The Morning Show Nobody Deserves

It’s from a few weeks back, but I keep returning to it—the Saturday Night Live sketch where Kanye West and Kim Kardashian get their own early-morning talk show. The premise alone is already too good: Kanye’s messianic self-regard crammed into the cheerful, coffee-and-couch format of morning television, Kim doing her effortless nothing-performance alongside him, and then a genuinely unexpected celebrity guest walking through the door with just the right amount of confusion on their face. I’ve watched it about five times and it lands every single time.

The reason it works is that it doesn’t really exaggerate anything—it just recontextualizes. Kanye is exactly as Kanye in the sketch as he is in real life; the format just makes it impossible to look away from. Morning TV runs on performed warmth and accessible enthusiasm, and there’s no register further from his actual public persona than that. The show parodies both of them without being mean-spirited, which is the harder trick. Kim in particular gets something close to a fair portrayal—someone who exists in rooms and situations that don’t quite match her, floating through them with complete composure.

Hi guuuys.