Old SNL
Netflix now has episodes of SNL going back to the first episode in 1975. Paul showed me select sketches from the first three episodes. I expected it to be pretty bad, because SNL is kind of bad, and variety shows from the 1970s are bad, but it was kind of good! Sure, there's a lot of stuff you can skip through, making each hour-plus episode approximately 20 minutes long, but that is true of the current iteration too.
What's striking is just how similar it is to the current version. Don Pardo announces; "Live from New York, it's Saturday Night" (the original name of the show); the opening credits with a jazzy house band tune (conducted by Howard Shore!) and a New York montage; commercial parodies; Weekend Update; everyone standing around waving over the credits. It is a weird little time-warp show, isn't it? You forget watching it now that there were probably a hundred shows like that back in the day.
That said, I understand that the practice of changing hosts each week was an unusual one even for the time, and perhaps that's the key to its longevity. Had it been "Saturday Night with Albert Brooks," I doubt it would be on now. No star to step down means no logical endpoint. Maybe that's the key to immortality.
1. George Carlin/Janis Ian/Billy Preston
Since we don't have the variety show category anymore, except perhaps for shows like Late Night with Conan O'Brien (another product of a bygone era), the musical guests that interrupt the comedy are an unusual remnant of its original format. Back in episode 1, this was really much more of a varied variety show. George Carlin's (awesome) stand-up comedy was interspersed throughout; there were two musical guests and an additional stand-up comedian. Regular features, including Weekend Update with Chevy Chase, Andy Kaufman, a short film by Albert Brooks, and a Jim Henson's Muppets segment, left relatively little time for comedy sketches. This was largely a good thing--the sketches that were there were short, punchy, heavy on commercial parody, and largely delightful.
Episode highlights:
* No less than four discrete George Carlin stand-up segments, including a classic final rant about God. "We are so conceited about this God concept that we go around describing him to each other. 'He's infinite, and we can never understand him, but I'll describe him for ya! First of all, he knows everything. He knows absolutely everything. I don't even know what I'm talking about, he knows what I mean.'"
* "Wolverines" sketch: The first sketch had a Russian-accented John Belushi repeating oddly wolverine-themed phrases from his English teacher.
* Solid commercial parodies; even with my limited exposure to commercials from the 70s, I can tell they are spot on. This week: "New Dad" (if anything should happen to you, your family will need a new dad--a service this insurance company can provide); "Tryopenin" (an arthritis medication in an impossible-to-open bottle); "Coach & Horse Home Security" (an agent from the security company breaks into a home to show its vulnerabilitiles); "Jamitol" (a woman's vitamin supplement--pretty much played straight, reading what I imagine is more or lessa transcript of the commercial it's parodying, except that the wife is played by Michael O'Donahue not in drag. Just a regular guy. It's worrying that the entire joke is the existence of gay dudes and/or Chevy Chase's deadpan description of O'Donahue as "my wife," "she," etc., but the little wink he gives at the end IS pretty charming.)
* Billy Preston, the funk musical guest, is great! I think the host chose the musical guests, which means George Carlin has good taste. Janis Ian is also good, but not as much my style.
* Andy Kaufman lip-synching to a record of "Mighty Mouse." While singing the lines sung by Mighty Mouse, he acts heroic, but while waiting through the other parts--which is most of the time--he stands around awkwardly. I'm not sure why Andy Kaufman has a reputation as a genius--the sketch doesn't sound like much when I write it down--but at the same time, I really enjoyed it for reasons I don't fully understand. For example, I can't explain to you why the audience cheered when Andy took a sip of water, but I was right there with them.
* Bee Hospital: Male cast members dressed in bee costumes pace outside a maternity ward door as female cast members come out dressed as nurses, handing them bundles and exclaiming, "It's a drone!" etc. That's all there is to it. So dumb it's almost kind of good. A classic "end of the night" sketch (weirdly in the middle of the show) where part of the fun comes from imagining the poor sap up all night dashing to turn it in for a 7AM deadline.
Episode Lowlights:
* Jim Henson's Muppets: Ugh. I LIKE Jim Henson's muppets, as a rule--I like Sesame Street and the Muppet Show and Fraggle Rock--but none of the charm of the children's shows seem to have made it into these "adult" sketches (adult here is not necessarily a euphemism for sexual, just wordy and crude). Tedious. Just tedious.
* A film by Albert Brooks: Nothing WRONG with it, per se, but I couldn't keep my eyes open. It's perhaps telling of the boring film style of the 1970s that I thought at first that the joke was that the Impossible Truth items were boring, but I think the idea is that they are actually impossible, such as Israel and Georgia, US switching places (" I know that my entire state is looking forward to heat without humidity"). The one part that got a chuckle from me was after a segment where a man hits on a little girl, and the narrator says in his usual authoritative narrator voice, "Although 'The Impossible Truth' airs what it must, some things it airs disgusts it."
They Didn't Know The Future:
* George Carlin jokes about how easy it would be to hijack an airplane.
* A commercial parody for the Triple Trac Razor, the razor with THREE (3) blades!!!
Final Grade: A
2. Paul Simon/Art Garfunkel/Randy Newman/Phoebe Snow
This is a much easier show for me to review, because there is just one musical guest after another. I have very little to say about music, especially the music of Paul Simon. In fact, instead of highlights, I will simply list everything that was NOT music or a regular feature (Weekend Update, Muppets, Albert Brooks).
Things In The Episode Other Than Music (Complete):
* Commercial for "Graffiti Wallpaper," allowing comfortable middle-class ex-hippies to reminisce about their protest days. According to the Internet, this was presented by a member of the Chicago 7!
* Hardly a sketch, but Paul Simon is apparently about to plug next week's show when the bees come out in their little nurses caps, etc. Paul Simon apologetically tells them, "The Bees number is cut. It didn’t work last week. I’m sorry." I like that they turned the Bees into a joke about how bad the bees are--it shows they have the same attitude toward them as me: knowing they are terrible but liking to see them anyway.
* Commercial for a battery to power a pacemaker. Actually doesn't seem THAT much like a parody. Boring.
See how easy that was?
Final Grade: D
3. Rob Reiner/The Lockers
I didn't make the connection before watching this between Rob Reiner, director of Princess Bride and When Harry Met Sally, and Meathead from All in the Family. But it is the same guy. His wife, Penny Marshall (Laverne from Laverne and Shirley) also appears heavily in the episode. They are solid comedic performers, both a little smarmy, but it works. And Rob Reiner's choice of musical guests--an awesome breakdancing team who seem to perform superhuman stunts, and John Belushi doing a Joe Cocker impression--are beyond reproach.
Episode Highlights:
* Stilted message from the "National Pancreas Association" tries awkwardly to raise pancreas awareness, with John Belushi delivering lines such as, "Gee, honey, I must have unthinkingly ruled my pancreas out."
* Andy Kaufman lip-synchs to an old-fashioned recording of "Pop Goes the Weasel" including a conversation between the singer and a "daughter" character. Most of the song Andy is in character as the smarmy "dad"/singer, only becoming shy and awkward during the instrumental and the girl's part. Amusing as always to watch Andy's face, though it does seem like a less-good version of last week's joke.
* The Lockers! So good
* John Belushi's Joe Cocker impression is spot-on. I ASSUMED it was true when I saw it and I confirmed with a Youtube video.
* Chevy Chase, in costume for once, delivers a public service announcement for the Droolers' Anti-Defamation League. "Contemporary droolers include Don Pardo."
* Rob Reiner and Penny Marshall perform a cookie-cutter dramatic break-up scene, during which the Bees quietly filter on taking extra roles. Rob freaks out, yelling, "I don't NEED THE BEES!" until John Belushi, to the accompaniment of a bee violinist, gives a counter-speech: "We didn’t ask to be bees. You see, you, you’ve got Norman Lear and a first-rate writing staff. But this is all they came up with for us."
Final Grade: B
Resource: SNL Transcripts
What's striking is just how similar it is to the current version. Don Pardo announces; "Live from New York, it's Saturday Night" (the original name of the show); the opening credits with a jazzy house band tune (conducted by Howard Shore!) and a New York montage; commercial parodies; Weekend Update; everyone standing around waving over the credits. It is a weird little time-warp show, isn't it? You forget watching it now that there were probably a hundred shows like that back in the day.
That said, I understand that the practice of changing hosts each week was an unusual one even for the time, and perhaps that's the key to its longevity. Had it been "Saturday Night with Albert Brooks," I doubt it would be on now. No star to step down means no logical endpoint. Maybe that's the key to immortality.
1. George Carlin/Janis Ian/Billy Preston
Since we don't have the variety show category anymore, except perhaps for shows like Late Night with Conan O'Brien (another product of a bygone era), the musical guests that interrupt the comedy are an unusual remnant of its original format. Back in episode 1, this was really much more of a varied variety show. George Carlin's (awesome) stand-up comedy was interspersed throughout; there were two musical guests and an additional stand-up comedian. Regular features, including Weekend Update with Chevy Chase, Andy Kaufman, a short film by Albert Brooks, and a Jim Henson's Muppets segment, left relatively little time for comedy sketches. This was largely a good thing--the sketches that were there were short, punchy, heavy on commercial parody, and largely delightful.
Episode highlights:
* No less than four discrete George Carlin stand-up segments, including a classic final rant about God. "We are so conceited about this God concept that we go around describing him to each other. 'He's infinite, and we can never understand him, but I'll describe him for ya! First of all, he knows everything. He knows absolutely everything. I don't even know what I'm talking about, he knows what I mean.'"
* "Wolverines" sketch: The first sketch had a Russian-accented John Belushi repeating oddly wolverine-themed phrases from his English teacher.
* Solid commercial parodies; even with my limited exposure to commercials from the 70s, I can tell they are spot on. This week: "New Dad" (if anything should happen to you, your family will need a new dad--a service this insurance company can provide); "Tryopenin" (an arthritis medication in an impossible-to-open bottle); "Coach & Horse Home Security" (an agent from the security company breaks into a home to show its vulnerabilitiles); "Jamitol" (a woman's vitamin supplement--pretty much played straight, reading what I imagine is more or lessa transcript of the commercial it's parodying, except that the wife is played by Michael O'Donahue not in drag. Just a regular guy. It's worrying that the entire joke is the existence of gay dudes and/or Chevy Chase's deadpan description of O'Donahue as "my wife," "she," etc., but the little wink he gives at the end IS pretty charming.)
* Billy Preston, the funk musical guest, is great! I think the host chose the musical guests, which means George Carlin has good taste. Janis Ian is also good, but not as much my style.
* Andy Kaufman lip-synching to a record of "Mighty Mouse." While singing the lines sung by Mighty Mouse, he acts heroic, but while waiting through the other parts--which is most of the time--he stands around awkwardly. I'm not sure why Andy Kaufman has a reputation as a genius--the sketch doesn't sound like much when I write it down--but at the same time, I really enjoyed it for reasons I don't fully understand. For example, I can't explain to you why the audience cheered when Andy took a sip of water, but I was right there with them.
* Bee Hospital: Male cast members dressed in bee costumes pace outside a maternity ward door as female cast members come out dressed as nurses, handing them bundles and exclaiming, "It's a drone!" etc. That's all there is to it. So dumb it's almost kind of good. A classic "end of the night" sketch (weirdly in the middle of the show) where part of the fun comes from imagining the poor sap up all night dashing to turn it in for a 7AM deadline.
Episode Lowlights:
* Jim Henson's Muppets: Ugh. I LIKE Jim Henson's muppets, as a rule--I like Sesame Street and the Muppet Show and Fraggle Rock--but none of the charm of the children's shows seem to have made it into these "adult" sketches (adult here is not necessarily a euphemism for sexual, just wordy and crude). Tedious. Just tedious.
* A film by Albert Brooks: Nothing WRONG with it, per se, but I couldn't keep my eyes open. It's perhaps telling of the boring film style of the 1970s that I thought at first that the joke was that the Impossible Truth items were boring, but I think the idea is that they are actually impossible, such as Israel and Georgia, US switching places (" I know that my entire state is looking forward to heat without humidity"). The one part that got a chuckle from me was after a segment where a man hits on a little girl, and the narrator says in his usual authoritative narrator voice, "Although 'The Impossible Truth' airs what it must, some things it airs disgusts it."
They Didn't Know The Future:
* George Carlin jokes about how easy it would be to hijack an airplane.
* A commercial parody for the Triple Trac Razor, the razor with THREE (3) blades!!!
Final Grade: A
2. Paul Simon/Art Garfunkel/Randy Newman/Phoebe Snow
This is a much easier show for me to review, because there is just one musical guest after another. I have very little to say about music, especially the music of Paul Simon. In fact, instead of highlights, I will simply list everything that was NOT music or a regular feature (Weekend Update, Muppets, Albert Brooks).
Things In The Episode Other Than Music (Complete):
* Commercial for "Graffiti Wallpaper," allowing comfortable middle-class ex-hippies to reminisce about their protest days. According to the Internet, this was presented by a member of the Chicago 7!
* Hardly a sketch, but Paul Simon is apparently about to plug next week's show when the bees come out in their little nurses caps, etc. Paul Simon apologetically tells them, "The Bees number is cut. It didn’t work last week. I’m sorry." I like that they turned the Bees into a joke about how bad the bees are--it shows they have the same attitude toward them as me: knowing they are terrible but liking to see them anyway.
* Commercial for a battery to power a pacemaker. Actually doesn't seem THAT much like a parody. Boring.
See how easy that was?
Final Grade: D
3. Rob Reiner/The Lockers
I didn't make the connection before watching this between Rob Reiner, director of Princess Bride and When Harry Met Sally, and Meathead from All in the Family. But it is the same guy. His wife, Penny Marshall (Laverne from Laverne and Shirley) also appears heavily in the episode. They are solid comedic performers, both a little smarmy, but it works. And Rob Reiner's choice of musical guests--an awesome breakdancing team who seem to perform superhuman stunts, and John Belushi doing a Joe Cocker impression--are beyond reproach.
Episode Highlights:
* Stilted message from the "National Pancreas Association" tries awkwardly to raise pancreas awareness, with John Belushi delivering lines such as, "Gee, honey, I must have unthinkingly ruled my pancreas out."
* Andy Kaufman lip-synchs to an old-fashioned recording of "Pop Goes the Weasel" including a conversation between the singer and a "daughter" character. Most of the song Andy is in character as the smarmy "dad"/singer, only becoming shy and awkward during the instrumental and the girl's part. Amusing as always to watch Andy's face, though it does seem like a less-good version of last week's joke.
* The Lockers! So good
* John Belushi's Joe Cocker impression is spot-on. I ASSUMED it was true when I saw it and I confirmed with a Youtube video.
* Chevy Chase, in costume for once, delivers a public service announcement for the Droolers' Anti-Defamation League. "Contemporary droolers include Don Pardo."
* Rob Reiner and Penny Marshall perform a cookie-cutter dramatic break-up scene, during which the Bees quietly filter on taking extra roles. Rob freaks out, yelling, "I don't NEED THE BEES!" until John Belushi, to the accompaniment of a bee violinist, gives a counter-speech: "We didn’t ask to be bees. You see, you, you’ve got Norman Lear and a first-rate writing staff. But this is all they came up with for us."
Final Grade: B
Resource: SNL Transcripts