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Phoebe Waller-Bridge lampoons Love Island on Saturday Night Live debut

YouTube/SNL Phoebe Waller-Bridge as Amber RoseYouTube/SNL
Phoebe Waller-Bridge appeared as Bella Rosa, from Essex

Phoebe Waller-Bridge hosted Saturday Night Live in the US for the first time this weekend and took the opportunity to take a swipe at Love Island.

The Fleabag star appeared as "Bella Rosa" in a skit of the UK reality show, which has also spawned a US version.

Waller-Bridge appeared caked in fake tan and with lip fillers, looking for love with somebody "proper fit", with "tattoos" and "really great banter".

"But at the same time I'd go with anyone," she added, in an Essex accent.

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The Fleabag and Killing Eve creator is a big name on both sides of the Atlantic, having won the prizes for best comedy actress, best comedy series and best comedy writing at last month's Emmy Awards.

Introducing herself on SNL's spoof Love Island, Waller-Bridge joked that her "dad's a boxer and mum's a pub".

She shacked up with Finlay - who was "just looking for the right woman to cheat on for the rest of his life".

Unsurprisingly, her character was then dumped, leading her to burst into tears and declare she's "absolutely gutted", before realising the ordeal had helped her gain 1.2 million Instagram followers.

She added: "Well, I don't have to be a stupid paediatric nurse anymore, do I?! Kerching!"

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The Telegraph said the sketch was "one of the highlights" of the programme. "Yes, depressingly, our fixation with the tackiest of reality shows has spread across the Atlantic."

Vulture said the segment "hits all the right notes", while IndieWire described it as "especially good".

Waller-Bridge appeared in the sketch alongside US cast members of Saturday Night Live, who tackled British and Irish accents.

Vanity Fair said it "mostly made fun of accents that were neither English nor Irish, but were so strange that even the other contestants couldn't understand one another."

Saturday's programme also saw Waller-Bridge appear in sketches about the royal family, a TV news bulletin, a game show and a bar. "The other sketches in the show were an absolute disaster," Vanity Fair said.

Waller-Bridge's presence "only served to highlight the material that wasn't up to her level", the magazine's critic Jordan Hoffman wrote.

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