It seemed, for a while, like Alec Baldwin might be leaving Saturday Night Live and his Donald Trump impression behind. The actor has made his feelings about his recurring role pretty clear, calling it “agony” to play the president, and saying as early as last spring that he was considering putting the role to bed: “I don’t know how much more people can take it,” he said.
Well, it appears they’ll have to find a way—because on Friday, the actor revealed that he will, indeed, don the wig and bronzer next season.
Per Variety, Baldwin revealed his intent to return on S.N.L. historian James Andrew Miller’s podcast, Origins. This past season’s finale seemed to indicate that the sketch show might be letting this version of the president go—but as Baldwin told Miller, “You can’t go far enough with this idiot. You can’t go far enough. You can’t go far enough.”
Making fun of Trump has been good business for Baldwin, who has used his ongoing feud with the president as something of a branding opportunity, razzing Trump at every possible turn. He even wrote a book in the president’s voice. And S.N.L. audiences have lapped it up, sending the venerated sketch show soaring in the ratings—though the numbers have fallen a bit as the Trump administration has worn on. Still, Baldwin has waffled in the past about how much time he wants to commit to impersonating the commander in chief on Saturday nights. And although the bit won the actor an Emmy last year, this year’s gala sent him home empty-handed in favor of Henry Winkler.
Either way, S.N.L. maestro Lorne Michaels is delighted to have Baldwin back when Season 44 premieres next Saturday. As he told Miller, ”I think there is probably no other actor who is looking to take that and follow Alec. And I think for a new cast member to come in and try that would be a really tough thing to do.” Taran Killam had been the sketch show’s resident “Trump” before Baldwin, but the show let him go in August 2016. Darrell Hammond, the show’s previous longtime Trump impersonator, expressed despair last year over having lost the role.
As Michaels told Miller, it’s still not a given that Baldwin will come back each season. “I think with Alec, I’ve known him and worked with him for so long, that needless to say, I trust him,” Michaels said. “And the audience connects to him in that role . . . We see each other a fair amount, so we don’t much talk about it in the off-season . . . But he is somebody you know you can always count on.”
And since Baldwin recently quit that Joker movie, it seems he’ll have plenty of time on his hands anyway.
