Kristen Bell completely trolled the SAG Awards audience with a joke about Meryl Streep
Last night, Kristen Bell served as the first host of the Screen Actors Guild Awards, and its safe to say we need her to host every year. The Good Place actress opened the show with a hilarious and heartfelt monologue, in which she poked fun at Melania Trump’s stagnant cyberbullying cause, spoke about the “watershed moment” happening in Hollywood right now with Time’s Up and #MeToo, and even gave a shout-out to Frozen 2 (in theaters in 2019). But one of Kristen Bell’s best moments from the show was playing a small trick on the audience — and watching them fall for it without a second thought.
As a veteran in the entertainment industry — and frankly, as a person in general — Bell is very aware of Meryl Streep’s status as Hollywood royalty, and naturally, she couldn’t help but use that to troll the SAG audience. While we only wish saying Meryl Streep’s name three times in front of a mirror could give us the power to say “Florals? For spring? Groundbreaking.” in that perfectly bored, disdainful tone, at least it’s now a *proven fact* that if you say her name once into a microphone, she’ll immediately get a standing ovation.
EVEN IF SHE ISN’T THERE.
Bell tested that theory as she went to introduce Olivia Munn and Niecy Nash to present the award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series (which ultimately went to This Is Us’ Sterling K. Brown). Uttering a simple “Meryl Streep,” an amused Bell watched as the star-studded crowd, which included Marisa Tomei, Steve Carell, Brie Larson, and just about a million other A-listers, jumped to their feet to give the beloved actress a standing ovation.
But while the audience may have expected Streep to step onto the stage, Bell admitted that Streep wasn’t even in attendance at the awards show. However, she did encourage the crowd to channel its enthusiasm into welcoming Munn and Nash to the stage.
Bell was clearly pretty charmed by the audience’s devotion to Streep.
Not gonna lie, it was definitely one of the funniest moments of the night — and we’re sure even Bell couldn’t have predicted the audience would immediately go for a standing ovation. As if the world needed any more proof that Meryl Streep is practically a god.
All this is to say: Kristen Bell couldn’t have been a better choice to host the SAG Awards, and we’re keeping our fingers crossed that she gets to poke fun at her fellow actors year after year as host.
