Myers as Musk on SNL.
Photo: Will Heath/NBC via Getty Images
James Austin Johnson wasn’t sure he was going to play Donald Trump during the lead-up to the 2024 election. He knew there would be a lot of eyeballs on those episodes; it was Saturday Night Live’s 50th season, and there were plans to bring in stars to portray the key political players. So when it became clear that Johnson was being tapped for the gig, he felt the pressure. “I’m standing with giants,” the comedian recalls thinking on this week’s episode of Good One. What he never would have predicted is that he would be asked by one of those giants to help with their impression.
“One morning, I was walking into work and I got a call from an unknown number,” Johnson remembers. “I answered it, and it was Mike Myers.” The SNL alum reached out to ask Johnson how he did his version of Elon Musk because Myers was slated to impersonate the Trump-allied megabillionaire that night on the show. By this point, Johnson was used to helping cast members with impressions, but Myers was a different story. Johnson couldn’t believe he was doing this “goofy South African Bond villain to Dr. Evil.”
Johnson’s Musk is his version of a bad South African accent. “It’s British, but it’s also Arnold [Schwarzenegger],” he says. And while Myers did not do what Johnson did, Johnson hopes a little bit of his take helped unlock Myers’s own instincts. To hear what that exchange sounded like, watch a clip from the episode below. You may learn how to impersonate Musk yourself. It’s an impression worth … one million dollars.
Related
