Apple+’s Bad Monkey is a breezy South Florida–set crime series that evokes some of the best laid-back ne’er-do-well gumshoes of the past 50 years, particularly Fletch and Jim Rockford. One of the show’s recurring bits centers on the interactions between the irritating yet charming sleuth protagonist, Yancy, played by Vince Vaughn, and his slimy real-estate agent neighbor, played by Alex Moffat.
The role is a familiar turn by the former SNL cast member, who endeared himself during his time at 8H by playing similarly privileged heels like the Guy Who Just Bought a Boat, a wealthy man who uses buzzwords to compensate for his small male organ. Moffat joined SNL in 2016, a heightened era defined by its Trump coverage and celebrity cameos that made it challenging for his more character-driven roles to pop. Still, at his best, Moffat imbued original characters like film critic Terry Fink with strange, lived-in tics and gave each of his impersonations, ranging from Chuck Schumer to Joe Scarborough, its own idiosyncratic bent. His joint appearances as the severely dim-witted Eric Trump alongside Mikey Day’s straitlaced Donald Trump Jr. remain a high-water mark for the show’s Trump material.
Since leaving the show in 2022, Moffat has built on his career as a go-to character actor in a range of projects, from a brief stint as Josh the line cook on The Bear to a Boston-sports talking head on 2023’s 80 for Brady. Last year, he made his debut on Broadway at the Helen Hayes Theatre in The Cottage. In between rehearsals for The Big Gay Jamboree, his latest show on Broadway, Moffat recently reflected on the perks and perils of being typecast as a jerk, as well as his fond memories of being one of SNL’s top utility men over the course of six seasons.
Your role on Bad Monkey immediately made me think of Guy Who Just Bought a Boat from “Weekend Update.” Did you draw on that character as you prepped for this?
I can certainly see the comparison. I mean, I tried to do a little something different with the characters, but if somebody were to compare the two, I wouldn’t fight you on it.
Are you worried about being typecast as a preppy or yuppie type moving forward?
I probably already am — let’s be honest. But no, I like to work. If it just so happens that the character is a little bro-y or preppy or whatever, I’m not necessarily so precious that I go, like, Well, this is sort of in the world of something I already did. I think a lot of times, whatever seems to hit the most that somebody does on SNL tends to be something that they’ve shown a strength for. But look, there’s more to come — I think I play jerks of all stripes and some who are just trying their best but come off to the world as a jerk. I do have fun playing a heel.
You can always point to your role in The Bear as a different kind of person. I was hoping you’d have a bigger role in season two, by the way. They got your character out of there pretty quick!
I think when you smoke meth, you’re not given the luxury of sticking around very long.
Everyone seemingly gets a second chance in that show — except for you. Doesn’t seem fair.
You said it, not me, pal.
One of your definitive SNL characters was Eric Trump, which was both hilarious and a noteworthy example of a popular Trump impression not outsourced to a celebrity. How did you land that part and develop it with Mikey Day without it becoming cameo fodder?
I guess I just called dibs on it before for myself. It’s funny — once I was in the process of possibly getting hired by the show, a friend of mine called me and said, “You know who you kind of look like? Eric Trump. You should work up an impression.” I didn’t have one in time for my screen test, so I didn’t audition with it. But then, once I was hired that first week, I went over to Mikey, and he was like, “Yeah, this is great. Let’s do something.” So we wrote an “Update” that was loosely based on that picture that the three elder Trump kids put out that was like “Millennials for Trump.” It was Ivanka in the front and then the two boys in the back, just looking like, you know, American Psycho–type dudes. And Eric had a look on his face that I based most of the impression on. [Laughs.]
We wrote the “Update.” It went well at the table, but they didn’t pick it because there was a lot of other good stuff. Then Mikey and I were sharing a car back to the studio after shooting the first thing I ever shot on the show, which was a Margot Robbie pre-tape where she plays a librarian who turns into a demon that Bobby Moynihan wrote. We got a call from somebody like, “Hey, we’re gonna plug your impression into this other sketch.” It was a “Family Feud,” the Trump team versus Clinton team, like Republicans versus Democrats.
Larry David was there as Bernie Sanders with Darrell Hammond as Clinton.
Yes. They had Margot do an Ivanka impression, and she said something like, “I wish my brothers were here.” And Kenan’s Steve Harvey goes, “Well, they’re not.” And then we rose up behind her and said, “Yes, we are.” I think that was us calling dibs on those two guys. Getting to do that two-man with Mikey was just about as much fun as it gets.
How did your show audition go?
It took a few tries for me. I first auditioned in 2013 when I was living in Chicago at the iO Theater. It was part of a showcase of about 20 people. I did pretty well, they flew me to New York for meetings and then I went back to Chicago, did a callback showcase, had a pretty good show, but didn’t get it that year. It was one of the early-career things of showing me that truly everything happens in its own time and for a reason, because then I got to do a sketch pilot with a bunch of amazing people and I got to do my first feature film.
The next year, I was living in L.A. I sent in a tape — didn’t hear a peep. The next year, I was also living in L.A. and did a showcase at iO West. They did not hire me from that either. And then the following year, I was back in Chicago for some family stuff. I happened to be in my Chicago agent’s office, and she was like, “Hey, I just heard SNL’s coming to town next week. You want me to try to get you in the showcase at iO?” She reached out to the owner of the theater, who said, “No, they’ve passed on him a few times.” My Chicago agent literally sent the owner of iO flowers — maybe even an Edible Arrangements — and said, “Please, call somebody from the talent department and just ask if they’ll take another look at Alex.” You know who was in that showcase? Sarah Sherman — before she got it, doing her own thing. So, so brilliant. So again, it takes some time for some of us.
Anyway, the next day I was in Chicago, because my sisters and I decided to throw a ten-year celebration-of-life party — it had been ten years since my mom passed at that point. So we threw an anniversary party as an excuse to see all my mom’s old friends. I didn’t have my phone on me all day, and my sister said, “I just got a landline call from your agent. She’s been looking for you.” So I called her back and she said, “Where are you? I’ve been trying to track you down! Lorne wants to have a drink with you.”
So I went into this hotel lobby bar and met Lorne, Steve Higgins, and Erik Kenward. I just sort of chatted with them all, and they were sort of like, “All right. Well, nice to meet you.” [Laughs.] It was that early psycho test that they like to do where it’s like, Is this a decent person? Would we be terrified if we ran into him in the hallway at three in the morning? I evidently passed that test, which was good. I did my screen test a few weeks later and then I got the call from Lorne the next day.
You joined the show weeks before the 2016 election. What was that time like?
That was a pretty heady time. When Chappelle hosted the election episode, I got my first piece on the show as a writer. At the Monday pitch meeting, I said, ”Maybe you’re a guy who has all your buddies over for a poker night, and we’re hanging out. And then it is revealed that you still live at home with your mother, and you still breastfeed.” It got a nice chuckle in the room.
In the evening, I sat with Chappelle for like an hour and a half while he sat there chain-smoking in my office. This guy is a hero to me — one of the all-time greats — and I’m sitting there, and he’s pitching bits about breast milk. He’s got all these incredibly funny ideas, and I’m writing it all down. I remember talking to another writer or producer about incorporating them, and they were like, “Yeah, those are great, but physically, there’s no way to do those things live.” I didn’t even plan to write it because I didn’t know how anything worked. Then at around 2:30 in the morning, a writer named Kristen Bartlett was like, “Hey, have you written your breastfeeding thing?” And I was like, “No? I didn’t know that I’m supposed to.” And she was like, “Well, let’s just bang it out.”
Chappelle threw his own after-after-party. The Roots played, and Lenny Kravitz played drums. I want to say Madonna was there, though I never saw her; I just heard. A Tribe Called Quest was there, and Busta Rhymes got up and did a set. I remember thinking, This will just be every week from now on. Meanwhile, that was the coolest party anybody threw the entire time, and it was like a month into my tenure.
Amazing.
Another vivid memory was when the Cubs won the World Series. I’m from Chicago — born and raised and a lifelong Cubs fan. I can remember Benedict Cumberbatch was the host that week. On Saturday, I was walking out of my quick-change booth and Lorne goes, “Hey, the Cubs are here. You should go say ‘hi.’” I was like, “Come again?” I walked into this room that had these curtains up, and Bill Murray was there on a pitch pipe practicing a barbershop-quartet routine. Thirty seconds later, Dana Carvey walks in — again, one of my all-time comedy heroes. I was like, What is happening in my life right now?
At dress rehearsal that night, as Benedict Cumberbatch was saying good night, he listed off all the Cubs. As he said that, I was standing in the back with the rest of the cast, looking up at everybody. The floodgates open, and I just started to cry. It was a real “pinch me” moment. I was trying to hug people and not show that I was just weeping. Cecily, whom I had known for years from Chicago, noticed what was going on. She goes, “Aw, this is pretty big for you, huh, bud?” Between Cubs and Bill Murray and Dana Carvey and being in my first three months at SNL, I realized I was living a dream.
There’s so many celebrities around, as you note. As a cast member vying for airtime, do you ever think that the show overdid it with, say, having Bill Murray as Steve Bannon? Did it ever feel like it was overshadowing the cast just to get clicks?
I mean, I grew up playing team sports, so I really do tend to think, like, If the team’s winning, we’re all winning. Yeah, maybe it got more clicks that Bill Murray played Steve Bannon or whatever, but then there was more attention on the show period. The fact that I was still getting to do Eric Trump and Joe Scarborough and all these other things? I was pretty well taken care of, and I still got to do a lot of fun stuff. It only brought more attention to the show that I got to be a part of.
Can you take me through the backstory of how you took over playing Joe Biden after Jim Carrey?
If you told 16-year-old Alex that he was going to be taking over a character from Jim Carrey, I would have said you’re crazy. The Jim Carrey thing was always meant to be a temporary thing during the election, and they were looking for somebody to take over next. I had screen-tested as Joe Biden, so they knew that I had an impression ready to go for it. So then I got a phone call from Lorne.
Why didn’t you stick with it longer? Seems like the show never quite got a handle on Biden, given there’s been this rotation of guys playing him.
I think the show decided that James Austin Johnson would be a better Biden, and I think history has proven that to be correct.
Terry Fink, the movie critic, was always an “Update” favorite of mine. Did you already have that character in your back pocket from before SNL?
I did not. The only thing I did from my screen test, for example, that ended up making it on the show was my world-famous Chris Hemsworth impression. So I don’t think much from my quote back pocket ever made it.
How did you develop Terry then?
First of all, I appreciate you bringing Terry up because some of the most fun I got to have in that building was being that lunatic. There’s a fellow who is a movie reviewer in New York who you sometimes see in cabs, and I’ve always gotten a kick out of the guy. I have no idea what made me think, like, Well, what if we took that guy and put him on acid? But I had that thought, and I texted my office mate, Will Stephen, and said, “What about this guy plus acid?” And he said, “Let’s do it.” We just would stay up till the sun came up, just cackling our little buns off, thinking of what that Terry could be doing or thinking of or seeing, and we always had a blast with that guy.
How did you wind up in the “Morning Joe” sketch with Kate McKinnon?
Bryan Tucker, who’s one of the great comedy writers of all time and a good friend, came to me and Kate McKinnon, and showed us a clip from Morning Joe like, “What do you think about playing these two?” We piled into Tucker’s teeny office and watched a few clips of them and wrote our first “Morning Joe.” I don’t think we initially wrote it as a cold open; it was just a regular sketch at the table.
You left the show in 2022 after six seasons. Was that simply a matter of your contract being up?
SNL is still literally the only job I ever wanted in my life, so the fact that I got to do it at all — I still pinch myself. Everybody leaves at some point. There was sort of a mass exodus going on. There’s a right time for everything. The last couple of years, I mean, it was a hard transition for me.
I’ll be honest: I miss the show. Anybody who works on it is going to miss the adrenaline of saying “Live from New York” or getting to do a bit on “Update.” Just getting to do live TV, it feels like being shot out of a cannon. I don’t know where that high comes from again, but getting to do theater and stuff like that since I left is a pretty close approximation.
It sometimes felt like you and Mikey Day were vying for a similar slot on the show. Did it feel that way behind the scenes, or did you see it as you had separate roles?
I’m sure you’ve heard this, if you are familiar with the show, but yeah, we probably had weekly fistfights.
No, I adore the man so much. Once we played the Trump brothers and Duffer brothers, Mike came to me and was like, “Dude, we gotta play every set of brothers we can think of.” There were plenty of brothers. We did Property Brothers, and we did Harry and Will. Maybe someday we’ll do a special of the brothers.
The other thing is that Mikey had been a writer there for a few years by the time I got hired, so I always felt he was like an older brother there who was taking care of me. I felt lucky to hit it off with him right off the bat. My freshman class of Melissa and Mikey and myself all bonded hard. Only later, after my first year, somebody did say that to me, and I was like, “Oh, really? I really didn’t think like we were occupying the same space.”
It’s an election year and you’re in New York. Any chance Eric Trump will pop up this fall?
You never know! It would be fun. Your guess is as good as mine.
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