Two years ago, Saturday Night Live reimagined Season 2 of The White Lotus as The Black Lotus (“coming to HBO and Starz”). Now they’ve parodied Season 3, and it’s about time, or even past time, what with the finale airing a week ago. James Austin Johnson gets a chance to do more of his excellent impersonation of Donald Trump in The White POTUS, which puts members of the Trump family and administration in the Thai setting of Season 3. He’s joined by other members of the cast doing some good impersonations (Chloe Fineman standing out with her send-up of Parker Posey’s Victoria Ratliff and her Southern accent), and some surprise guests.
It was actually a very well-thought-out sketch that used the economic crisis of America’s isolationist trade war as a substitute for the financial and legal downfall of the Ratliff family in The White Lotus. Instead of popping Lorazepam to block out reality, Donald Trump has a prescription vial full of McDonald’s hashbrowns to pop. Almost directly reflecting Posey’s lines in the show, Fineman (as Melania Trump / Victoria Ratliff) says, “I mean, we are so lucky that America will always be a rich and powerful nation. I mean, can you imagine how awful it would be if America lost all its money and no one in the world respected us anymore?”
Scarlett Johansson returns as Ivanka Trump, who has stayed out of the spotlight during Trump’s 2024 campaign and his current presidency. Fittingly, she takes on the role of Piper, the wealthy Ratliff daughter who seeks to get away from her family, capitalism, and materialism by heading to a monastery. Except, when a monk mentions relinquishing “greed and material possessions,” Ivanka gets up and leaves.
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Returning Cast Members Make ‘The White POTUS’ Even Better
The sketch also brought back former cast members Mikey Day and Alex Moffatt with their beloved impersonations of Don Jr. and Eric Trump, who are substitutes for Saxon and Lochlan Ratliff in the sketch. SNL doesn’t go so far as to imitate the incest storyline between the brothers, but instead has Don Jr. waking up in a haze after sleeping with Tiger Woods (who is dating his ex-wife in real life). Jon Hamm played RFK Jr., who was operating as the Rick character in the sketch, and the trio of gossipy friends consisted of Kristi Noem (Heidi Gardner), Pam Bondi (Ashley Padilla), and Marco Rubio (Marcello Hernández).
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One of the darkest parts of the sketch has Donald Trump, in the Tim Ratliff role, pointing a gun at Uncle Sam and threatening to kill him (and impose 500% tariffs on China). The wonderful former cast member Beck Bennett reprised his funny impersonation of a shirtless Vladimir Putin in the sketch as well. The only real negative aspect of the sketch was a somewhat cruel impersonation of the beautiful Aimee Lou Wood, who was incredible as Chelsea in Season 3 of The White Lotus. See it below for yourself.
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