George H.W. Bush Is the Best Impression of All Time.”

George W Bush

His Saturday Night Live persona was created by Will Ferrell. In 2001, the New York Times said: “Mr Ferrell’s George Bush was an inarticulate, squinty-eyed frat boy doing his best to fake his way through final exams.” Ferrell still returns to the role on occasion: last year his Bush trashed Trump.

Sarah Palin

Tina Fey was uncannily accurate as the gaffe-prone Alaska governor who was John McCain’s running mate in 2008. In one Saturday Night Live sketch, Fey’s Palin said: “I can see Russia from my house.” Today many people think Palin herself made the statement and still mock her for it.