Sketches are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
COLD OPENING
Fred Silverman (JOB) appoints Gary Coleman as vice president of NBC
— Funny reveal with the announcement of Gary Coleman being Fred Silverman’s new chief assistant. A snapshot of the days when then-new sitcom “Diff’rent Strokes” was one of the very few hits NBC had at the time.
— Overall, a pretty good cold opening.
STARS: ***
MONOLOGUE
host does stand-up about how his mother mistreated him when he was young
— Another mention of Michael’s mother.
— The whole coal miner baby story has several funny parts.
— Abrupt ending with him suddenly throwing to James Taylor’s musical performance.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Johnnie Comes Back”
MILES COWPERTHWAITE
Miles Cowperthwaite sails with manly men aboard The Raging Queen
— Ah, here’s the “Raging Queen” sketch that I thought we were getting in the Miles Cowperthwaite sketch from Michael’s earlier episode this season.
— John’s flirtatious behavior towards Michael at bedtime is pretty funny.
— Gilda, Laraine, and John all “comforting” Michael in bed was hilarious.
— Funny with Bill’s decision to amputate Michael’s legs just because they had been soaking wet.
— I like the ending with the next chapter being titled “I Am Eaten By Sharks”.
— Overall, a very well-done epic sketch. I didn’t find this to be quite the classic this sketch has often been called; maybe because this type of humor with stereotypical gays doesn’t come off as outrageously hilarious now as it did back in the day. Still a very good sketch, though. Personally, I find the first Miles Cowperthwaite sketch from earlier this season to be the better of the two.
STARS: ****
MAGNA-GRO
Magna-Gro anabolic steroids build seeds into gigantic, strong plants
— I can already tell right from the opening scene with Bill and Laraine that this will be our usual absurd-premised Dan Aykroyd pitchman commercial.
— I was right.
— The mature live ox “extraction” Dan held up was a funny visual.
— I liked Bill arm-wrestling with the now-giant flower.
— Overall, a decent ad, though not as crazy as most Aykroyd pitchman commercials, which is kinda disappointing as this probably ends up being the last one he does before leaving the show.
STARS: ***
WEEKEND UPDATE PREVIEW
WEEKEND UPDATE
footage of Chico Escuela’s disastrous final game with the Mets
newly-elected Margaret Thatcher (host) clashes with JAC on Rhodesia
JAC & BIM don top hats & sing to wish Fred Astaire a happy 80th birthday
Father Guido Sarducci talks about two obscure Earth-like planets
— ANOTHER Chico Escuela pre-tape for the third episode in a row?
— Bill ends the Chico Escuela segment by announcing that Chico will be re-joining Update as a regular correspondent. Not exactly thrilling news for me, considering how tired I am of the endless narrow Update cycle of Chico, Roseanne Rosannadanna, and Father Guido Sarducci. I knew Chico’s “retirement” wouldn’t last long.
— Michael’s really funny as Margaret Thatcher.
— HA at Michael responding to Jane’s angry rant with “Jane, you’re an ignorant slut”.
— A mention from Bill of Fred Astaire’s birthday. Is this going to be yet another smarmy singing of “Happy Birthday” from Bill?
— Oh, never mind, this is actually different, with Bill and Jane wishing Astaire a happy birthday by doing a low-key Astaire-esque number, complete with top hats and canes. That was very nice.
— Speaking of the endless narrow Update cycle of Escuela, Rosannadanna, and Sarducci…..
— I swear, almost every episode this season, based on who that night’s Update guests are, you can predict which of the three members of the “endless narrow Update cycle” will appear in the next episode. In that regard, I predict we’ll be getting Rosannadanna next week. Then again, it’s more likely they’d want to save such a popular character like her for the season finale, which is two episodes from now.
— As burned out as I’m getting on Sarducci, there’s a few okay parts tonight like the ending of his description of reverse aging and his “corn on the cob” bit.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest sings “Up On The Roof”
BOULEVARD OF PROUD CHICANO CARS
the gas crisis takes its toll on a gang
— I’m already liking this just from the opening credits sequence.
— LOL at John’s entrance.
— Wow, Gilda’s actually convincing as a tough, adolescent Hispanic boy. Love her voice, delivery, and demeanor as Carlos.
— Just now, there was a loud off-camera sound of what sounded like a pipe or tool dropping to the floor. Did NBC just drop yet another show?
— I liked Michael’s use of matches to chase Gilda off.
— Bill, when meeting Gilda as Carlos: “Well, you’re not very Caucasian, are you?”
— The double entendres when Gilda and Jane are talking about siphoning gas are quite hilarious.
— Haha, Dan as President Carter randomly appears as a houseguest. That and the extensive nature of this sketch is bringing back memories of the epic Pepsi Syndrome sketch from a few episodes ago.
— Wow, they didn’t even try to hide the… uh… bumps under the chest area of Gilda’s shirt, even though she’s supposed to be playing a boy.
— Great line from John: “(in Chicano accent) All they teach you is chit……… and chat.” Nice fake-out there.
— Overall, another very well-done epic sketch tonight. It seems to have become the norm lately to do really long sketches. I know that trend carries over into season 5, but I’m not sure if that’s a good thing considering how weaker SNL’s writing is known to be that season.
— I wonder if this ends up being the final appearance of Dan’s Jimmy Carter impression. Strange to think that in the following season, nobody in the cast would take over the impression, and thus, the show would go through a whole season without doing ANY sketches involving the president (which is something I know quite a lot of people are wishing would happen nowadays).
STARS: ****
MR. BILL RUNS AWAY
by Walter Williams- Mr. Hands picks up a hitch-hiker
— The visual of Spot with a fake beard covering most of his face was both pretty funny and cute.
— Overall, not great, and I’ve already mentioned how burned out I’m becoming on these overused Mr. Bill shorts, but the ending was good. I always enjoy a good “stock footage of a car crashing off a cliff” ending, which is a type of ending SNL would get a lot of good mileage out of in later eras.
STARS: **½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Millworker”
SNYDER MOTHER’S DAY
Tom Snyder (DAA) & his mother (JAC) celebrate Mother’s Day together
— The return of Jane as Mama Snyder. A Mother’s Day dinner is a great setting for her.
— Funny line from Dan’s Snyder regarding his childhood worries that his father would “snip the darn thing off”, when Snyder’s talking about the strong feelings he had for his mother.
— Wow, the sketch is over already. This was unusually very short. Considering this was the final sketch of the night, I wonder if the show had started running long and perhaps they had to do some last-minute trimming to the script right before the sketch aired.
STARS: ***
GOODNIGHTS
— It’s very evident how much the cast loves working with Michael by the insane amount of affection they’re showering him with in these goodnights. Huge contrast to the “reception” they gave Milton Berle in the last episode’s goodnights.
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A pretty good show, with two great epic, long sketches, and a few decent sketches/segments surrounding them. Nothing flopped too badly tonight.
— Michael Palin did his usual strong work, though thinking back on it, he didn’t appear in many segments. In fact, he was almost non-existent in the post-Update half of the show. That may be due to the fact that there was an overall very small number of sketches tonight, which is something I have to get used to, as it’s pretty much become the norm around this time.
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Milton Berle):
— a big step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW:
Maureen Stapleton
“The Raging Queen” was apparently the most elaborate and expensive set the show had ever done – they were still building the set right before showtime. The sketch itself is pretty good, if a little too long.
Gilda’s “Carlos” voice had a touch of Roseannadanna to it for a minute there. Also, JT was a relatively rare instance of a single musical guest getting to do 3 songs.
There’s a joke that’s cut from the cold open of this episode (I think it’s about Carson?) that I never saw. Does anyone know what it was?
Though dress rehearsals were never recorded to videotape til s11 1985, some audio recordings of dress sketches were released. Here’s a dress sketch from the Palin program in audio form (it was presented as bonus audio on the Amazon.com page for the SNL s4 DVD boxset when it was released in late 2008). There could’ve been one more Nerds installment with Michael as the manhood-stirred Mr. Brighten! Gilda is Lisa (and at times can’t seem to hold it together), Billy is Todd, Jane is Mrs. Loopner, and Laraine joins in as a character she perhaps couldn’t do on air today. (*look for the joke that was salvaged for an aired Nerds sketch in s5.)
https://soundcloud.com/rssk1970/the-brightons-visit-the-nerds-06121979/s-aV1sE7xoFLw?si=9e3f0896e76d43d5a67ecf514334bcde&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing
Notes on Boulevard of Proud Chicano Cars (pretty layered the inspiration for this sketch):
– a film released March 1979 called “Boulevard Nights” a neo noir crime drama which, though with a deeper meaning, is also about “Chicanos driving up and down the boulevard….”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWVu98wfyho
– On May 4 1979, President Carter while touring America “flew to Los Angeles for an overnight stay with a Mexican-American family…” (p6, Daily News, May 5 1979)
– One of two confirmations of Brian-Doyle Murray’s contribution to the writing of this sketch: the scene between Gilda and Michael of a “drug deal” but with gasoline was lifted fairly word-for-word from a National Lampoon Radio Hour sketch performed by John Belushi and BDM in 1974 (cue at 3:45):
https://www.radioechoes.com/?page=play_download&mode=play&dl_mp3folder=T&dl_file=the_national_lampoon_radio_hour_1974-03-16_episode_18_-_dr_norman_vincent_nightcap_answers_your_questions_-_royal_dutch_gas.mp3&dl_series=The%20National%20Lampoon%20Radio%20Hour&dl_title=Episode%2018%20-%20Dr.%20Norman%20Vincent%20Nightcap%20Answers%20Your%20Questions%20-%20Royal%20Dutch%20Gas&dl_date=1974.03.16&dl_size=6.59%20MB
-And a 2nd, here’s a quote from Betty Thomas (Hill St Blues, 2-time SNL host) on working a sketch with BDM on Chicago’s Second City stage, from the book “The Second City” by Donna McCrohan (Putnam Publishing Group, 1987):
“We did a funny improv. We were at a country club during the gas shortage. Brian played the guy having an affair with me. (Joe) Flaherty was my husband. I’d left my husband to come out and talk with Brian in the parking lot, and his big thing was, ‘If you really loved me, you’d siphon the gas out of your husband’s car and put it in mine.’ It was very soap opera, very high-style. Brian loved style. I said, ‘I have no siphon.’ He said, ‘Here’s a hose.’ He had me down with the hose trying to siphon the gas. Full of innuendos.”