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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Ruth Bader Ginsburg met Kate McKinnon, her SNL doppelganger, at a musical

By Emily Heil Washington Post

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has said she likes Kate McKinnon, the actress who spoofs her on “Saturday Night Live” – and on Tuesday night, they got the chance to meet in person. Both women were in the audience of a performance of “Fiddler on the Roof” in New York, per social media evidence, and were introduced after the show.

McKinnon, who has also memorably portrayed Hillary Clinton, Angela Merkel and other pols on the late-night show, plays RBG as a defiant, vitamin-huffing roadblock to President Donald Trump. She peppers her delivery with insults and informs her targets that “ya just got Gins-burned!”

All of which the real-life justice apparently enjoys. “I like the actress who portrayed me,” Ginsburg told NPR reporter Nina Totenberg in an interview last year, when asked about her reaction to the sketches – which Ginsburg’s children alerted her to. “I’d like to say ‘Gins-burn!’ sometimes to my colleagues.”

The real-and-faux Ginsburgs meeting happened onstage after the curtain of the off-Broadway, all-Yiddish production. McKinnon and Ginsburg, a well-known theater and opera aficionado, posed for photos with the cast and crew, per People magazine, which quoted actor Nick Raynor describing McKinnon as “star struck.”