Quinta Brunson called for better pay for teachers in her SNL monologue

Quinta Brunson hosted Saturday Night Live last weekend. She was great and for the most part, they gave her good material to work with, so it made for a good show. While Quinta was not in the Trump indictment-based cold open, she had a solid opening monologue. It felt too short, but that was because it was a tight set and her jokes landed. Those things usually drag on when the host is flailing. The biggest joke from Quinta’s monologue was the one about Friends and the rest of it was just as good. She talked about how much she’s always wanted to do SNL but instead of trying out, she developed a TV show, had it become popular, won some Emmys and then she got invited to host because it seemed easier. She also seamlessly humble-bragged Obama into a bit. While talking about her show Abbott Elementary, Quinta said people expected her to be her character outside of the show. After several jokes about how that hampered her social life, Quinta ended with a plea to honor teachers and pay them what they’re worth.

Live from Studio 8H, it’s Quinta Brunson!

The Abbott Elementary star, 33, hosted Saturday Night Live for the first time over the weekend, where she was joined by Lil Yachty as the musical guest.

During her opening monologue, Brunson opened up about the success of her hit sitcom Abbott Elementary, at one point comparing it to Friends. “Except instead of being about a group of friends, it’s about a group of teachers. And instead of New York, it’s in Philadelphia. And instead of not having Black people — it does,” Brunson joked.

Brunson then explained in her monologue that viewers keep expecting her to fix problems within the public school system in real life, much like her character, teacher Janine Teagues. But as she shared, she’s the “opposite” of her character, and the success of the show has introduced her to some pretty big names. Showing a video she and Barack Obama sent to her mother thanking her for being a teacher, Brunson then concluded that teachers get “taken for granted.”

“Please remember how important teachers are, acknowledge the work they do every day and for the love of God, pay them the money they deserve,” she said.

[From People]

Like I said, it was a tight set and Quinta closing on the teachers was the perfect cap. There is a teachers’ crisis in this country right now. I know it’s going on everywhere but it’s so bad here in Los Angeles currently, I’m a bit myopic. LAUSD just went on strike and since that’s the second largest school district in the country, you can imagine how many children were affected. But the pandemic broke teachers as much as it did kids. Parents were not prepared to teach their kids and made life hell on teachers who were dealing with figuring out how to educate all of their students from their houses with their own families home. After the country reopened, a lot of people reevaluated where they were in life, and I think plenty of teachers asked if the stress they endured on a day-to-day basis was worth the paltry pay they received. Remember the only upside to the pandemic for schools was there were no school shootings, which is another horror teachers must face on barely-there wages. If you ask any teacher why they don’t demand more, they’ll tell you it’s because they have to decide between making enough so they don’t have to work a second job to make rent, or their students getting textbooks or whatever supplies they need. And every time it comes to a vote, the public votes it down. I hope Quinta has a more persuasive voice on this.

Outside of the monologue, Quinta had a few good sketches too. Even a couple that were just okay, she elevated. The best one was the Traffic Altercation in which she and Mikey Day mime out their road rage at each other with assists from Chloe Fineman and Ego Nwodim. It sounds dumb on paper, but Quinta and Mikey really make it work. Like Peridot, I cannot wait to see Tajaji P. Henson as Janine’s mom on Abbott. I hope we eventually get the three Teagues women in one show. Until then, can you imagine Momma Teagues up against Ava Coleman?

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