Stacey McGunnigle as Katie Zacharia in ‘This Hour Has 22 Minutes.’22 MINUTES/Supplied
Katie Zacharia gave her first, shockingly shaky briefing as President Donald Trump’s new press secretary on Tuesday last week – and it turned out to be her last. She was released from her role on Friday.
This Hour Has 22 Minutes, CBC’s long-running satirical comedy series, was in the middle of filming a sketch about Zacharia when the news of her ouster came out.
Stacey McGunnigle, now in her sixth season and the go-to in the cast for MAGA women, was playing the press secretary – and she and co-stars Aba Amuquandoh and Chris Wilson quickly pivoted to incorporate the firing. That night, the sketch was up on social media; by Monday, it had amassed 8.5 million views on Facebook, 4 million on Instagram and 3.4 million on TikTok.
McGunnigle spoke to The Globe and Mail on Monday ahead of the pre-taped sketch’s premiere in front of a live studio audience in Halifax.
The last time I spoke with you was when you were going viral for playing Trump press secretary Karoline Leavitt. That character had a lot of legs, but not so much with Katie Zacharia, eh?
Can you believe it? There was a feeling in the air. I wrote this sketch with Allana Reoch, too, and we were just like, “We don’t have much time with her.” We could feel it.
Walk me through exactly what happened. So you and Allana pitched a sketch on Tuesday?
Zacharia was one of these classic Trump women – it feels like he has a machine they all come out of. So I messaged Allana and was like, “We’ve got to do something.” We watched her press conference on Tuesday and wrote the sketch; Wednesday it was selected; then we shot it on Friday.
And while you were shooting…
It was pretty wild. I was all up in the MAGA glam. We were done my coverage, and we were turned around onto Aba and Chris. In between the shots, Gerry Wilson, in our art department, looked at his phone and he said, “Hey, bud, you’re fired.”
McGunnigle says creating political sketches has been fast-paced, exhilarating work.KC Armstrong/22 MINUTES/Supplied
So what did you do?
Immediately, I’m talking with Chris and Aba and the writers are figuring out how to fix it. We had to incorporate that she’s gone.
Our amazing camera operators were like, “Well, we can flip around. We can get you reacting.” So we improvised Chris checking his phone, kind of like Gerry had, saying, “You’re fired, by the way.” I’m improvising and then we all settled on me going, “That was fast! Thank God!” That got a laugh from the amazing performers sitting with us. It was so fast and quick.
What was the original ending of the sketch going to be?
The original ending was me running off, her saying, “I can’t do this.” And then she screams off camera. So it kind of was emotionally already there.
22 Minutes does put up the pre-filmed sketches on social media before the show airs on CBC – but this was unusually fast.
In all my seasons, we haven’t been able to do something like that. It was pretty exhilarating.
Because the news cycle travels so fast, especially with the Trump administration. We were like, “What will be the next thing this weekend?”
Remind me how the pre-taped sketches work.
We select six sketches. We shoot three on Thursday and three on Friday, typically.
Was it just a fluke that this one was shooting on Friday?
Yeah. If we were faster to set, we probably would have missed the news and we would have already been on to the next sketch.
It’s just one of those moments where you feel very lucky to be working with the most incredible crew and cast that are quick on their feet, that were able to pivot.
This sketch also happened to land on social media in a week when Saturday Night Live was not making a show, so you really were the only sketch with production value about Zacharia losing her job. Is there a sense of competition with SNL?
It’s so exciting that we are in that conversation with SNL. We see it in the comments. It’s so validating to the work that that we’re doing here that people are thinking that there’s a big rivalry.
It’s been a bit of a weak SNL season so far. That’s the general perception, not just mine. Then, obviously Shane Gillis’s monologue about how women dress at the gym – a lot of people were sour about that. I saw you repost the bit from SNL UK’s Ania Magliano mocking him.
SNL UK are really setting the bar. Those Weekend Updates are incredible. It’s really freeing what they get to say. Being in Canada, and witnessing the United States and the administration and what’s going on over there from that slight distance, you feel emboldened to go for it.
Just to go back to your Katie Zacharia – can you tell me a little bit about what you were doing.
With these women, I try to find an essential personality quirk in there, and just like try and get myself in more and more trouble based on that. So, Katie was so ill prepared, so scared, so nervous – it’s about taking that nervousness and really pushing it.
What I enjoyed about the sketch was not just the sketch itself, but that you were now incarnating this other Trump woman. It felt like there was a meta layer, you playing this revolving door of, as you say, MAGA women – first Katherine Levitt, then Natalie Harp, then Katie Zacharia.
There is something satirical about them being the same, having the same look. It says something that it’s just another wig parted on a different side. This is what this administration values and the women are tossed aside when no longer needed.
I want to end by highlighting for readers who don’t watch 22 Minutes that you do Canadian politicians as well such as Danielle Smith and Chrystia Freeland. But my favourite of your new characters this season is Donna Cherry, co-host of Coach’s Corner on the PWHL version of Hockey Night in Canada with Aba’s Rhonda MacLean.
That wig did something to me. I don’t know what happened with me in that wig, but Aba was like, “You are changed.”
The writing for the female version of Don Cherry was really excellent: “12 teams, 300 lesbians… BE A DAMN ALLY!”
That was Dan Dillabough and Ashley Botting, I remember saying to the director, “Okay, well, you know, Don Cherry’s like a big yeller, and this is going to be big and yelly. And if you can find, help me find levels.” And she goes, “I don’t think there there are any. I think you just kind of have to go full tilt, and we’ll pull you back.”
Do you think there’s any chance we might see Donna Cherry and Rhonda MacLean on on the actual PWHL broadcasts?
Listen, we’re manifesting right now. I mean, I would. The PWHL – I love that it’s mainstream. Everyone’s talking about it, and we’re like creating comedy related to it. It’s a thrill.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
This Hour Has 22 Minutes airs Tuesdays at 8:00 p.m. ET (8:30 p.m. NT) on CBC Television and streams on CBC Gem.