Alec Baldwin As Trump: What Makes Actor's 'Saturday Night Live' Impression So Accurate? [VIDEO]
Alec Baldwin recently revealed what makes his parody of Donald Trump on Saturday Night Live work.
Baldwin has received rave reviews for his performance as the President-elect this year, even winning a Critics' Choice Award for Best Comedy Guest Performance. The actor has played Trump in all but two SNL episodes this fall and he's gotten into the groove of just what makes him tick.
"I see a guy who seems to pause and dig for the more precise and better language he wants to use, and never finds it," Baldwin said in an interview with The New York Times this weekend. "It's the same dish - it's a grilled-cheese sandwich rhetorically over and over again."
Baldwin observed that the most important part of imitating Trump is in the "puffs," the pauses between the president-elect's words.
Much has been made of the media helping to "humanize" Trump, from Jimmy Fallon tousling his hair on his talk show to People's magazine cover, and Baldwin's impression has been included in that. Baldwin spoke on whether he thought that his impression might have been part of this "humanizing," for such a polarizing candidate.
"I do recognize that that is a possibility," Baldwin said. "But I think that now that he is the president, we have an obligation - as we would if it was him or her - to dial it up as much as we can."
The New York Times piece also made note of the similarities Baldwin shares with Trump, from their outspoken beliefs to their frequent Twitter outbursts, and while the actor has gotten in trouble for saying some controversial things in the past, he draws the line there.
"The difference is, with Trump, it's incontrovertible that he has said the things he's said," Baldwin explained. "And he ran on them.''
Saturday Night Live is done for 2016 but it remains to be seen if Baldwin will continue into 2017 as Trump.
