SNL’s ‘Weekend Update’ Takes Aim at Cornell Controversy and Ryan Murphy’s ‘Glee’ Reboot
Michael Che addressed the Cornell sexual assault case before turning to a very different topic: Kam Patterson’s enthusiasm for Ryan Murphy’s planned return to the Glee universe.
Michael Che used Saturday’s edition of Saturday Night Live’s “Weekend Update” to tackle two very different subjects: the controversy surrounding a sexual assault case at Cornell University and Ryan Murphy’s plans to revive Glee.
The Cornell segment began with Che briefly striking a more serious tone. Referring to the sexual assault case, he said, “obviously we don’t want to make light of anything that happened,” before shifting the discussion toward the broader issue of men holding other men accountable.
Che then joked about the difficulty of recognizing when someone who appears to be a decent person may have troubling behavior that others overlook.
“Look, we all have that one friend that seems like a nice guy, but they’re definitely not,” Che said, adding that sometimes people may not be able to prove what they suspect but can still have concerns about someone’s behavior.
The joke took a more personal turn when Che described “weird, privileged Ivy League types” as having questionable behavior.
The camera then moved toward Colin Jost, who sat silently at the desk.
“Is there anything you want to add, Colin?” Che asked.
Jost immediately pushed back on the camera attention.
“Stop cutting to me,” he replied.
The exchange played on the long-running Weekend Update dynamic between Che and Jost, with the joke placing Jost in the middle of Che’s commentary without requiring him to say much.
Kam Patterson Gets Very Excited About ‘Glee’
Later in the segment, the show moved from Cornell to television nostalgia as cast member Kam Patterson joined Che at the “Weekend Update” desk to discuss the planned return of Glee.
The appearance comes after Ryan Murphy revealed that he had recently completed a script for a Glee reboot. The original Fox musical comedy-drama became a major pop-culture phenomenon during its run and launched a number of young performers into stardom.
Patterson presented himself as an enthusiastic Glee fan, expressing interest in questions surrounding characters from the original series. Among the things he wanted to know were whether Rachel was still performing on Broadway and whether Kurt and Blaine were still together.
Che, however, was not convinced that Patterson was actually a devoted Gleek.
“Look, I know you man,” Che told him, suggesting that Patterson did not need to agree to every project pitched by a white writer.
He then imagined how the supposed pitch might have gone, joking that two white writers in suits had approached Patterson with a Glee idea and that Patterson was now attempting to impress everyone by naming characters he had never heard of.
Patterson eventually admitted that Che had a point.
He acknowledged that he had not actually known the names he had just mentioned and said he felt “pretty bad” after realizing he had “just did jazz hands on national television.”
The exchange gave the segment a deliberately awkward punchline, contrasting Patterson’s enthusiastic performance with Che’s increasingly skeptical questioning.
Murphy Has Already Started the ‘Glee’ Revival
The jokes arrive as Murphy has confirmed that the Glee revival is more than just a nostalgic idea at this point. Murphy recently said that he had “just finished” writing a reboot script, although further details about the project’s cast, story and production plans remain limited in the supplied report.
That leaves plenty of unanswered questions about what a new version of Glee would actually look like and whether original characters or performers could return.
For now, Saturday Night Live used the possibility of the reboot as another opportunity to revisit the show’s enormous cultural footprint — while making Patterson’s supposed fandom the punchline.
The two “Weekend Update” segments also demonstrated Che’s familiar approach to topical comedy: begin with a current news story, push into uncomfortable territory, then pivot sharply into entertainment and pop-culture material.
