Today’s SAT question of the day is a sentence completion question about an actor’s performance. This definition sentence tells us that the actor’s performance was “deeply affecting.”

That’s a positive comment – members of the audience were moved to tears, so this is an emotionally strong performance.

Some of the answer choices are negative (insipid, negligible). Friendly wouldn’t make sense (amiable), nor would receptive. Poignant (pronounced POYN-yant…just in case it comes up, my dear students!) things are emotionally captivating or moving.  We have a winner, even if it arrived via elimination.

This one might have been tricky even if you thought you knew the word poignant, because it is so frequently (mis-)used to mean interesting or cutting-edge.  Elimination is a helpful strategy here since it provides the reassurance that none of the other answer choices would fit.