Brooks Wheelan, Noel Wells and John Milheiser have all been fired from Saturday Night Live last week. That’s one half of the cohort of featured players brought in at the beginning of the 2013-14 season. Despite trumpeting their collective SNL debut in the season premiere with two sketches devoted to the new hires, it felt like the show lost faith in them by the end of November...
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Kenan Thompson, doing his stock reaction shot.
Back in December, I decided this season of Saturday Night Live wasn't likely to improve from the string of disappointing shows that aired up to that point, and figured it was no longer worth watching the live shows. SNL wasn't truly bad this year, but it was more frustrating than enjoyable. The show has clear potential to be good, but for a variety of internal reasons that I can only speculate about, the writers and performers continue to fall into traps that make their output so bland and rote: even the Dick Ebersol era (1981-1985), seen by many as a safer and corporate version of Lorne Michaels' show, comes off as relatively adventurous in comparison.
Since that point, I have tuned into SNL only sporadically, deliberately skipping some of the less-than-exciting guest lineups and catching material online if the message board buzz tantalized me. The nights I bothered to watch live, I usually regretted tuning in, particularly for the weak Jim Parsons and lazy Andy Samberg shows. The studio audience doesn't seem to mind the show's quality, but outside the electric atmosphere of Studio 8H, the crutches seem more obvious than ever.
I feel that going too much into detail regarding my specific opinions about the cast, writing staff and general show hierarchy would be redundant, and fear that my true feelings about some of the talent on the show border on unkind. I'll leave it at this:
SNL needs to cut a number of writers and performers that have overstayed their welcome before any cast changes that happen can seem anything other than cosmetic. I get the sense the show is more concerned about their own internal hierarchy and rewarding loyalty and popularity than the overall quality of the show. There's a noticeable rigidity and lack of personality to many of the proceedings, and I can't help but feel the sketches are written as Mad Libs templates. The "surprise cameos" come across as mandatory and perfunctory; merely something to get the studio audience to cheer loud. Even the show's use of filmed sketches make it seem like the live material is merely filler to pad airtime.
In an ideal world, the next season of Saturday Night Live would force the cast, writers and producers to cut the safety net. I'm concerned that the lukewarm reaction to this season will only lead to next year's SNL being even more rigid, formulaic and pandering.
Sketches include "Dressing Room", "E.T.", "The Adoption", "Brain Surgery", "Oklahoma", "Dress-Up", "My Friend Zeus" and "Single".Squeeze performs "Annie Get Your Gun" and "Pulling Mussels From The Shell".A phone-in poll is held to determine whether Andy Kaufman ever appears on Saturday Night Live again.
Read MoreA few years ago, I did a poll where readers could vote on the best and worst episodes of SNL of all time. Despite only getting eleven votes, the results page has become my most frequently accessed post. Since then, I've been considering doing a poll about individual SNL sketches, but I wanted to come up with something slightly different. There are so many "greatest SNL sketches" posts on the web, usually with a lot of the same contenders, so I want to focus on the other side. When discussing bad SNL, it's so easy to talk about how bad the show gets from time to time without getting specific, or just mentioning the show's tendency to milk a sketch or character for all it's worth. This isn't just a "10 most irritating characters" poll: I want specific examples of the most terrible sketches the show's ever brought to a network audience.
My primary focus is going to be a list of the worst individual sketches, but because of the show's reliance (or over-reliance) on recurring material, I'm going to have a separate category for the worst recurring sketches. I will also allow votes for individual sketches featuring a recurring character, but the main reason for having a separate category for the recurring stuff is because there have been some truly terrible one-offs that the show never felt necessary to bring back.
To have your voice heard, submit your picks using the form at the bottom of this post. I also prefer if you also give a good rationale behind your choices, so tell me why you thought these sketches were terrible. You can submit as many or as few choices as you want. The more people that pick something, the better.
I will keep the voting open until March 1, 2014, at 12:00 am Atlantic time. Once all the votes are tabulated, I'm going to do a series of weekly posts based on the results; the number will depend on how many votes come in.
EDIT: VOTING HAS NOW ENDED.
I've been watching SNL regularly for about 20 years. I still have my original tapes from when I first started recording the show back in March 1994; in fact, I can tell you that the first episode I taped was a rerun of the show with John Malkovich and Billy Joel. I've stuck with the show through that horrible season with Janeane Garofalo. I've seen the historically bad years that almost got the show cancelled. I've sat through that godawful 10 minute sketch with the sub at the bottom of the ocean. None of these low points has made me want to give up on the show as much as this current season has.
Last month, I wrote that I mainly watch the show out of a routine I can no longer justify to myself. I was originally going to pack it in at that point, but held out hope that the next four shows would show some flicker of life that's been noticeably absent this year. That would not be the case.
Josh Hutcherson was dull. Paul Rudd had cameos and a Bill Brasky sketch, but weak writing pretty much everywhere else. John Goodman's long-overdue return to SNL had more tepid writing, plus a sketch starring Sylvester Stallone and Robert DeNiro that felt like a rejected script from a bad Bob Hope special; the kind of sketch that SNL would make fun of when it spoofed bad variety shows.
The Jimmy Fallon show that aired last night was a bit more fun than the show's been in a while: Fallon has come a long way since he was the messy-haired new kid 15 years ago, and his collaborations with Justin Timberlake guaranteed several fan favorites would be trotted out. That said, so much of the show felt like pandering: Paula Pell's Dancing Mascot sketches doesn't do much for me (it just feels too by-the-numbers and obligatory), and the cameos by Paul McCartney, Madonna, Barry Gibb and Michael Bloomberg felt like they were intended to distract from how lifeless the writing is on the show. The episode came off as self-congratulatory towards Lorne Michaels' takeover of NBC late night.; an extended commercial for The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, if you will.
It's not that the show is actually terrible: a truly bad year would at least be interesting. Yet, more than ever this season, it feels like the show's on auto-pilot. There's no need for the show to try anymore; it's one of the few relative successes NBC has left, so there's no impending cancellation to force the show to correct course.
Sketch comedy shows by their very nature are uneven, and even SNL's best seasons have had their dud shows. This season feels different; I don't think "mediocre" is the right word, though, because even something mediocre can have an appreciable effort behind it. The six new faces added to the show in the wake of the recent departures of Bill Hader, Fred Armisen and Jason Sudeikis just feel purely cosmetic; only a mask to cover stagnant and lazy writing.
The cast has too much potential that's not being used properly. Taran Killam and Kate McKinnon are in a class by themselves on the show, and could potentially carry a new era of the show, but they're weighed down by so many people who have overstayed their welcome. The move to make Kenan Thompson the cast anchor (a la Hader or Sudeikis) is baffling; Thompson doesn't have the range to pull off that role in the cast, and he's already demonstrated everything he's capable of as a performer years ago.
The real dead weight is in the writers' room. There are 23 writers on staff this year, including Lorne Michaels, who always gets a credit. Steve Higgins and Paula Pell have been with the show since the last big changeover in 1995 (Pell is part-time); their tenure with the show is longer than those of the original writers who were still with the show before Michaels cleaned house. James Anderson has been around since 2000; he and frequent collaborator Kent Sublette seem to be the writing staff's equivalent of Kenan Thompson, in that they recycle their bag of tricks and that their output tends to annoy more than amuse. There are a handful of prolific and talented newer writers (Zach Kanin, Sarah Schneider and Chris Kelly) and a fair bit of turnover in the staff over the last five years: the only trouble with this is that it's the newer writers that leave, while the veterans stick around and churn out the same old material.
I need a break from the show. I've come to the conclusion that I'm getting too frustrated by SNL this season to justify watching live anymore; until some non-superficial changes are made to the creative side of the show, I'm not going to be tuning in. Whatever's worth checking out will be on the internet the next day (unless it has a music clearance issue).
My original plan was to finish the 1982-83 season reviews, but I think I'm going to take a break from those as well. I'll try to resume those in a few months.
I've previously published my "want list" for SNL on my blog; I have access to pretty much the show's complete run, but because of the discrepancies between live and rerun versions, the copies of the shows currently circulating may not have all the segments that aired in the live show, or else may use dress rehearsal takes. I have plans for future reviews once I'm finished 1982-83, but am looking for the live airings of many of these shows. Original commercials would be a bonus, but I'm aware how expensive blank tapes were back then, so it's not as big a deal. Comedy Central ran a few original versions back in the early 90s, but most have some additional editing (mostly bumpers and the Don Pardo closing voiceovers); many of the missing segments are also available through streaming sites, but I prefer to have a copy of the complete airing.
Revised: January 30, 2016
SNL-Primary want list (missing content, unconfirmed live run orders, and dress rehearsal substitutions):
SNL - Secondary want list (Ebersol-era with minor missing segments or small edits, plus upgrades over repeats/Comedy Central).
SNL - Tertiary want list (Quality/completeness upgrades; these I prefer to have in good quality with commercials)
SCTV - Primary Want List
Any pre-1984 airings of season 1-3 episodes with the original opening credits sequences and bumpers are appreciated (I have a handful), but I'm looking for some rare sketches and compilation episodes.
Fridays - Primary Want List
Fridays - Secondary Want List (completeness/quality upgrades)
Looking for full 70-minute (53 without ads) 1980-81 or 90-minute (66 without ads) 1981-82 airings. Preferably single source live airings (not edited from several recordings)
The New Show
Almost Live!
After an underwhelming episode with Bruce Willis, pretty much anything would seem like an improvement for SNL's next show. Fortunately, Edward Norton's episode was markedly better than the last few, thanks to a game host and strong musical guest, even if the writing continues to be sub-par.
The Wes Anderson parody was easily the strongest and most fully realized segment, drawing primarily from Royal Tenenbaums, with some smaller nods to Rushmore, Fantastic Mr. Fox, and Moonrise Kingdom. I have to admit that "failure to grasp a simple concept" is pretty reliable as far as a sketch premise goes, so "School Visit" and "Steve Harvey" both made me laugh. "School Visit" was the stronger sketch, with Nasim Pedrad getting a rare featured segment on the show as an elementary school student who doesn't quite understand "Stranger Danger". The sketch works because Pedrad plays her character with such undue confidence, while Norton is able to hold his own against Pedrad in his role as the police officer; the remaining cast also does some good support work. "Steve Harvey" was weaker and didn't have an ending, but Harvey's (Kenan Thompson) completely wrong guesses about punny Halloween costumes were some good quick laughs.
The show's weaknesses were still apparent last night. Norton's final sketch, where he explained individual pieces of Halloween candy he gave out, had some good lines, but seemed like a quick rewrite of the Christmas ornaments sketch from the 2011 Steve Buscemi show. Miley Cyrus' cameo in the monologue didn't bother me as much as it did other people, but the gratuitous twerking reference that ended "12 Years Not A Slave" only served to instantly date the sketch. A sketch revolving around a "Rain Man"-type character 25 years after the movie got some grousing from the message boards for its untimeliness, but the bigger problem was a lack of an ending. Weekend Update was mercifully shorter than usual, but Cecily Strong still seems a little tentative, and Bobby Moynihan's Anthony Crispino character seems to be more to provide Seth Meyers something to react to than anything else.
I'm still baffled by the decision to hire six new featured players to replace three (four if you count Tim Robinson's move to the writer's room). I understand that Fred Armisen, Bill Hader and Jason Sudeikis were the cast's foundation in the last few seasons, but the huge number hired seems to indicate a lack of faith in the established cast; this is even more aggravating when you take into consideration their limited opportunities to develop their own dynamic, especially during the reign of Kristen Wiig as alpha-castmember. Kenan Thompson is being pushed as this year's bedrock, but he doesn't have the versatility of the departed players; why the show didn't look for a stronger black performer to replace him is a mystery. To their credit, Bobby Moynihan and Taran Killam are still very dependable in whatever they do, but there are so many players competing for airtime that the cast can't establish a true group dynamic.
Sketches include: "The Merv Griffin Show", "Little Rascals Reunion", "Space Shuttle", "PBS", "The Best Little House On The Prairie", "Tyrone Goes Reggae", "Blue Lagoon", "Masterful Theatre", "Viewer Mail", "DTV", and "No More Andy Kaufman". Kenny Loggins performs "Heart To Heart" and "I Gotta Try". Merv Griffin makes a special appearance.
Read MoreOne of SNL's current booking strategies seems to be to grab random celebrities who've only hosted the show once many years before. Tonight's host, Bruce Willis, last appeared on the show's season premiere in 1989. Willis' musical guest this time around was Katy Perry, whose performance of "Roar" with an animal-suited band was one of the oddest things on this week's show.
Willis' performances were off all night and sloppy compared to his first show; while Perry markedly improved over her 2010 songs, despite a iffy audio mix. Even iffier was the writing, which was weaker than the previous two shows, with too many of the sketches going nowhere beyond the reveal of the main joke.
The Lady Gaga Show was the latest dressing on one of SNL's favorite crutches: the talk show sketch. Besides not being particularly funny, the sketch was a performance misfire for Vanessa Bayer, whose delivery as Gaga seemed too similar to her bar mitzvah boy character Jacob.
More frustrating was the attempt to recur two one-off sketches from last year; the resurrection of Bobby Moynihan's kittycat-fixated astronaut Kirby was a beat-for-beat remake of a sketch that aired almost exactly a year ago, while Taran Killam's Eddie character predictably hectored a character played by the host over a mispronounced word. Perhaps the laziest piece of writing was Penelope Cruz (Kate McKinnon) mispronouncing hair product chemicals in Gaga Show, a routine cribbed from a sketch in McKinnon's debut show in April 2012.
There were handful of bright spots: Boy Dance Party got a great reaction from the audience and is likely to be SNL's latest meme-generator, while the Good Neighbor guys' "Sigma" short was well constructed, with several good jokes. Centauri Vodka had the most interesting and classically funny premise of the night, as well as giving two of the season's least-used castmembers (John Milheiser and Nasim Pedrad) some much-needed airtime. Brooks Wheelan also managed to show some promise in a Weekend Update desk segment, though Cecily Strong's awkward WU performance felt like a backward step from last week's signs of improvement.
I don't know how the hierarchy at SNL currently works regarding who gets their material on air, or how big a part in the sketch writing process the cast have, but over the last few seasons, I've noticed it's the veteran writers that stick around while the newer hires come and go. I get the feeling that the writers with the most influence are the ones who are also holding the show back. It's a shame, really, because the cast has been quite good in the last couple of seasons; Bobby Moynihan is particularly reliable for saving sketches. However, the show is only as good as its writing, and I have a feeling that even the celebrated original cast or '86-90 ensemble would have trouble salvaging some of tonight's material.
Next week is a dark week for the show, which will return live on October 26 with Edward Norton and Janelle Monae. I will continue my Classic SNL reviews that week with the next show from 1982-83 (Robert Blake / Kenny Loggins).
Miley Cyrus first hosted SNL back in 2011; at the time I was a little irritated by the show's kowtow to the youth demographic, but in retrospect she ended up being a decent host. Following the media attention to her infamous twerking performance with Robin Thicke at the 2013 Video Music Awards, her second hosting gig seemed to be an inevitability. This honestly didn't bother me much, largely because all the finger-pointing and tongue-wagging towards that particular incident seemed to disproportionately blame and criticize Cyrus, as well as call her mental health into question. Her attempts to sexualize her image have a whiff of trying too hard, but for all the questionable decisions she made in the past few years, Cyrus comes off more as a 20-year-old who makes many the same mistakes as a lot of non-famous people do than a cautionary tale in the waiting.
Some were expecting the show to be a trainwreck; Cyrus did seem to fan those flames by getting into a feud with Sinead O'Connor over the latter's open letter to her, but by air, she seemed collected and in control. I'm not going to kid myself: Miley Cyrus is no Justin Timberlake, but she did fine on double-duty. She has a self-awareness that I never really detected in Britney Spears, so while she sometimes does stupid things, she also seems fully aware of her actions.
I was more impressed by her ability to share the spotlight and join in SNL sketches as part of the ensemble. In that respect, she was light years ahead of Justin Bieber. Cyrus also performed her songs decently, even if it only served to illustrate that "Wrecking Ball" and "We Can't Stop
aren't especially great songs to begin with.
Where the show faltered was the writing. A lot of the sketch ideas came across as fairly low-hanging fruit for the show, particularly the VMAs, the cable networks' Hilary Clinton movies). My main issue with the "Mornin' Miami" sketch is that SNL has overused the promo shoot premise in the past few years; while the one-liners ended up justifying the sketch's place in the live show, it still felt like the writers plugging things into formulas instead of building towards a strong payoff. The poetry teacher sketch had a few moments, but while it was nice to see Vanessa Bayer get a feature role, her character wasn't developed enough for the sketch to work. The worst segment was the "cheerleader alien abduction", which felt too similar to "Nascarettes" and "Delinquent Teen Girl Gang" in that the crux of the sketch was the same unfunny joke repeated over and over. I actually found the technical miscues funnier than the actual content of the sketch.
There were bright spots here and there: the "We Can't Stop" parody with John Boehner (Taran Killam) and Michelle Bachmann (Cyrus) twerking was memorable, and new players Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett got some of their own sensibility on the air with a pre-taped 10-to-1 sketch. Bobby Moynihan can be still depended on to provide a quick laugh if a sketch begins to falter. "Girlfriends Talk Show" came across as a predictable choice for a lead-off, but Aidy Bryant demonstrated that she carries those sketches. Cecily Strong is growing into her role as Weekend Update co-anchor, but has yet to fully ditch the "Seth Meyers' trainee" vibe that permeated last week's show, and the segment as a whole has become way too long and bloated in recent years.
Next week's show should prove to be a wild card: Bruce Willis returns as part of SNL's "Hey, let's get someone who hasn't hosted in a long time" series with musical guest Katy Perry.
A BRIEF NOTE ABOUT CANADIAN TV: I missed a good chunk of the "Fifty Shades Of Gray Auditions" because Global, the Canadian broadcaster of SNL, mistook the commercial parody for a real commercial. This has been happening infrequently for the last 10-11 years or so, possibly longer: I remember back in 2005-06, the network would run commercials during the Robert Smigel "TV Funhouse" segments. It's annoying because in most markets, the American signal from NBC is unavailable due to simultaneous substitution. SNL has been clearly marking their ad breaks for years, and to keep doing this suggests incompetence with live TV on Global's part. NBC needs to consider renegotiating the Canadian rights to the show with another network.
Saturday Night Live began its 39th season with a bit more media attention than usual: six new featured players were added to pad out a cast that lost three of its key players over the summer, and last year's rookie breakout Cecily Strong was added to Weekend Update to prepare for anchor Seth Meyers' departure for his own Late Night show mid-season. In short, another "transition year" for a show that seems to be in the throes of a particularly long and gradual "transition year".
I've written about this before, but the season premiere is not really the best place to judge how the season as a whole will go. The first few shows in September and October have the cast and writers slowly settling back into their routines, and they largely play it safe until the group dynamic is re-established. Selecting TIna Fey as a host was a smart choice, though I suspect, like with Amy Poehler three years ago, the producers were having a little trouble finalizing that slot as the announcement came less than three weeks before air. Fey also didn't really have anything to promote aside from being a successful alumna.
Her fourth gig as host (and first since appearing while 6 months pregnant in May 2011) was welcome, though: with Fey, it feels like there's an extra member in the cast rather than someone being shoehorned into sketches.
It did feel like the show was struggling to come up with content. The influx of new players served as the basis for two whole segments: the monologue, and a game show where Tina Fey had to guess whether someone was a new featured player or a member of Arcade Fire. Both of these segments were actually pretty funny, but SNL usually handles their new cast influxes a bit more succinctly than this (Side note: my all-time favorite way of introducing new players was 1986's premiere, which didn't show a member of its mostly-new cast on-camera before the first commercial break).
On the downside, there were a few thin premises (the airport sketch, the PBS movie show), and the recurring characters (Drunk Uncle and the Ex-Porn Stars) didn't have their best outings. I suspect that this was less of a problem than it would have been without Fey, who knows how to play the weaker bits. While the Aaron Paul cameos were welcome and appropriate considering the event-level finale of Breaking Bad the next night, by the time of his third appearance they began to feel like a crutch.
Cecily Strong made her debut as a Weekend Update co-anchor. Last season, she made a quick impression with characters like "The Girl You Wish You Haven't Started A Conversation With At A Party", and felt like a veteran after only a few shows. Her first time at the desk showed promise, but was underwhelming: she seems to be trying to force herself into the Seth Meyers sarcastic delivery mold, and seemed to have an absence of the gravitas that Jane Curtin or Fey herself had at the desk. I hope she eventually grows into her new role and finds a way to make the desk her own, rather than continue to dish out more of the same style of humor that Seth Meyers has been serving on WU since 2006.
The large number of people in the cast (and tendency toward longer openings, monologues and Weekend Update) means that there are a lot of people competing for airtime, and because the show only has so much space, some will inevitably get shut out some weeks. Of the new hires, Kyle Mooney and Noel Wells seemed to make the strongest impressions tonight. Mooney got an Update feature for his inaugural show with his hack stand-up character Bruce Chandling, and Wells led a fake promo for HBO's Girls with her Lena Dunham impression. Writer-turned-player Mike O'Brien also had a feature playing an old-timey used car salesman character, but Fey was the one who carried the sketch. Beck Bennett ended up relagated to support roles, while John Milheiser and Brooks Wheelan only had bit parts. It remains to be seen how the male players will distinguish themselves from each other.
The size of the cast will only serve to make it tougher for some veterans to get airtime: Nasim Pedrad, now in her fifth season, seems to appear on the show significantly less each passing year, and while Jay Pharoah's Obama ensures his spot in the cast, he was nowhere to be seen after the opening montage. Other than these two, the remaining cast seems to be gelling as a group, with Bobby Moynihan, Taran Killam, Vanessa Bayer, Aidy Bryant and Kate McKinnon settling into clear roles in the cast. Curiously, it feels like they're grooming Kenan Thompson to take some of the Bill Hader and Jason Sudiekis roles, as his game show emcee and PBS host characters would have been portrayed by either of the two departed players.
I was disappointed that Tim Robinson was swapped out of the cast and into the writer's room for this year, essentially switching places with Mike O'Brien. Robinson may not have had as stellar a year as Cecily Strong, but he was responsible for some of last year's more memorable sketches ("Z-Shirts" and "Roundball Rock"). O'Brien seems to fill a similar niche in the roles he plays, but he's not as strong a performer as Robinson, nor does he quite have his strong comedic sensibility.
I'm still on the fence about the Arcade Fire performances: I do give them credit for always trying to present themselves with an interesting visual, but I wasn't feeling either of their songs tonight. I suspect they'll grow on me in the context of the album, though. For me, their best appearance was backing up Mick Jagger on "The Last Time" if only for the sheer joy exuding from their faces (Sarah Neufeld had a huge grin on hers all throughout).
Next week: Miley Cyrus is the host and musical guest. Hope she keeps her tongue in.
Sketches included "Makeup Room", "The Interesting Four", "A Sense Of Fear", "Thank You, Ron Reagan", "Snookie", "Bill Smith Cares", "Topol The Idiot", "Nutty President", and "Pumpkin".The New Joe Jackson Band performs "Steppin' Out" and "Another World".
Read MoreSketches include "Hallway", "Girls of SNL", "DeLorean Home", "Good Morning America", "The Confession", "Caribbean Vacation", "Naked Wake", "Uncle Teddy's Little Theatre" and "The Amazing Ronco Answer Book".Men At Work perform "Who Can It Be Now?" and "Down Under".Bill Irwin also appears.
Read MoreLast year, Saturday Night Live said goodbye to Kristen Wiig and Andy Samberg, two of the major performers on the show's past couple of seasons. Samberg and his cohorts from The Lonely Island brought the show into the viral media age with their Digital Shorts, and for better or worse, Wiig was the show's dominant performer. The loss of the show's most recognizable stars seemed to portend an uncertain time in SNL's history, but despite the hiring of a few new faces and the dismissal of another player (Abby Elliott), the 2012-13 season didn't seem to have a feeling that there was a void the show was desperately trying to fill. A lot of the credit for this belongs to the new performers hired as featured players, particularly Cecily Strong; she established her place on the show quickly and firmly, in a way not seen since Amy Poehler. Kate McKinnon (a late-season addition for 2011-12), was also fairly prominent, owing to having similar strengths as the departed Wiig. While Aidy Bryant and Tim Robinson are still waiting for their breakouts, both show promise and distinct sensibilities that the show could mine to its benefit.
I do feel the long tenures of some players like Seth Meyers, Fred Armisen and Kenan Thompson tend to hold the show from effectively developing some of the new cast, but in three seasons alone, Taran Killam seems ready to take over as SNL's alpha male next season. Jason Sudeikis and Bill Hader provided a solid backbone for this season. Bobby Moynihan had the best year of his tenure, Vanessa Bayer rebounded from a confidence drop that plagued her throughout 2011-12, and Jay Pharoah taking over the Obama impression helped establish his place in the cast. Only Nasim Pedrad feels particularly misused, mainly stuck with "little kid" and "old lady" roles.
The writing staff was mostly stable this year. There were a few departures: Christine Nangle and Weekend Update writer Jessica Conrad did not come back this season, and John Mulaney joined Paula Pell as a part-time contributor. One writer returned to the show after a seven-year absence (Joe Kelly, most recently a writer/producer for How I Met Your Mother). Neil Casey and Josh Patten joined the staff, and, beginning in February, a slew of guest writers were brought aboard for brief stints, including Chelsea Peretti, Cora Frazier, Michael Che, Edi Patterson, Monica Padrick and Kids In The Hall alum Kevin McDonald (Che was later added to the regular roster for the May shows).
The season was fairly uneven, though, with more pronounced highs and lows than SNL's experienced in a few years. There were a greater number of outright duds this year (the Mountain Pass sketch from Louis CK comes to mind), yet the stumbles felt more like the show was losing its fear of failure that made the last couple of seasons a little too safe and antiseptic. In a way, this actually came off as promising. There were also enough flashes of inspiration, including the Mike O'Brien-penned short film "Sad Mouse" and two-part sketches like Tim Robinson's "Z Shirts" and Seth Meyers' "Darrell's House" that imbued this season with a freshness not seen in a while.
The show has always had castmembers come and go to varying levels of fanfare, but it seems that the big emotional farewell for a departing player has become de rigeur in recent years. Phil Hartman's 1994 send-off featured the show's recurring characters performing a variant of "So Long, Farewell" from The Sound Of Music. Will Ferrell's 2002 departure was marked by the cast (except for Tracy Morgan) speaking out-of-character about how he'll be missed. What turned out to be Darrell Hammond's final show didn't have an explicit tribute, but the cameo-filled full-cast "Goodnight Saigon" performance felt uncharacteristically emotional to be just a random Will Ferrell sketch. The Kristen Wiig "graduation ceremony" at the end of Mick Jagger's show last season seemed to outdo all these earlier goodbyes; despite Wiig being such a divisive castmember for a lot of fans, the emotional displays of from her colleagues made her swan song all the more moving.
I touched on the news of Bill Hader, Fred Armisen and Seth Meyers' departures from SNL in my last post. Hader and Armisen both got their goodbyes last night; unlike Wiig, both performers chose to say their goodbyes in character. Hader's farewell was one last Stefon appearance on Weekend Update, culminating in a pre-taped segment of Seth Meyers racing through New York to stop the club promoter's wedding to Anderson Cooper a la The Graduate. Armisen used the show's 10-to-1 to perform an understated farewell tune as his Thatcherite punk character Ian Rubbish, with Hader, Killam and Sudeikis as the Bizarros, and cameos by Aimee Mann, Michael Penn, J. Mascis, Kim Gordon, Sex Pistol Steve Jones, and Armisen's Portlandia collaborator Carrie Brownstein. SNL is not a show that often features genuine emotion very often: when it does, such as last night, the results are amazing and devastating.
With the departures of Hader and Armisen, Meyers' impending move to the Late Night desk, and the rumored exit of Jason Sudiekis, last night's show truly felt like the end of an era for Saturday Night Live. Even if Meyers sticks around to ease the transition to the next Weekend Update anchor and head writer, he will seem more like a vestige of a prior version of SNL than a full-fledged member of the new guard.
The next season I'm going to be reviewing on the blog is...1982-83! I'm going to start my reviews after the current season wraps up; I'll be giving my thoughts on 2012-13 as a whole before doing my intro post for the season, then the first review will be of the Chevy Chase / Queen show.
It's been quite an eventful week in Saturday Night Live related news: it hasn't been a full week since the last live show with host Kristen Wiig (which was, by most accounts, underwhelming) but with word that this week's season finale will be Bill Hader and Fred Armisen's last show, and the announcement that Seth Meyers will depart mid-season to take over Late Night, SNL's next season is already shaping up to be very different.
Bill Hader's departure is going to be a huge loss for the show; I consider him to be the "glue" of the current cast, and many fans on the message boards have already mentioned he belongs in the ranks of the top ten SNLers of all time. He impressed me even as far back as his rookie season: there was one sketch in the Jason Lee episode that was a commercial parody for tasers, and Hader walked away with the whole thing with his delivery on one line: "Is that man a criminal? Well, he sure looked like one." There was a time when Andy Samberg overshadowed him, especially immediately after "Lazy Sunday" hit big, but Hader has been consistently solid in sketches, even if sometimes he begins to break character, as he does in Scared Straight, The Californians, or Stefon. Despite sticking around the show for a year longer than Kristen Wiig, it never really felt like he overstayed his welcome: even his big recurring character Stefon is still capable of providing the highlight of a particular show.
I'm a little more mixed on losing Fred Armisen. Early in his tenure, he brought such a different sensibility to the show, and was a relief from the antics of Jimmy Fallon and Horatio Sanz, which were starting to run their course (side note: I've since grown to appreciate both a bit more). Unfortunately, Armisen's last few years haven't held up to the standard set by his early SNL work. Part of the blame goes to his being cast as Barack Obama: at the time, it made a bit of sense, since Armisen had the closest resemblance to the candidate, but he never really got the voice down or found a real hook for the impression. It didn't help that the most frequent use of his Obama was in these lengthy, lecture-like "in one" segments. Toward the end of the run, his other roles started to run together: in the Arab Spring, he had a string of appearances as middle-eastern dictators making outdated pop-culture references in the same identical accent. I never cared much for Garth and Kat or The Californians either. His work on Portlandia seems to be where he's at his best, though, even if his later SNL work comes off as him goofing off and participating in private jokes. Even so, he still had a knack for knowing parodies of certain types of people and affectionate tributes to musical genres. Eleven years is a long time to stay on the show, though, and Armisen's departure is something that opens up a lot of possibilities for SNL.
The biggest change will be Seth Meyers' promotion to late-night talk show host. Meyers has been the show's head writer and Weekend Update anchor since 2006; he is currently the longest-tenured WU anchor of all time. While the show has taken a bit of a dip in quality around 2009, a lot of the sketches with Meyers' name attached have been some of the strongest of the past few seasons: he wrote Coach Bert (Steve Buscemi episode) and Darrell's House (Zach Galifianakis episode). He's staying an extra half-season, but I'm curious whether his exit will also mean that he's going to poach the ranks of the current SNL writing staff for his new show. Despite all the new players that have been introduced since Meyers became head writer, the writing feels stale at times, with the writers' room dominated by veterans and new writers only lasting a short period of time (particularly the 2008, 2009 and 2010 hires). If anything is going to shift the show significantly, it's going to be Meyers leaving.
I think the remaining cast (particularly Taran Killam and Cecily Strong) has proven they are more than capable of carrying the show, even if these three veterans are gone. Some expect Jason Sudeikis and Kenan Thompson to leave with them, but until either say the word, they could still be heading up the next year's cast. Despite some issues with the writing, this year's cast is one of the best in a long time.
But I'll get back to that after the finale.
There's finally a decent St. Elsewhere site on the internet. I had caught the show periodically when the Canadian cable channel then known as Prime ran episodes after M*A*S*H reruns, but it was the DVD release back in 2006 that got me hooked. Unfortunately, the DVD releases stopped with the first season: while there are some good episodes in that set, it's the least characteristic season of the show. I eventually managed to get a hold of the rest of the series in some form or another, and season two is where it starts resembling the show it would be for the rest of its run: Dr. Jack Morrison suffering through the first of many tragedies and indignities that befall him, the "you're a pig, Ehrlich" running gag, autistic Tommy Westphall, and the obsession with continuity that would pay off greatly as the show goes on. It's a shame this show isn't more readily available.
Viewers with nostalgia for the PBS kids shows they grew up with should also take a look at The Neighborhood Archive, a tribute to Fred Rogers and comprehensive exploration of his biggest TV legacy, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. There's a detailed episode guide that's still in the process of being put together (the webmaster is almost finished summarizing the 1969 season). Looking at some of these episode summaries brings me back to when I was watching the show in the late 80s and PBS still ran many of the older episodes during the spring and summer. I remember they would run a block of newer episodes with school-aged Prince Tuesday and Ana Platypus, then in the next week's shows, the model neighborhood in the titles would look different, Mister Rogers would have darker hair, and the walls of his "TV house" would be brown instead of blue. Watch this video of the 1970 opening and closing (pre-PBS, when the show was still called "Misterogers' Neighborhood); even if you weren't watching the show the last time that season aired in 1989, the music playing during the art card with the trolley and the episode number will stir some memories for people of a certain age.
As part of my research for the SNL Archives, I go through old episodes to see if I can identify writers, crew, and various other production staff, especially if they are used prominently in sketches. I've posted a few times before to see if I can get some help identifying them (so far I was able to get IDs for writers Paul Barrosse, costume designer Karen Roston, and talent executive Laurie Zaks; there are still a few I haven't identified yet. Check out out the first and second posts). I was wondering if anyone reading can confirm the identities of some of these staffers (and guests):
Dark-haired female staffer: She can be seen wishing Michael Keaton luck at the beginning of the October 30, 1982 show. It looks a tiny bit like Laurie Zaks going by the picture from the Casablanca sketch later that season (she's the one playing Julia Louis-Dreyfus' lesbian skier girlfriend); not entirely sure though.
Gary and Eddie's Hookers: From "Why?" sketch in the Ron Howard episode (October 9, 1982). They used up the full female cast on three roles. I'm assuming they're either writers or PAs that got roped into appearing on camera.
Dr. Robert Levine: Joel from the SNL Archives is quicker to include a non-cast if they end up portraying a real person on the show, and this commercial parody made fun of Mary Tyler Moore's recent marriage to a much-younger man.
Clamdigger #1: From "A Roy Orbison Christmas" sketch (December 21, 1985). The other three are (left to right) Terry Sweeney, Lanier Laney and Robert Downey Jr. I'm trying to figure out who the guy on the far left is.
Older man onstage during goodnights: Same show as above.
A lot has already been written about this season of Saturday Night Live, and a fan is more likely to read extensively about this season before actually watching a single episode. The first time I actually saw these shows was in late 1998, when they ran on the Comedy Network; I was surprised that they weren't anywhere as terrible as their reputation made them out to be. The shows were still weak, but I had already seen worse first-run shows by that point. When watching the show again for these reviews, I have to admit it was a little more draining this time around, but that could have been because I was in a more analytical frame of mind, and trying to identify specific strengths and weaknesses in sketches.
What I saw was a decent group of actors without a strong group dynamic. It usually helps a new SNL cast when some of the members have worked together in the past, the most notable examples being the original 1975 ensemble and the 1986 "second golden age" group. Ferris Butler confirmed that the entire creative staff had not worked together before. Several of the writers were also very young or inexperienced. Twelve episodes would not have been enough time for such a cobbled-together team of cast and writers to find their collective voice (for comparison's sake, the original cast's 12th show was Dick Cavett / Jimmy Cliff). There definitely was no lack of talent in either group, but they would have benefited from a little more time, a little less pressure and better leadership at the top.
A lot of the blame for the season's woes rightly falls on Jean Doumanian's head. Most accounts I've read indicate that she was not suited to a creative role, yet wouldn't cede authority on that particular front. One of the most widely-circulated stories about Doumanian's creative input was her written advice on one 1980-81 sketch: "Make it funnier". For all the criticism Doumanian deserves, though, NBC should get its share for selecting her for the role of producer. Once the network's buyer's remorse about Doumanian set in, their increased meddling with the show probably didn't help matters much either.
That said, I'm not entirely convinced that the show would have been received better under anyone besides Jean Doumanian. One such scenario would be if Al Franken hadn't done the "Limo for a Lamo" bit in May 1980 and succeeded Lorne Michaels as producer as intended. Franken may have been able to retain some key creative staff, and that likely would quell the cries of "pretender" from the viewers and critics, yet that may not have been enough. Franken (and the late Tom Davis) did actually produce the first season after Lorne Michaels returned to SNL in '85, which had similar negative response to the Doumanian year. (Michaels has served as executive producer for every season since except 1986-87 and 1995-96: he had a more hands-on role during these "retooling years" that followed very poorly received seasons). Continuity in creative personnel from season 5 may not have helped the show either, since the season before often had a tired and burnt-out aura.
I sometimes think Doumanian's failures ensured SNL's survival in the long-term, by necessitating the hiring of a network suit (Dick Ebersol) who served as a buffer between the show and NBC. His show wasn't quite as edgy as the Michaels or even Doumanian versions, but Ebersol kept the show going long enough so that by the time he stepped down in 1985, Lorne Michaels was ready to return to the show.
I'm always interested in hearing the different takes on life at the show; I want to thank 1980-81 writer Ferris Butler for his valuable information regarding that season and his identification of show staff in bit parts as well. Special thanks also goes to Raj for his information on the extras. If anyone has more information regarding sketch writing credits, people doing background work, or are just interested in telling their side of their story, please feel free to leave a comment or contact me directly.
The cast:
Denny Dillon and Gilbert Gottfried
Denny Dillon: Dillon made a strong impression fairly early by carrying a lot of the sketches in the first two shows of the season, having the first recurring character of the new cast, and bringing needed energy to weaker sketches. There was a little bit of a sameness to her performances that became more evident over the season, but she was a consistent, dependable performer. She gave a lot of her castmates a boost whenever she shared sketches with them (Gail Matthius' Vickie was better once she had Dillon's Debbie to play off), and just seemed to exhibit a willingness and commitment in whatever she appeared in. [MVP: Gould, McDowell]
Gilbert Gottfried: It's a little disarming to see Gofffried in these shows, especially since he was so young, with his eyes wide open and not speaking in that famous stilted squawk. Where Dillon jumped in, Gottfried had a tendency to hold back: the legend goes that he didn't want to use his A-material on the show because he was concerned the network would claim ownership. Gottfried's performances would end up being the clearest barometer of the Jean Doumanian era: early on, he's more lively and animated, if a little green, but toward the end of the season, he is a little more sullen and withdrawn. His decrease in spark could have been because he got some of the most thankless jobs on the show that didn't go to featured players (having to wear the Master Po makeup all night in Carradine, playing a vegetable along the featureds in Dazola, and his nadir: being the corpse in a funeral sketch). Like most of the cast, though, he was not without his moments: he worked well with Dillon as the Waxmans, and I thought his collaborations with writer Ferris Butler were particularly fruitful. [MVP: Kellerman]
Gail Matthius
Gail Matthius: Matthius definitely had potential to be a great cast member, and hit the highest highs out of all three female leads, but she also had a few really frustrating moments on the show. Impressions were her weakest point, and despite her efforts, she didn't really have the ability to rise above some of the material she was given. She had a rough time on Weekend Update as well; fumbling a bit in her early shows at the desk and getting saddled with some of the worst jokes ever written. These missteps seem even more disappointing because when she was actually given good material, she did quite well: I especially liked Francis Lively and the little girl character she played in "Lonely Old Lady", and thought she ended up going out on a strong note with "Same". I can only wonder how she would have fared on a different incarnation of the show. [MVP: Carradine, Harry]
Joe Piscopo
Joe Piscopo: Piscopo ended up being one of the two castmembers that stole Charles Rocket's thunder by demonstrating he was a better fit for the characters and celebrity impressions that the show built its name on in the first five seasons. Piscopo was consistent, well-rounded, and seemed to feel more natural in the prominent roles that Rocket was being schooled for. I'd draw the line at calling Piscopo an MVP of the season: I believe the key to his relative success this year were clear and repeated hooks in his signature bits (SNL Sports and Paulie Herman; Sinatra developed more fully after Ebersol took over), but he was always more of a "safe" performer and didn't have the kind of charisma that demanded attention like what Eddie Murphy provided, a quality that was desperately needed this season. [MVP: Gould]
Charles Rocket and Ann Risley
Ann Risley: I actually thought Risley handled the straighter roles fairly well. Risley never managed to have a recurring character, and there were a few performances of hers that were pretty dodgy (mainly as the hosts of "Dying To Be Heard" and "Was I Ever Red"), but I wonder how much of it was actually her acting style (she's more of a straight actress) and how much of it was the writers not finding a breakout role for her (she did come close with the Toni Tenille sketch). Some say that she was a poor fit for SNL, but I saw a few small glimpses of a potential Kristen Wiig-style performer whose true gift was understatement, although Wiig had the added benefit of being able to write for herself. A key part of success on the show is either writing for yourself or finding the right writer to collaborate with; I don't know whether Risley had that support for herself.
Charles Rocket: Doumanian was banking too much on Rocket to be the breakout star: usually when something is pushed so heavily, it only helps build a backlash toward the performer. Rocket was no exception, and he had a few liabilities that probably hurt him on the show: his impressions were weak, and whenever he tried to play big (like his February Updates or even in Billy-Gram), he chewed so much scenery it was distracting. When he dialed it back, though, he was a decent utility player, and his strengths in those roles presage his respectable career as a character actor. Rocket's true strength on the show, though, was catching people off-guard during The Rocket Report, where a different type of charm emerged than when he was doing sketches. Unfortunately, Rocket became the public face for Jean Doumanian's mistakes on the show, and that one moment during the Charlene Tilton goodnights overshadowed pretty much everything he did since, even after he took his own life. [MVP: Black]
Yvonne Hudson and Charles Rocket
Yvonne Hudson: SNL's first black female featured player was essentially doing the same types of roles she had been doing uncredited for the previous few seasons; aside from some increased prominence in sketches for a few episodes, she was still essentially an extra on the show. There is actually one episode where she has less lines that SNL's resident "old man" extra, Andy Murphy. Despite no longer being in the opening credits, she was kept around as an extra the next few seasons.
Matthew Laurance and Eddie Murphy
Matthew Laurance: Aside from Eddie Murphy, Laurance was the most prominent of the featured players. I thought he was decent as a utility man, and served as a good counterpoint to the more exaggerated performances of Rocket and Piscopo, even if he didn't make a strong impression on his own. I wonder how he would have done with one of Rocket or Piscopo's pitchman roles.
Eddie Murphy: From his first speaking role, Murphy demonstrated why he was full cast material. There were a few appearances that betrayed his inexperience (particularly Newsbreak in Harry), but he had a confidence that the others in the cast seemed to lack, and made stronger impressions in less airtime than most of the cast did in more. [MVP: Burstyn, Sharkey, Hays, Tilton]
Patrick Weathers
Patrick Weathers: His Bob Dylan sketch in Carradine was the main thing that distinguished him; he might have made a bigger impact if he was given more to do. I won't hold Ravi Sings against him.
Robin Duke
Robin Duke: Out of Dick Ebersol's three full-cast hires, Duke made a smallest impression of the three, getting a band intro, a leftover Jane Curtin role, a decent part in a five-man sketch and a last-minute voice-over in the bag lady film. None of these roles really showed what she was known for on SCTV, and viewers would get a better glimpse of her capabilities the next season. Part of this can be attributed to the fact that Duke was a last-minute addition: Catherine O'Hara was originally slated to be on the show in her place (and was listed in news articles as late as five days before airtime), but O'Donoghue's first staff meeting seemed to justify her reticence towards joining the SNL cast. O'Hara recommended old friend Duke for the show, and a month later, O'Hara was on the same network with the resurrected SCTV. If the strike hadn't happened, Duke could have made an impact as soon as the next show.
Tim Kazurinksy and Tony Rosato
Tim Kazurinsky: Kazurinsky seemed to fit SNL immediately, and ended up dominating the first Ebersol-produced show. Part of Kazurisnky's strong first outing comes from his prominence in two of the longer pieces, but being a combination writer/performer, and coming from an improv background certainly helped him hit the ground running. It was John Belushi's recommendation that got Kazurinsky hired on the show, and Belushi's instincts turned out to be correct. [MVP: Finale]
Tony Rosato: Like Duke, Rosato came from SCTV, and like Kazurinsky, he was hired as a writer/performer and made a fairly strong impression in his first show. He and Kazurinsky worked well together in their two main sketches, but he would find a stronger footing the following season.
Laurie Metcalf
Laurie Metcalf: One of the most successful people to have an incredibly brief SNL tenure, Metcalf's sole appearance on the show was a pre-filmed "man on the street" piece. I can't assess how she would have fared if Ebersol kept her on based on that one segment.
Emily Prager
Emily Prager: Prager didn't even appear on-camera during her only live show. She has, however, appeared on the show before and after her tenure as a featured player: she was a girlfriend of Tom Davis' and appeared occasionally as an extra around 1977-78; she and Davis also appear in the Button film next season.
Strongest shows:
Weakest shows:
Best sketches:
Honorable mention: The Rocket Report - Fifth Avenue Charles Rocket's signature piece remains the place where his talents were best put to use.
Worst sketches:
Best musical guests:
Worst musical guests:
To be honest, I couldn't really say that there were any truly bad musical guests. Joe "King" Carrasco may have had a rough and raw sound but it was clear the band was going for energy over technique, and the worst I could really say about Ellen Shipley is that she was decent but a little generic-sounding. The other musical guests only really pale in comparison to the stellar choices Doumanian (and whoever else was involved in snagging musical guests) made this year. I wonder how much of the booking strategy was intentional and how much of it was necessity, but this was where the Jean Doumanian show had some of their biggest victories.
Writer tally and turnover:
(*) indicates the writer returned the next season, (~) indicates a previous writer returning to SNL.
Aside from Ferris Butler's contributions (special thanks goes to Butler for providing a lot of insightful information about the season, by the way), knowledge of Blaustein & Sheffield's partnership with Eddie Murphy and a handful of other sketches whose writers have been identified, I don't really know what each specific writers' voices are in the show and whether any shifts in quality were from writers joining or leaving, or being favored or disfavored. If anyone has more information regarding who was responsible for any sketches, please feel free to drop me a line.
Full season:
Full Doumanian run:
Shorter tenure:
Post-hiatus hires:
An essay regarding the season as a whole will follow in a subsequent post.
Cancer claimed two former SNL writers this week. Nelson Lyon, a writer for the 1981-82 season, died Tuesday of liver cancer at the age of 73. Two days later, Tom Davis, one of the show's original writers and a returning contributor to the show following Lorne Michaels' re-arrival, succumbed to throat and neck cancer at 59.
Davis was a prominent figure in the show's history: he was responsible for many of the well-known sketches such as Coneheads, Final Days, and got more than a few complaints with his and Al Franken's Stunt Baby, X-Police, and First He Cries. He appeared on camera fairly often through his tenure on the show, usually in tandem with Franken, and at one point landing "featured player" status with the other tenured writers for 1979-80; he also provided countless voiceovers for sketches. He left with the original writers in 1980, then returned along with Lorne Michaels and Al Franken five years later. Franken and Davis produced the poorly-received 1985-86 season (with Michaels as executive producer). When Michaels took a more direct involvement with the show the following season, Davis was gone, but not for long: he rejoined the writing staff in January 1987 and stayed through the 1993-94 season. Since then, he contributed sketches on 12 shows between 1997 and 2004, including "Leather Man" with Jimmy Fallon and Horatio Sanz.
Lyon was more of a shadowy, underground figure; a collaborator of Michael O'Donoghue's, and probably known more for his sex comedy "The Telephone Book" and his association with John Belushi during his final days. Lyon contributed to O'Donoghue's "At Home With The Psychos" (with Terry Southern and Rosie Shuster) and penned "The Mild One", an existential biker sketch featuring Bruce Dern. He had a handful of on-camera appearances as well, as a prisoner, a bodyguard and Josef Stalin. Lyon's impact on SNL may be less apparent than Davis', but as the basis for O'Donoghue's "Mr. Mike" and a key part of the unique tone of the 1981-82 SNL, it should not be underestimated.
Personal website of photographer and writer Bronwyn Douwsma.
I’m on the bus. It’s too early to be human and I haven’t had my coffee yet so I don’t really want to do much; maybe read or listen to music, things that help tune out the other people or the monotony of the commute. When I leave the suburbs, it's usually dark. I sometimes look out the windows, but more to see how far I’ve traveled than at anything interesting. By the time I arrive downtown, I can see the sun coming up over the harbour.
The year is winding down. I’m preparing to go to New Brunswick for my regular Christmas visit with the family; my travel arrangements up there have all been taken care of. I haven’t bothered with Christmas shopping yet; my cash flow was a little tight until my last paycheque came in, and my tolerance for the malls has dropped over the years. Everything costs too much money now.
“Mel’s Rock Pile - MacArthur Park” sketches include “Sunrise Semester: Greek Travel”, “Message From Prickley: Mel’s Rock Pile”, “Promo: Jackie Stewart’s Wide World of High Voices”, “Exercise Is Easy”, “Kanadian Korner” and “Mel’s Rock Pile”.
“Dick Cavett” sketches include “Cooking With Marcello”, “Kanadian Korner”, “Promo: Fish ‘N Chips”, “Logos Galore”, “Monster Chiller Horror Theatre” and “The Dick Cavett Show”.
“The Mating Game” sketches include “Promo: Starting Out with Bill Needle”, “Eskimo Arts”, “Message From Prickley: The Mating Game”, “Kanadian Korner”, “Promo: Taxi Driver”, “SCTV News” and “The Mating Game”.
“Gene Shalit’s America” sketches include “Sunrise Semester: Societal Behavior”, “American Express”, “SCTV Special News Report”, “Kanadian Korner”, “SCTV News”, “Comment with David Brinkley”, “Gene Shalit’s America” and “Dialing For Dollars”.
“Midnight Express Special” sketches include “Sunrise Semester: Basic Photography”, “Mamorex Video Tape”, “Kanadian Korner”, “Promo: Tomorrow, Today, Tonight”, “Bill Needle’s Mailbag”, “Message From Guy: Midnight Express Special”, and “Midnight Express Special”.
“Cookery Crock” sketches include “Sunrise Semester: Disasters In The Home”, “Nasex Nasal Deodorant”, “Bill Needle’s Mailbag”, “Kanadian Korner”, “Promo: The Freddie De Cordova Show”, “Cookery Crock” and “Quincy: Cartoon Coroner”.
“Two-Way TV” sketches include “Sunrise Semester: Astrology”, “Promo: Monster Chiller Horror Theatre”, “Kanadian Korner”, “SCTV News”, “Comment with David Brinkley”, “Promo: Cruisin’ Gourmet”, “Two-Way TV”, “Bill Needle’s Mailbag”, “Promo: Crazy Crafts”, and “Sermonette: Rabbi Karlov”.
“Alpha Channel” sketches include “Gordon Lightfoot Sings Every Song Ever Written”, “Cooking With Marcello”, “Kanadian Korner”, “Crazy Crafts”, “Message From Guy: Alpha Channel”, “Promo: Alpha Channel”, “Bill Needle’s Mailbag”, and “Dialing For Dollars”.
There’s a podcast called The Loudest Girl In The World, hosted by Lauren Ober. The show concerns Ober’s autism diagnosis at 42, as well as her experience dealing with this information and opening up to others about it. When I listened to it last summer, I related pretty heavily to what she was talking about. I’ve also started to make peace with how my own brain works in the last few years. It’s been a rough road, though.