For several years, the final “Saturday Night Live” episode of the year includes a segment of “Weekend Update” in which co-anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che write jokes that the other must read for the first time on the air. For Jost, this typically has meant Che forces him to say a litany of jokes about race and racism that are horrifically tone deaf and over-the-top — and, in context, often quite funny.

This year, however, Che found a new way to torture Jost: Making him say outrageous things about his wife, Scarlett Johansson — while a camera captured Johansson’s live reactions in the hallway outside of the studio. The actor appeared during the episode’s cold open to welcome host Martin Short into the Five Timers Club, and Che apparently could not resist the chance to have some fun at the couple’s expense.

The bit started with Jost reading that this year, he was going to “read all the jokes in ‘Black voice’ so I don’t get in trouble,” which led into Jost reading a joke about Kamala Harris saying she still supports the idea of slavery reparations. 

“Well, damn girl, me too,” Jost said, barely able to get the words out through his exasperated laughter. “Because white people deserve our money back for all those slaves that ran away.”

That was a mere appetizer for what Jost was required to say about his wife. Just the sight of her face in an image over Jost’s shoulder was enough to have some people in the audience screaming in anticipation of what was to come.

“I want to dedicate this next joke to my boo, Scarlett Johansson,” Jost said, and then a camera cut to a nervous Johansson, clutching a drink as she watched Jost from a monitor above her.

“No! No!” Jost said, as he realized what was happening. “Oh my gosh, she’s so genuinely worried!”

Then he got to the business of reading, for the first time, the jokes Che had written for him.

“Y’all know Scarlett just celebrated her 40th birthday, which means I’m about to get up out of there!” Jost said, again exploding in guffaws before he could even finish the line. After he regained his composure — and Che reminded him that there was more to the joke — Jost continued. “Shiz! Nah, nah. I’m just playin’,” he said. “We just had a kid together, and y’all ain’t see no pictures of him yet, because he’s Black as hell!” — at which point, a Photoshopped image of Jost and Johansson holding a Black baby appeared over Jost’s shoulder.

Che certainly had his fair share of comedic humiliation, forced to make jokes about “Moana 2” and Jeffrey Epstein, Jay-Z, and his promise to Diddy that “I will help get you off.” But then the spotlight turned back to Jost, who ended the segment with a joke involving his wife that is so R-rated that it genuinely startled Johansson. Warning: This is not for the faint of heart!

“Costco has removed their roast beef sandwich from its menu, but I ain’t tripping,” Jost said. “I be eating roast beef every night since my wife had the kid!” After the audience, Jost and Che all stopped laughing, Jost read the final lines. “Nah, nah, I just playin’ baby. You know I don’t go downtown! Shiz! That’s gay as hell!”

Martin Short hosted the episode with Hozier as musical guest. You can watch the full segment below:

FIRST ON FOX – Aviva Siegel, the wife of American hostage Kieth Siegel and a former hostage herself, is pleading with everyone and anyone involved in the hostage negotiations to get her husband, and the others, freed from Hamas captivity after they have spent more than 440 days in deplorable conditions. 

“Hamas released a video of Keith, and I just saw the picture,” Aviva told Fox News Digital in an emotional interview in reference to a video Hamas released in April. “He looks terrible. His bones are out, and you can see that he’s lost a lot of weight.

“He doesn’t look like himself. And I’m just so worried about him, because so [many] days and minutes have passed since that video that we received,” she said. “I just don’t know what kind of Keith that we’re going to get back.”

7 US HOSTAGES STILL HELD BY HAMAS TERRORISTS AS FAMILIES PLEAD FOR THEIR RELEASE: ‘THIS IS URGENT’

“I’m worried about all the hostages, because the conditions that they are in are the worst conditions that any human being could go through,” Aviva said. “I was there. I touched death. I know what it feels being underneath the ground with no oxygen. 

“Keith and I were just left there. We were left there to die,” she added. 

Aviva and her husband of, at the time 42 years, were brutally abducted from their home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, and held together for 51 days before she was released in the November 2023 hostage exchange after suffering from a stomach infection that left her incredibly ill. 

She has since tirelessly fought for Kieth’s release, meeting with top officials in the U.S. and Israel, traveling to the United States nine times in the last year and becoming a prominent advocate for the hostages. 

“I just hope that he’s with other people from Israel, and if he has them, he’s going to be okay,” Aviva said. “He’s just the person that will make them feel that they’re together. That’s what he did when I was there – he was 100% for me and the hostages that we were with.”

TEL AVIV, ISRAEL – MARCH 30: Released hostage Aviva Siegel, wife of hostage Keith Siegel, speaks during the final weekly ‘bring them home now’ rally on March 30, 2024 in Tel Aviv, Israel. According to the families of hostages forum, this would be the last week a rally is held at ‘hostage square’ citing that the government is not serious about negotiations and instead will be protesting in front of the Knesset from now on.  (Photo by Alexi Rosenfeld/Getty Images)

 “If you get kidnapped, get kidnapped with Keith, because he was outstanding to everybody. He was strong for all of us. And I’m sure that he’s keeping strong and keeping his hope to come out,” she said. 

Aviva recounted their last moments together before they were separated ahead of her release, telling Fox News Digital, “When I left him, I told him to be the strongest – that he needs to be strong for me, and I’ll be strong for him.”

PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY UNDER PRESSURE AMID RISING RESISTANCE, POPULARITY OF IRAN-BACKED TERROR GROUPS

Top security officials from the U.S., Egypt, and Qatar have been pushing Israel and Hamas to agree to a cease-fire and the return of hostages. 

Reports on Thursday suggested that negotiators are pushing for a 42-day cease-fire in which 34 of the at least 50 hostages still assessed to be alive, could be exchanged. 

Hamas is also believed to continue to hold at least 38 who were taken hostage and then killed while in captivity, along with at least seven who are believed to have been killed on Oct. 7, 2023 and then taken into Gaza. 

Though all the hostages are believed to have been held in deplorable conditions, the children, women – including the female IDF soldiers – the sick and the elderly have reportedly been front listed to be freed first in exchange for Hamas terrorists currently imprisoned. 

“I’m keeping my hope and holding on and just waiting – waiting to hug Keith, and waiting for all the families, to get their families back,” Aviva said. “We need to get them back.”

Aviva said she dreams of the moment that she gets to hug her husband again and watch their grandchildren “jump into his arms.” 

“We’ll be the happiest people on Earth,” she said. “All the hostages, I can’t imagine them coming home. It’ll be just the happiest moment for all of the families. We need it to happen.”

Reports in recent weeks suggest there is an increased sense of optimism in bringing home the hostages, but Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged some caution when speaking with MSNBC Morning Joe on Thursday when he said, “We are encouraged because this should happen, and it should happen because Hamas is at a point where the cavalry it thought might come to the rescue isn’t coming to the rescue, [Hezbollah’s] not coming to the rescue, [Iran’s] not coming to the rescue.”

“In the absence of that, I think the pressure is on Hamas to finally get to yes,” he added. “But look, I think we also have to be very realistic.  We’ve had these Lucy and the football moments several times over the last months where we thought we were there, and the football gets pulled away.

“The real question is: Is Hamas capable of making a decision and getting to yes?  We’ve been fanning out with every possible partner on this to try to get the necessary pressure exerted on Hamas to say yes,” Blinken added.  

Trump also hinted at China’s growing influence around the canal, which connects the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans.

United States President-elect Donald Trump has threatened to demand control of the Panama Canal after accusing Panama of charging excessive rates on US ships passing through one of the busiest waterways in the world.

“Our Navy and Commerce have been treated in a very unfair and injudicious way. The fees being charged by Panama are ridiculous,” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform on Saturday.

“This complete ‘rip-off’ of our Country will immediately stop.”

The US largely built the canal in 1914 and administrated territory surrounding the passage for decades. But Washington fully handed control of the canal to Panama in 1999 after a period of joint administration.

Trump also hinted at China’s growing influence around the canal, which connects the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans.

“It was solely for Panama to manage, not China, or anyone else,” he said. “We would and will NEVER let it fall into the wrong hands!”

The post was an exceedingly rare example of a US leader saying he could push a sovereign country to hand over territory.

“It was not given for the benefit of others, but merely as a token of cooperation with us and Panama. If the moral and legal principles of this magnanimous gesture of giving are not followed, then we will demand that the Panama Canal be returned to us, in full, and without question,” Trump said.

Trump’s tariff plan

It also underlines an expected shift in US diplomacy under Trump, who has not historically shied away from threatening allies and using rhetoric when dealing with counterparts.

Last month, Trump said he would impose tariffs on Mexican and Canadian imports on day one of his administration and that the measures would remain until the “invasion” of undocumented migrants and drugs came to an end.

“Both Mexico and Canada have the absolute right and power to easily solve this long-simmering problem. We hereby demand that they use this power, and until such time that they do, it is time for them to pay a very big price!” he posted on his Truth Social platform.

Authorities in Panama did not immediately react to Trump’s post.

An estimated 5 percent of global maritime traffic passes through the Panama Canal, which allows ships travelling between Asia and the US East Coast to avoid the long, hazardous route around the southern tip of South America.

The Panama Canal Authority reported in October that the waterway had earned record revenues of nearly $5bn in the last fiscal year.