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Ryan Gosling and Mikey Day's Beavis and Butt-Head Had the SNL Cast Cracking Up
Saturday Night Live's hair and makeup departments knocked it out of the park with Gosling and Day's unsettlingly spot-on looks, and no one could keep it together.
Capturing the look of a well-known pop culture figure — quickly — is all in a day's work for Saturday Night Live's creative teams, who nail every detail with wigs, makeup, wardrobe, and even prosthetics. All of which were fully on point in April 13's "Beavis and Butt-Head" sketch, in which Host Ryan Gosling and cast member Mikey Day fully became human versions of Mike Judge's cartoon headbangers. Or, more accurately, they became two perfectly normal guys who bear an insane resemblance to the animated duo.
The sketch is framed as an episode of a talk show called News Nation, in which an AI-skeptical professor (Kenan Thompson) visits to chat with a journalist (Heidi Gardner). But less than a minute in, the camera reveals an audience member (Gosling) that no one, including Thompson's professor, can take their eyes off of. A young man in a blue "Death Rock" T-shirt who looks extremely familiar to fans of Mike Judge's MTV series about two goofy couch potatoes, which ran for eight seasons in the 1990s and was most recently revived in 2022.
"Professor, is there a problem?" Gardner's journalist asks.
"Um, yeah. There is a gentleman in your audience who looks strikingly similar to Beavis, from the cartoon Beavis and Butt-Head," the professor admits. "Just a little distracting."
At this point, Gosling turns to reveal the full majesty of his blond pompadour wig and prosthetic Beavis nose, as he obliviously scans the crowd for the man in question.
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Turning to ask the Beavis doppelganger to move his seat, Gardner herself hides a small laugh as the near-unrecognizable Gosling stares back.
Ryan Gosling and Mikey Day's Beavis and Butt-Head made everyone lose it on SNL
Though the man's never heard of this Beavis character, he moves to sit elsewhere. He's soon replaced by a second man (Mikey Day) who, by complete coincidence, looks exactly like Butt-Head in his "SKULL" shirt.
"Oh my GOD," the professor exclaims mid-sentence. "Are you serious?"
"Professor, just because our audience members aren't as informed on the issue as you doesn't make them 'butt-heads,' the journalist says, upon hearing his new complaint. Day's Butt-Head nods in somber agreement.
But when Gardner turns to ask this second audience member to relocate, the sight of Day in his getup (complete with a non-existent upper lip) proves too much. Holding up a hand at Day, who remains in character as he looks around, Gardner needs a minute to recover.
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"Kindly move seats?" she asks the man, who misunderstands and nudges his neighbor (Michael Longfellow) instead.
"She's talking to you," Longfellow informs the confused man, whose reaction sets Gardner off again (and who can blame her?).
But when the two are revealed to be sitting next to each other — now looking exactly like Beavis and Butt-Head when they famously watch music videos together — Day and Gosling erupt into giggles at how ridiculous the other looks.
"You two really don't know that you look like Beavis and Butt-Head?!" the professor yells.
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"I've heard rumblings that I look like someone from TV, but maybe it's this Beavis person. I don't know," Gosling says, as he and Day do their best to keep it together (and did we hear Chloe Fineman snort in the background?). "I don't watch much television, I have an incredibly busy life," he adds.
And yet the two performers' Beavis and Butt-Head laughs are as spot-on as their hair and makeup. Watch the cast-breaking SNL sketch above, which ends with a quick tribute to another iconic Mike Judge cartoon.
