Here are the funniest moments from the actress’ first time at Studio 8H.
Claire Foy is having a good year.
She won an Emmy and a SAG award for her performance as Queen Elizabeth II in The Crown, she got married to Ryan Gosling in First Man and she’s currently headlining her very own action movie, sitting astride Swedish anti-heroine Lisbeth Salander’s motorcycle in The Girl in the Spider’s Web.
Being asked to host Saturday Night Live is the cherry on top of that particular cake. And Foy did not disappoint. From the second her dry and acerbic monologue kicked off – “It’s such an honour to be here hosting Saturday Night Live, or as we call it in England: Sunday morning” – Foy looked like she was having the most spectacular fun.
In sketch after sketch, she skewered Netflix’s rapacious appetite for content, poked fun at her own performance as the Queen, suggesting that the next reboot on Netflix could be Saved by the Crown, in which the Queen goes back to school, and demonstrated an ear for quite a few different American accents.
Here were her funniest moments from the episode:
As a school-aged Queen Elizabeth in Saved by the Crown
Foy’s most famous role might have been on Netflix, but she wasn’t against having some laughs at the streaming giant’s expense in a faux-Netflix commercial aired during the episode: the commercial joked that in 2019 Netflix was going to produce “every show in the world”, ensuring that by the time you scroll through the end of their menu, new shows will have been produced so that you never have to leave the app.
Foy appeared in the advertisement in a snippet from a ‘forthcoming’ Netflix show Saved by the Crown. “We love Claire Foy as Queen Elizabeth so much, we’re sending her back to high school,” the advertisement said.
Enter Foy in tiny little tiara and hot pink sash, leaning despondently against a bank of school lockers. “I’m in over my crown,” she sighs.
As a wife sending mysterious letters to her husband on the front in World War I
Foy stars in this two-hander (with a little cameo from Kenan Thompson) with SNL castmember Mikey Day who plays James, a man deployed in the trenches of WWI receiving cryptic letters from his wife Margaret back on the homefront.
At first, Margaret’s short-winded responses seem absent-minded. (“Sounds dreadful,” Foy writes. “Love, Margaret.”) Then, as the sketch progresses, things take a turn for the ridiculous. James’ exhortations for more details are met with more of Margaret’s succinct missives, as well as some downright bizarre responses, including sending a baby photograph to her husband and suggesting that he “enjoy it in private”, and the appearance of Thompson as a mysterious interloper into the marriage.
The sketch descends into madness at the end, with Margaret on trial for murder and then, finally, enlisting into the German army. Foy’s delivery is pure Rosamund Pike in Gone Girl: chilling, sociopathic and completely insane. Iconic.
As the co-host of a talk show for Staten Island mistresses
The best sketches on SNL know that the devil is all in the details, which is what makes this segment, titled ‘Good Morning Goomah’, really sing. Foy and SNL’s Kate McKinnon star as the two co-hosts of a morning show filmed out of the lounge room of two Staten Island Mistresses.
“I’m Gina Barbarosa,” McKinnon says.
“And I’m… Waiting for him to call,” Foy cackles, Staten Island accent on point. (Think: Margot Robbie in The Wolf of Wall Street levels of good.)
Lips pursed, nails fake and in an almighty amount of leopard print, Foy and McKinnon crack joke after joke about mistress life, all while the real world tries to interrupt the talk show in the form of disgruntled wives banging on the door and one of the boyfriends – Pete Davidson in a terrifying receding hairline wig – barging in during filming.
“Remember, wait it out,” McKinnon says, by way of a sign off.
“He’s only with her for the kids,” Foy smiles.
As a home shopping network doyenne with shades of Reese Witherspoon
In a lurid fuschia shift dress, hair teased to high heaven, Foy is Becky, a co-host on the Home Shopping Network. The guest that week is Cecily Strong’s Tamara, a woman who wants to shill her Teeny Adorables, miniature ceramics the size of grains of rice. Ultimately, Tamara discovers that she left her entire 800-strong cache of Teeny Adorables in an Uber and has a complete mental breakdown on-air.
But it’s Foy and her Reese Witherspoon-esque Southern accent that steals the show in this sketch. “Stay tuned right here to HSN, the Homosexual Shopping Network,” Foy says, flipping her hair.
“No, it’s Home Shopping Network,” co-host Thompson replies.
“Is it?” Foy responds. “Okay, if you say so.”
We already know that Foy is great at the dramatic roles, but someone book her in a Paul Feig or Amy Schumer joint right now. Judging by this episode of Saturday Night Live, the woman has serious comedic chops.
Images: Getty
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