Cecily Strong delivers SNL's opening monologue in French last weekend. photo: screen grab. Last Friday, the world was shocked by a series of terrorist attacks in Paris that left at least 129 people dead, with many more wounded. Terrorists struck the Stade de France as a soccer match was playing out, as well as the well known Bataclan theater during a concert. France's president responded by immediately closing the country's borders and, over the weekend, launching a bombing campaign in Syria against targets associated with ISIS.
Immediately after the attack, people around the world began to show solidarity with the attacks. On Saturday, a day after the attacks took place, Facebook offered its users the option to change their profiles to the colors of the French flag. And Saturday Night Live, in lieu of its normal goofy opening gags, instead opted for an opening monologue by cast member Cecily Strong. Strong read a prepared statement, assuring Parisians that "Our love and support is with everyone there tonight." Then she repeated the statement, this time in a fairly convincing French. Americans are famously resistant to learning French, or anything that has to do with France. But last weekend they seemed to set all of that aside, in the name of remembrance for the victims, and perhaps, of hope for a more peaceful world. |
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