SNL’s choice to have Melissa McCarthy impersonate Sean Spicer tied in with this week’s theme on gender performativity. While it may seem that McCarthy was merely impersonating Spicer, I would argue that the level of political subversion surrounding the act makes it more explicitly a drag king performance. As Halberstam says in his chapter on drag kings, “whereas the male impersonator attempts to produce a plausible performance of maleness as the whole of her act, the drag king performs masculinity (often parodically) and makes the exposure of the theatricality of masculinity into the mainstay of her act” (232). It is clear from the video that McCarthy’s take on Spicer is an exaggeration of the press secretary the public is exposed to. The entire
