The Best Kate McKinnon Saturday Night Live Transformations

In February 2025, "Saturday Night Live" celebrated its 50th year on air with a pair of specials. A concert at Radio City Music Hall brought back some of the show's most iconic musical guests, while a super-sized Sunday episode allowed former cast members to dust off some old recurring sketches for another go-around. Kate McKinnon was one such star who came back to Studio 8H, treading her old stomping grounds one last time.

When McKinnon left the cast in 2022, she told Vulture that it was tough to say goodbye to her spot on the iconic sketch show. After all, she'd spent a decade appearing on television a few dozen times a year, commenting on the news of the week through a series of recurring political impersonations. She'd also created some iconic recurring characters all on her own, making audiences laugh with her reliably-wacky perspective on the world.

"The only thing that ever made sense to me was doing a funny voice. I have always worked from the sound of a voice, which makes impressions easy, because you just copy what's already there," she told Vulture. That may be the basis of her writing, but McKinnon's transformations often involved more than just doing a silly voice. She was such a gifted cast member because she was able to take just a few pieces of clothing, a wig, and occasionally a prosthetic, and turn them into comedy gold. Here are the best Kate McKinnon "Saturday Night Live" transformations.

The first Donald Trump administration was full of a colorful cast of characters, various politicians, and hangers-on who stepped to the forefront of the news cycle, took their time in the spotlight, and then receded. Remember Jeff Sessions? No? The Southern Senator was selected as Trump's Attorney General, but he was ultimately let go from the position for reasons that may or may not have been related to his willingness to investigate the president for his ties to Russia.

Kate McKinnon played the Senator as a mousy fellow on "Saturday Night Live," donning a sparse grey wig and pushing her ears out. She was a recurring "Weekend Update" guest as the former Attorney General, lampooning his off-putting demeanor and Southern drawl.

McKinnon also took the impression to "Late Night with Seth Meyers" in 2017, breaking down the way she was able to mimic the Attorney General's idiosyncratic manner of speaking. "It began as a joke pitch, and then it just sort of happened," she said. "What I noticed was, he's got this funny little mouth, and I could always do this thing with my lip." She contorted her mouth into a point, which she likened to the mouth of a turtle. McKinnon had developed the lip thing long ago, but she could never find a reason to do it on the show until Sessions. "He popped up into the world," she said, "and I thought, oh my gosh! I'm gonna use it!"

"Saturday Night Live" is, of course, a New York City institution. Several times throughout her career on the show, Kate McKinnon had the opportunity to portray another New York City icon: Rudy Giuliani, the city's former mayor. Of course, McKinnon played the politician far after his heyday, after the dream of becoming president on the wave of how he handled 9/11 had long since faded. During McKinnon's tenure on "Saturday Night Live," his career declined; ultimately, Rudy Giuliani was disbarred and became President Donald Trump's worst lawyer.

McKinnon wore a bald cap for the transformation, mimicking the lawyer's receding hairline. Otherwise, a pair of black-framed glasses were all she needed to complete the look; paired with a bit of wide-eyed mania, McKinnon certainly looked the part.

In an appearance on "Late Night with Seth Meyers" in 2018, McKinnon revealed that she was initially unsure about taking on such a character. When she tried the impression, however, she picked it up quite quickly. "Turns out, it wasn't as hard as I thought, because we have something in common," she said. "Which is, that we both go like this." McKinnon opened her eyes as wide as they went, looking around in something resembling indignant panic — perfectly capturing Giuliani's strange vibe in the latter part of his career. After Meyers joked that Giuliani picked up the strange expression from McKinnon rather than the other way around, she cracked, "I've been doing it a long time."

"Baby" singer Justin Bieber is a somewhat-controversial figure in "Saturday Night Live" lore. He's been the musical guest multiple times, and he even took on double duty in 2013, hosting the show in addition to performing. He's been impersonated on the show by hosts like Miley Cyrus and Jimmy Fallon, but it was Kate McKinnon who played the baby-faced pop star multiple times on the show. It only took a short wig, some temporary arm tattoos, and a leather vest over a hoodie, and McKinnon was a passable replica for the "Sorry" singer.

McKinnon has gotten great feedback from some of the celebrities she's impersonated, but Bieber, it seems, wasn't a fan. In a book called "Live From New York: An Uncensored History Of Saturday Night Live," McKinnon revealed, "Bieber wasn't too upset by my impression of him, but he wasn't pleased." The feeling, it seems, was mutual. Cast member Bill Hader confessed in the same book that Bieber was his least favorite host who'd ever been on the show. "I really didn't enjoy having Justin Bieber around," Hader said. "He's the only one who lived up to the reputation. I think that's the only time I felt that way in eight years."

Things went better, thankfully, when McKinnon reprised her Bieber impression in a series of sketches meant to mimic his Calvin Klein ads. When the sketch aired, Bieber replied on X, "well played. Lol."

If you're crafting an impression for "Saturday Night Live," it helps if your costume is going to do a lot of the heavy lifting. That was the case when Kate McKinnon played Theresa Caputo, best known on television as "The Long Island Medium." McKinnon donned the psychic's giant, poofy hair, her long nails, and her love of plunging necklines in a sketch that spoofed her television show. "One of the problems with being a medium on Long Island is that a lot of people have shared experiences with their loved ones," she joked in character. "Okay, who had the grandfather who choked on a meatball parm? Everybody? Okay."

McKinnon appeared on "Live! with Kelly and Michael" to discuss the impersonation, which Kelly Ripa also attempted. Caputo herself surprised the "Saturday Night Live" star by walking out on stage in the middle of the interview, and she had notes. "All I'm gonna say is Kate, you didn't get the hair high enough, and Kelly, your nails weren't long enough," Caputo cracked. "That's all I'm gonna say! Everything else was perfect."

In all seriousness, Caputo heaped praise on the "SNL" star, especially thanking her for having Daniel Craig play her husband in the sketch. "We loved it," Caputo said. "It was very cute."

Not all of Kate McKinnon's biggest "Saturday Night Live" transformations involved playing real-life celebrities. Occasionally, she created original characters, too. In 2013, when a meteor exploded over Russia, McKinnon debuted a character called Olya Povlatsky on the show's "Weekend Update" segment. Olya was a Russian woman, "hottest in her village," who frequently started off describing something mundane and gradually revealed that her life in Russia was horrifying.

The look was a relatively simple one. McKinnon wore a brown cable-knit sweater and a red head-scarf, often depending on her facial contortions to convey the image of a Russian woman; the simple transformation let her play an exaggerated, probably-outdated version of what Americans imagine life is like for Russian peasants. The character started out as a one-off, but as Russia gradually became more prominent in the American news cycle — thanks, in part, to the election of Donald Trump amid alleged collusion with the superpower — Olya became a recurring presence on the show.

In addition to her fondness for playing men in the political sphere, Kate McKinnon also excelled at crafting memorable old-lady characters. In a recurring segment that re-imagined an awards season roundtable, McKinnon often played an aging character actor named Debette Goldry. While she was often surrounded by ingenues — relatively new up-and-coming stars who were receiving awards attention for whatever was topical at the time — Debette could be relied upon to deliver Old Hollywood anecdotes from underneath a curly wig and from behind a pair of giant glasses that amplified McKinnon's trademark crazy eyes.

"SNL" writer Anna Drezen spoke with Vulture about the character, which she created alongside McKinnon and fellow writer Sudi Green. Drezen noted that Debette first appeared on the show before the #MeToo movement kicked off, but they began to use her as a way to comment on the reckoning that Hollywood was experiencing. "The subtle shift that we made, that we didn't call out in the sketch, was making the game not 'You think you have it bad; I have it worse,' but 'Yes, I agree. Things are terrible. They need to stop marrying us off to chimps,'" Drezen joked. "And the modern actresses say, 'That does not happen.' Debette is trying to be woke, and be a part of the movement, but all of her experiences are not relatable."

Kate McKinnon's best transformations didn't just make the audience laugh. They didn't just make her fellow cast mates laugh, either. Occasionally, when McKinnon really slipped into character — when she really disappeared into a role — she cracked herself up, too.

That was the case in 2020, when she showed up on "Weekend Update" as an original character called Dr. Wayne Wenowdis. She dressed in a lab coat complete with a stethoscope, a clutched a pipe between her fingers, and sported a frizzy wig, looking not unlike Ludwig von Drake, the Disney duck. The character showed up the week after Donald Trump came down with COVID-19; McKinnon envisioned the good doctor as a way to comment on the wacky health updates the country was given as the president, visibly ill, claimed to be totally fine. She broke down the seeming inability of some people in the country to understand disease transmission, joking in a silly accent, "A room have air, right? We know dis. And everybody have a nose, we know dis. Everybody's face, it have a hole. Everybody get the virus, we know dis."

Ultimately, McKinnon couldn't stop giggling. As she attempted to take Colin Jost's blood pressure while laughing and babbling incoherently, he asked, "Kate ... Kate, are you okay?" She couldn't help but chuckle, "I'm obviously not."

Kate McKinnon was one of the few out lesbians to have been a regular cast member on "Saturday Night Live," so it only makes sense that she would be tapped to play one of the most famous lesbians in all of pop culture. We're talking, of course, about her impression of Ellen DeGeneres, whose coming out was a historic moment for Hollywood. All McKinnon needed was a short blonde wig, a sweater over a collared shirt, and a willingness to dance while she spoke.

DeGeneres, it seems, was a fan of McKinnon's work. When the comedian appeared on her show, they talked about all of the studying she did in order to pick up the talk show host's mannerisms. McKinnon revealed that she'd attended the taping of one of DeGeneres' stand-up specials, confessing, "I've since memorized it. So I went back and I watched it, and I made notes on the way that you say all the different letters. And it's the way that you say 'R' that really sunk in." After she captured the "Finding Nemo" star's voice, McKinnon developed a simple catchphrase that she felt would capture her essence: "I'm Ellen!"

"It's really, really funny," DeGeneres gushed. This is also one of the rare impressions that McKinnon reprised off of "SNL." To close out her appearance on "The Ellen Show," she dressed as her counterpart, and they had a dance-off.

In many ways, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a pioneer. One of the first female Supreme Court justices, she fought for reproductive rights and made sure women would be represented in the highest court in the land. As such, she was made into a bit of a pop cultural figurehead, with many court-watchers calling her "the Notorious R.B.G." in an effort to compare her to an effortlessly-cool icon like Biggie Smalls.

Kate McKinnon's recurring appearances as Ginsburg helped cement this image of the judge in the American consciousness. Wearing glasses, earrings, and a wig meant to mimic the justice's look, McKinnon often played her as a woman in on the joke, someone just as likely to get up and dance as she was to go on a rant about the importance of equal rights. After particularly withering pronouncements, she would exclaim, "Gins-burn!"

Ginsburg died in late 2020 after a long, public cancer diagnosis. McKinnon paid tribute in a statement to Entertainment Weekly, reflecting, "For so many of us, Justice Ginsburg was a real-life superhero: a beacon of hope, a warrior for justice, a robed crusader who saved the day time and again." McKinnon said she was honored to have brought the judge to life so many times on television, adding, "Playing her on 'SNL' was a profound joy because I could always feel the overwhelming love and gratitude that the audience had for her."

Kate McKinnon played Senator Lindsey Graham numerous times on "Saturday Night Live," donning what appeared to be prosthetic jowls in order to look like the Southern politician. Graham is a hard-line family-values Republican and McKinnon is, of course, an out lesbian, so the juxtaposition usually led to humorous results that hinged on rumors about Graham's sexuality. (After all, Lindsey Graham once revealed why he never married.)

While Congress worked on confirming Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, for example, McKinnon played Graham as a closeted man who couldn't help but defend Kavanaugh against rumors of sexual impropriety, listing off his own stats as though he were on a certain dating app. During another cold open that took the form of a Tucker Carlson broadcast about President Donald Trump's second impeachment trial, McKinnon portrayed Graham as a man overjoyed by Trump's acquittal. "Tonight, we party!" she droned, mimicking his high-pitched, nasally voice and Southern drawl. Add in some Britney Spears references, some finger-snapping and hip-swishing, and you have quite the portrayal.

The recurring character was a hit with "Saturday Night Live" fans, who praised McKinnon's skewering of the politician. After one appearance, a fan on X asked, "How does Kate McKinnon always get Lindsey Graham's self-loathing despair down cold?"

Toward the end of her time on "Saturday Night Live," Kate McKinnon had developed quite the knack for playing relevant, usually-male political figures. The last few years of her time on the show were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, so it's only natural that McKinnon took a stab at playing Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Fauci was also played in a cameo by Brad Pitt, but when McKinnon took over, she wore a neatly-combed, short, side-part grey wig and wire-frame glasses. Combined with the way she held her mouth, the transformation made her a dead ringer for one of the country's most famous scientists.

McKinnon played Fauci several times on the show. She parodied a press conference where Fauci talked about the widespread end of masking and mocked a holiday message from Fauci about watching out for surges, appearing alongside Aidy Bryant's take on Senator Ted Cruz.

While plenty of political figureheads have been annoyed with their "Saturday Night Live" doppelgänger, Fauci was a fan of McKinnon's take on his persona. "When I'm on 'Saturday Night Live,' it's not good news for the health of the country!" he joked in an appearance on "Late Night With Seth Meyers" in 2021. He added, "[Pitt] did a really good job, but McKinnon was also spectacular. I mean, she's really amazing."