Brad Pitt portrayed Dr. Anthony Fauci in the second at-home episode of "Saturday Night Live," that featured musical guest Miley Cyrus, an Adam Sandler cameo and plenty of disinfectant jokes.
A bespectacled Pitt, speaking in Fauci's raspy voice, tried to recast false assurances and misstatements pitched by President Donald Trump during the pandemic, for instance when Trump said there'd be a COVID-19 vaccine "relatively soon. "
"Relatively soon is an interesting phrase. Relative to the entire history of earth? Sure, the vaccine is going to come real fast," said Pitt's Fauci, seated at a desk behind a stately bookcase. "But if you were going to tell a friend, 'I'll be over relatively soon' and then showed up a year and a half later, well, your friend may be relatively pissed off."
The episode was the show's second "quarantine edition," with pre-recorded segments at actors' homes delving into the frustrations and touchstones of quarantine life, but, of course, with an SNL twist.
Sandler and Pete Davidson teamed up to mock being cooped up with family for a musical duet called "Stuck In The House," another sketch featured a Zoom version of "Law and Order" and another poked fun at zealous fitness moved online during the pandemic with one boasting of "eating clean" by preparing a "Clorox juice" cleanse.
Cyrus, sitting fireside with a guitar, performed Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here."
Pitt's depiction followed a Fauci interview on CNN when he jokingly said he thought Pitt should portray him when he was asked to chose between Ben Stiller or Pitt. The cold open also featured Trump's far-fetched statements earlier this week about disinfectant and light being studied in the fight against the virus.
"When I hear things like the virus can be cured if everyone takes the Tide Pod Challenge, I'll be there to say, 'Please don't,'" said Pitt's Fauci, before he broke character, took off his wig and paid tribute to Fauci and thanked him.
There also were jabs at Trump's battle with governors in an outdoors segment with Cecily Strong as Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who has blasted Trump's handling of the pandemic. Strong's Whitmer urged continued social distancing.
"We're not out of the woods yet," she said, gesturing to her surroundings. "We never will be. We live in Michigan."
The Grammys’ voting body is more diverse, with 66% new members. What does it mean for the awards?
For years, the Grammy Awards have been criticized over a lack of diversity — artists of color and women left out of top prizes; rap and contemporary R&B stars ignored — a reflection of the Recording Academy's electorate. An evolving voting body, 66% of whom have joined in the last five years, is working to remedy that.
At last year's awards, women dominated the major categories; every televised competitive Grammy went to at least one woman. It stems from a commitment the Recording Academy made five years ago: In 2019, the Academy announced it would add 2,500 women to its voting body by 2025. Under the Grammys' new membership model, the Recording Academy has surpassed that figure ahead of the deadline: More than 3,000 female voting members have been added, it announced Thursday.
"It's definitely something that we're all very proud of," Harvey Mason jr., academy president and CEO, told The Associated Press. "It tells me that we were severely underrepresented in that area."
Reform at the Record Academy dates back to the creation of a task force focused on inclusion and diversity after a previous CEO, Neil Portnow, made comments belittling women at the height of the #MeToo movement.
Since 2019, approximately 8,700 new members have been added to the voting body. In total, there are now more than 16,000 members and more than 13,000 of them are voting members, up from about 14,000 in 2023 (11,000 of which were voting members). In that time, the academy has increased its number of members who identify as people of color by 63%.
"It's not an all-new voting body," Mason assures. "We're very specific and intentional in who we asked to be a part of our academy by listening and learning from different genres and different groups that... Read More