Pete Davidson has had a long, eventful journey since his debut on Saturday Night Live’s 40th season premiere in 2014. One of the youngest SNL cast members of all time, and the first to be born in the ‘90s, Davidson made a splash at first simply for adding a youthful perspective to the show. Over the past six years he’s quickly become known for his brutal honesty and vulgar sense of humor, often giving his uncensored thoughts on drugs, relationships, and mental health. While he receives plenty of press for his dating life following a whirlwind engagement to Ariana Grande, Davidson is most known for being open about his own mental health issues, speaking candidly about his own borderline personality disorder diagnosis and the wellness check updates he gives on his life in SNL’s Weekend Update. The thin line between his life experiences and his comedy have now resulted in the release of King of Staten Island, a movie loosely based on Davidson’s own life, starring Davidson, and directed by Judd Apatow. In honor of the digital release of King of Staten Island, here are the top 10 SNL sketches featuring Pete Davidson.
WWII Scene
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In the vein of Saturday Night Live’s classic movie parodies, this scene from the fake war movie A Degree of Valor finds soldier Brooklyn (Pete Davidson) mortally wounded as he gives his sergeant (Lin Manuel-Miranda) his final requests. They start normally at first, with wanting him to say goodbye to his grandma but quickly devolve into butt plug and “boogie woogie music” concerns. The humor comes from how deeply silly and specific his requests are, especially for his sarge to get rid of photos he took where he looked “sassy”. The kicker? Lin eulogizing Brooklyn once he finally dies, mid-sassy pose: “He died as he lived: sassy.”
Riverdale
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Riverdale is almost too ripe for parody, but SNL found a pretty funny angle: over-acting. The cast and crew of Riverdale is filming the season finale with Jughead (Beck Bennett), Betty (Halsey), and a corpse played by Lionel Rogers (Pete Davidson). Only problem is, Lionel is playing his corpse way too accurately, employing moans and other bodily noises that a corpse would emit, even thrashing much to the chagrin of the director (Kenan Thompson), but to the surprising delight of Jughead and Betty who appreciate his method acting. Davidson’s uncharacteristically over the top in this sketch and it works very well for him.
GoT Tribute
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Remember when people really liked Game of Thrones? In the midst of the final season, SNL and Pete Davidson crafted a rap tribute to the show… that turned out to be about another show. After being called out by Kenan Thompson and Grey Worm (Jacob Anderson) himself for not knowing anything about the show, Davidson raps about a show he really likes: Grace and Frankie. Cue a litany of very specific references to the show and stars Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin. Even funnier: Davidson enlists DJ Khaled and Paul Rudd to give guest raps about how they’re favorite TV show is… Grace and Frankie of course. The cherry on top is a small cameo appearance from Fonda and Tomlin themselves wearing shirts that say “We love Pete”.
Career Day
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Adam Driver is one of the most surprisingly great SNL hosts in recent history, applying his superior acting skills deftly to the show’s brand of comedy. One of his most iconic sketches, “Career Day”, is a one-on-one between him and Pete Davidson. It’s career day and Mortdecai’s (Pete Davidson) father Abraham H. Parnassus (Adam Driver) is visiting and explains his career to a classroom of teenagers. Parnassus is an oil man, as he would tell you, and he succeeds by “CRUSHING HIS ENEMIES”. Driver succeeds by playing the role completely straight, bringing to life a character straight out of There Will Be Blood, and Davidson cements the sketch by playing the straight man to Driver who can’t help but break as he is described as “weak like H.R. Pickens” and witnesses his father murder a bird while screaming.
Chad & RuPaul
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“Chad” is one of Pete’s signature characters, popping up in numerous sketches since his very first season on the show. One of the biggest highlights of the sketches featuring the monotone, constantly bored bro is the one where he seemingly meets his opposite: RuPaul. During a photo shoot, the drag queen laments that she personifies drag and that there seemingly is no future generation of drag until she is suddenly inspired by one of the crew: Chad, of course. What follows is RuPaul trying her best to craft Chad into the ultimate drag queen despite Chad being hilariously confused and not quite sure what he’s doing at all. RuPaul’s larger than life personality perfectly juxtaposes Chad’s utter cluelessness and delivers plenty of laughs. After doing a very bro-y lip sync, Chad disappoints “Rupal” by saying he doesn’t want to be the world’s greatest drag queen. As Chad walks away awkwardly in heels RuPaul laments: “Some horses were born to run wild.”
Tucci Gang
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Pete Davidson’s pop culture rap songs have become somewhat of another signature of his tenure on the show. Even funnier than the aforementioned Grace and Frankie sketch is his “Tucci Gang” rap. A parody of “Gucci Gang” by Lil Pump, the song is an ode to character actor Stanley Tucci, rapped by Lil Pump (Pete Davidson) and Sam Rockwell. Davidson’s pitch perfect parody goes in-depth into why Stanley Tucci is so great: even though you might just say “that’s the guy from Hunger Games”, he elaborates that he has “mad respect for his range”, “adds value to your flick”, and that “The Devil Wears Prada was sick.” Add some of Rockwell’s signature dance moves and you have a parody that’s very silly yet relatable (who doesn’t love the Tooch?).
Chad Horror Movie
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Chad peaks in this sketch that perfectly uses the character in a hilariously specific and parodic setting. Like the title indicates, Chad is in a horror movie, and he’s acting just like you would expect him to. The masked killer (John Mulaney) calls and asks if he wants to “play a game” and Chad says “no thanks” before quickly hanging up. The masked killer continues to taunt Chad to no avail: when he asks what his greatest fear is, he simply says “dick falls off” and ignores a dead pizza delivery man at his doorstep. Even when giving his speech on why he’s here to kill Chad, Chad can’t help but ignore him to watch Ridiculousness. The zenith of the character of Chad, Pete Davidson has never been funnier as the character.
Pete Davidson & John Mulaney Review The Mule
![Pete Davidson’s friendship with John Mulaney goes back almost two years now. Having met during Mulaney’s first hosting gig in March 2018, they became quick friends and ended up even going to a Steely Dan concert together. Following Pete’s wellness check in December of 2018, Mulaney joined him on Weekend Update to discuss a very important recent experience: the then-recently released Clint Eastwood movie The Mule. Mulaney elaborates that he’s been teaching Davidson how to live a calm, sober life, and Pete of course jokes that “after observing [Mulaney’s] life, [he] publicly threatened suicide.” Following that typically dark Pete joke, Mulaney and Davidson talk ad nauseam about The Mule (The Mule!), a seemingly incredulous movie about Clint Eastwood playing a ninety year old drug trafficker. Davidson and Mulaney are in perfect comic synchronicity as they deliver joke after joke about their fascination with the movie, and it’s a joy to watch.](https://img.youtube.com/vi/X5TEsdb918c/mqdefault.jpg)
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Pete Davidson’s friendship with John Mulaney goes back almost two years now. Having met during Mulaney’s first hosting gig in March 2018, they became quick friends and ended up even going to a Steely Dan concert together. Following Pete’s wellness check in December of 2018, Mulaney joined him on Weekend Update to discuss a very important recent experience: the then-recently released Clint Eastwood movie The Mule. Mulaney elaborates that he’s been teaching Davidson how to live a calm, sober life, and Pete of course jokes that “after observing [Mulaney’s] life, [he] publicly threatened suicide.” Following that typically dark Pete joke, Mulaney and Davidson talk ad nauseam about The Mule (The Mule!), a seemingly incredulous movie about Clint Eastwood playing a ninety year old drug trafficker. Davidson and Mulaney are in perfect comic synchronicity as they deliver joke after joke about their fascination with the movie, and it’s a joy to watch.
Uncle Meme
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John Mulaney’s second SNL hosting gig gave us his best collaboration with Pete Davidson in Uncle Meme. Mulaney plays Davidson’s uncle who grills his nephew at a family gathering after learning he has been making offensive memes of him and posting them on Reddit. The laughs are already there from Mulaney’s ridiculously lame photo of himself, but the kicker is the meme version where it says “When she wanna smash but the pee-pee too small”. As Mulaney goes through all the offensive memes made of him, it’s especially funny watching Davidson try to explain as Mulaney shows him meme after meme, such as one of him as the Joker saying “wanna know how I got these tiny-ass balls?”, culminating with a perfect dig at Green Book. Meme humor is difficult to transfer to sketch comedy but Uncle Meme makes it look effortless.
Stuck In The House
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Much of Pete Davidson’s career has been him emulating his ultimate comedic hero: Adam Sandler. The Sandman did many of the things during his SNL tenure that Davidson does now: write and sing comedic songs, cultivate a youthful persona, and make his mark in feature films. It’s only logical that Pete Davidson’s very best sketch is one he got to do with Sandler himself. In the second episode of Saturday Night Live At Home, Pete debuted a music video about being stuck at home as he practices social distancing. Featuring his real family and creative lyrics that are reminiscent of Sandler’s own parody songs, the sketch becomes an instant classic when Sandler himself shows up to rap about his own quarantine woes, including missing Rob Schneider and dealing with his terrible baking skills. It’s a sketch that’s as funny as it is sweet, with Pete’s mom and Adam’s daughters credited as directors, and it’s a perfect representation of the unique brand of humor that Davidson brings to Saturday Night Live.
