March 26, 1977 – Jack Burns / Santana (S2 E17)

Sketches are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
JOB refuses to say SNL’s opening line until his demands are met
 
— Just now, John noticeably referred to the show as “Saturday Night Live”. I wonder if this is the episode where the show’s title officially became that instead of just “Saturday Night”.
— I love John’s mischievously joyful realization that he’s the only thing keeping the show from starting.
— All of his LFNY fake-outs are funny.
— Funny turn with him now reading a list of demands.
— Great ending with him being tricked into saying LFNY when reading aloud the letter he was handed. His panicked reaction when realizing he was fooled is killing me.
STARS: ****

OPENING MONTAGE
— Yep, this is indeed the very first episode where the show’s title was officially changed to “Saturday Night Live”.

MONOLOGUE
host fulfills a lifelong yearning by touching himself
 
— I thought I didn’t know who this guy is, but he looks surprisingly familiar. Eh, maybe he just reminds me of another actor.
— Oh, this guy’s a stand-up?
— Really? THAT’S the punchline? THAT’S what this whole monologue was building up to?
— The less said about that overly-corny punchline, the better…
STARS: *½

THE FARBERS MEET THE CONEHEADS
Larry & Bobbi Farber have Coneheads over for dinner
   
— Ah, the Farbers.
— Coneheads! I love this idea for a recurring character crossover. I’m kinda surprised, though, because the Farbers weren’t established recurring characters yet; they’ve only appeared once prior to this, in a miscellaneous piece with Kris Kristofferson.
— Something about the forehead/eyebrows area of Jane’s Conehead make-up looks odder than usual in tonight’s installment.
— Very funny part with the Coneheads “reading” the game instructions.
— Haha, Gilda and John are now breaking character and cracking up after the Coneheads all jumped through the window. Very rare to see any major character-breaking from this particular cast, which makes it a welcome novelty whenever it happens.
— The unplanned laughing was a good way to end the sketch.
— Overall, a great sketch.
STARS: ****

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE

MARINE WEDDING
(host) performs a militaristic wedding service for Marines (DAA) & (JAC)
  
— When I first saw Jane, I almost thought that was Candice Bergen making a cameo. I guess it’s something about Jane’s wig…
— This premise seems like it’ll get old FAST.
— They basically already used this same one-joke premise in that season 1 sketch with Chevy trying to film a commercial for the Marines, and I wasn’t crazy about it then.
— Overall, I was not a fan of this sketch at all.
STARS: *½

A TOWN WITHOUT PITY
Eliot Ness (DAA) & Untouchables take over India from Indira Gandhi (LAN)
   
— The return of Laraine’s Indira Gandhi impression.
— Oh, no, not a song.
— John’s performing very well in his and Laraine’s song, but this is still a chore for me to sit through.
— Ha, I like the sudden turn this has taken with “The Untouchables” being revealed to be the characters from the Untouchables TV series.
— Our first time in quite a while seeing the “drop the cow” sketch-ending routine that was used a few times in season 1.
— Overall, a sketch that started out really bad, but slowly improved a little in the second half.
STARS: **½

WEEKEND UPDATE, PART 1
JAC begs cardboard cut-out of Harry Reasoner to join her at SNL
   
— Funny beginning with Jane flirting with a Harry Reasoner cardboard cut-out.
— The Karl Malden/Ernest Borgnine joke was hilarious.

LEECH-TAB 100
old-fashioned pharmacist (DAA) prescribes leeches to (BIM) & (GIR)
 
— Fairly funny concept.
— Dan’s pitchman in this is a big change of pace from the fast-talking pitchmen he usually plays.
— Ha, they’re actually using REAL leeches?
— Despite the okay concept, the execution felt a little bland and didn’t work as well as I thought it would.
STARS: **½

WEEKEND UPDATE, PART 2
JAC announces the Oscar winners with results stolen from accounting firm

— The bit with Jane “spoiling” the results of the then-upcoming Oscars was interesting. I wonder how accurate those “spoilers” ended up becoming.
— No guests this week (unless you count Cardboard Harry Reasoner)
STARS (FOR BOTH WEEKEND UPDATE HALVES): ***

THE STORY OF THE SQUATTERS
crouching early Americans settle the frontier
   
— The visual gag of literally “squatting” – ohh, geez. Not sure how to feel about this premise; something about it feels very season 6-ish – not a good thing.
— I did get a laugh just now from the “Does a bear squat in the woods?” line.
— Props to the performers for being committed in carrying out this premise, but man, is this sketch going awfully far for such a flimsy, corny visual gag.
STARS: *½

SUICIDE LETTER
host blows suicidal businessman skit by doing his jump without ducking
   
— I think the suicide revelation was supposed to be a surprise, but I saw it coming early on as soon as Jack casually opened the window.
— I like the way this is breaking the fourth wall after Jack has “ruined” the sketch.
— This is great with more and more cast members coming on and realizing the illusion of the sketch has been shattered.
— Loved Bill’s stern delivery of “What the hell are you doing standing up?”
— Gilda’s overly-emotional entrance as the wife is hilarious.
— Oh, wait, Gilda’s actually playing a mistress. Still funny, though.
STARS: ***½

ROCKY
by Gary Weis- host trains for SNL Rocky-style
host drinks a raw egg to show that his training worked
   
— Funny hearing some audience members having a grossed-out reaction to Jack drinking the egg yolk.
— What’s with the generic background music during this parody of the famous training montage from “Rocky”? Shouldn’t we be hearing the usual “Gonna Fly Now” song?
— Oh, there’s the song now, in this “the next day” scene.
— This film had an okay pay-off and Jack gave a good performance. The ending slo-mo shot went on way too long, however.
STARS: **½

ASK BIG DADDY
Idi Amin (GAM) thinly covers massacres of citizens

— I like seeing the return of Bill’s Walter Cronkite impression. The voice he uses as him always makes me laugh.
— Is this supposed to be a variation of the “Ask President Carter” sketch from a few episodes earlier?
— Hearing white cast members & writers doing voices of African citizens feels kinda wrong.
— The repeated “everyone died in a car crash” joke has already gotten old.
— Overall, this wasn’t very good. Yet another weak Garrett Morris-led piece.
STARS: **

MIRAGE
desert vending machine fails to quench a traveller’s thirst
 
— Well, that sure was short, but the punchline definitely worked.
STARS: ***½

PANTYGRAMS
Ricardo Montalban (DAA) tells how Pantygrams send messages via underwear
  
— The idea of a Panty-Gram is pretty funny.
— LOL at Gilda in those shorts.
— This sketch is not really working so far, and is falling flat.
— Despite looking awkward at the very beginning of his scene, Bill ended up being funny and the pay-off of his scene made me laugh. That almost redeemed this whole sketch.
STARS: **

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE

GAGS BEASLEY
drunk, washed-up comedy writer (host) approaches JAC & GIR in a bar

— I like the staging of this sketch.
— What was with that brief cut to a far away camera angle?

— I love the name Gags Beasley.
— This sketch is being performed very well, and even has a sad undertone to Jack’s character. This era of SNL was always good at pulling off pathos.
— Funny bit with Jack’s “business card” turning out to just be an 8 of clubs card.
— A nice sentimental ending to this overall solid 10-to-1 sketch.
STARS: ****

GOODNIGHTS
 

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A pretty weak episode. A large number of sketches fell flat, either due to overly-thin concepts (Squatters, Marine Wedding, Ask Big Daddy), poor executions of decent ideas (Panty-Gram, Leech-Tab 100), or other circumstances. There were a few things that did work well, like the Farbers/Coneheads crossover, the 10-to-1 piece, and the fourth-wall-breaking suicide sketch, but there sure was a lot of mediocrity surrounding them.
— Jack Burns seemed to have a natural comedic presence, but boy was his monologue cringeworthy. Other than that, he wasn’t bad, but as a host, he ended up coming off as kind of a poor man’s Robert Klein. Great job in that last sketch, though.
— Man, the show has been in a bit of a slump lately, with the overly-average Sissy Spacek episode, the fairly-underwhelming Broderick Crawford episode, and now this mediocre episode. It’s been a while since the last time I was crazy about an episode.

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Broderick Crawford):
— a slight step down

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW:
Julian Bond