‘Saturday Night Live‘ recently took a sharp satirical swipe at the ongoing controversy around HBO’s upcoming ‘Harry Potter‘ reboot during its April 4 episode.
In a ‘Weekend Update‘ segment that has quickly gone viral, cast member Kam Patterson played a reimagined Severus Snape who called Harry Potter “racist as hell,” and joked by calling him “The Proud Boy Who Lived.”
Black Snape Roasts ‘Harry Potter’ Casting Backlash
The sketch directly parodied the heated online debate over HBO’s casting choices for the new series, especially the decision to cast Paapa Essiedu as Severus Snape, a role made famous on screen by the late Alan Rickman.
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Appearing on the fake news desk, Kam Patterson’s version of Snape complained about his “last year at Hogwarts” in the reimagined story.
“We got this new kid. His name is Harry Potter, and he’s racist as hell,” Snape declared to loud studio laughter. “Harry Potter — or, the Proud Boy Who Lived — spent the whole year telling everybody that the school’s only Black teacher was secretly evil.”
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The parody directly mocked fan outrage and claims of “woke” changes to J.K. Rowling’s wizarding world. In the skit ‘Harry Potter’ and, by extension, parts of the fandom, are reframed as the real villain for suspecting Severus Snape, with that suspicion now cast as racial bias rather than the more layered tension of the original story.
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Kam Patterson kept pushing the joke further, portraying the wizarding world as full of prejudice. The bit leaned on the irony of the situation. In the HBO version, a Black Snape teaches at Hogwarts, and the sketch suggests that Harry’s distrust would now be seen through a modern lens shaped by race and identity.
What This Means for HBO’s New ‘Harry Potter’ TV Series
Saturday Night Live has a long history of aiming at pop culture, from major film franchises to debates around identity and representation. This sketch tapped into both, using the Harry Potter world and its themes of prejudice and outsiders to reflect current arguments.
HBO has stayed quiet on the satire, focusing instead on promoting the upcoming series, which is expected to offer a more detailed take on the books with a new cast.
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