Maya Rudolph is speaking out about her return to “Saturday Night Live” to play Vice President Harris, saying, “This is so much bigger than me.”
“This is about something very important,” Rudolph said in an interview with Variety published Wednesday.
“I’m thrilled to be associated with it, and I’m also glad that I’ve played [Harris] and everyone’s cool with it. She likes it,” Rudolph said of her “SNL” version of the vice president, whom she first portrayed on the NBC late-night show during the 2020 White House race.
The 52-year-old “Loot” star opened up about how she initially approached her impression of Harris.
“I said, ‘When I see her, I see her having fun,’” Rudolph said.
“And so the fictional Kamala that we created tapped into her fun. And then [producer] Steve Higgins said to me that his wife called her a ‘fun aunt,’ and we were laughing at how that sounds like ‘funt.’ We just went from there,” the Emmy Award winner said.
“That was the moment where you realize, ‘Oh, now I know how to do this.’”
Rudolph revealed that before being tapped for the Harris role, she did a gender-bending turn as Barack Obama during the then-Illinois senator’s presidential bid.
“There was a moment of asking me to step up and try,” Rudolph recalled.
“And we did try for dress rehearsal. Sadly, Obama was there and had to see me dressed as him. We both laughed heartily, and thank God that never made it to air,” she said. Obama made a cameo on “SNL” in 2007.
Rudolph indicated she recognizes the noteworthiness of portraying Harris, who’s the first Black vice president and the first female vice president of South Asian descent.
“I never saw it coming, really, until she came on the scene,” Rudolph said.
“And then I thought, ‘Oh, wow. The playing field has completely changed.’”