Lady Gaga and R Kelly Molest Each Other on Saturday Night Live

Lady Gaga and R Kelly get freaky during their performance of Do What You Want on  Saturday Night Live.

Given that Lady Gaga was once considered the most important pop star on earth, her apparent decision to follow Miley Cyrus’ lead is somewhat dispiriting.

While performing as the musical guest on “Saturday Night Live,” Lady Gaga did an inept duet with R. Kelly, the sort of performance that exists solely to get people talking and generate articles like this one by dint of its self-conscious bid for “controversy.” Gaga caterwauled her current single “Do What U Want,” alone onstage at first, grabbing her crotch after she sang “Do what you want / What you want with my body / Do what you want / Don’t stop, let’s party.” When R. Kelly joined her onstage, Gaga jumped onto his shoulder in a prone position; she then bent over fully as R. Kelly touched her posterior, then the two simulated sex onstage, with Gaga lying on the ground as R. Kelly did pushups over her.

The reason for this Parents Television Council-style breakdown is not because of inherent prudery but because such obvious salaciousness is something of a surprise coming from Gaga, a musician who’s made a career out of wearing obvious, outré fashions and singing about her love for her audience, not male attention. Those past performances, as with the flawlessly executed quick-change act at this summer’s Video Music Awards, used skill and the desire to impress to be about something other than themselves.

“Do What U Want” on “SNL,” however, was thuddingly obvious in just the Cyrus manner, right down to the signifiers. In both cases, a younger female pop star performed alongside an older male star with a reputation, in life or in art, far raunchier than the pop star’s; both women seemed to be making up their dance moves as they went along, and got a cheap hit of danger from the whole thing. Miley Cyrus, famously, twerked; Lady Gaga bent over and sort of lazily shook from side to side, as though she hadn’t gotten the knack yet.

Jacked from