December 5, 1981 – Tim Curry / Meat Loaf (S7 E7)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
SNL sponsored by Texxon- “SNL writer will suffer Karen Silkwood’s fate”

— Haha, this is the first disclaimer cold opening gag this season that actually made me laugh out loud (even if I don’t know who Karen Silkwood is).
STARS: ****

OPENING MONTAGE
— Whoa, who in the world is this gruff-sounding announcer I’m hearing right now? Where’s this season’s regular announcer Mel Brandt? Is he out sick? You mean to tell me Don Pardo’s replacement has been replaced himself??? That’s strangely hilarious to me.
— Man, this guy’s gruff, stern-sounding, fast-talking voice doesn’t seem right for SNL AT ALL. It’s almost comical how out-of-place he sounds in this opening montage.

TALENT ENTRANCE

— Robin looks like Laraine Newman with her hair like that.
— Where’s Eddie?

MONOLOGUE
host tries to help Stepin Fetchit EDM change his image

  

— Oh, we’re getting a monologue tonight after all.
— Oh, THERE’S Eddie, making his entrance as a janitor.
— I never heard Eddie speak in that voice before.
— Loved Curry’s delivery of “Call me Massah Tim”.
— Curry telling Eddie to never appear in public as a black man, and then applying white shoe polish all over Eddie’s face is very funny, and it goes without saying that it feels like a precursor to a certain famous short film Eddie would later star in during his season 10 hosting stint.
STARS: ***½

TRANSEASTERN
— Rerun

ILLEGITIMATE SON
EDM says he’s Ronald Reagan’s illegitimate son & wants pop to come home

 

— Another Eddie Murphy-led segment already, right after the monologue?
— Ah, it’s the classic “Eddie reveals he’s the illegitimate son of Ronald Reagan” sketch.
— Overall, this was fantastic and had a lot of good laughs. Can’t think of anything else to add here.
STARS: ****

REACH OUT
parents “reach out & touch” elderly couple to talk with kidnapped son

   

— Great dark reveal with the little boy turning out to be a kidnapping victim.
STARS: ****

MICK!
Jagger’s (host) first TV variety special; Frank Nelson cameo

         

— Curry is dead-on and hilarious as Jagger.
— Looks like this will be a fun impression showcase for the cast; a type of sketch that surprisingly feels rare in this era.
— A cameo from Frank “Yyyyeeeeeeesss?” Nelson! He’s always cracked me up in the various TV shows I’ve seen him in.
— Wow, very fast costume change for Robin, going from one of the Mandrell Sisters to Shari Lewis in just two minutes.
— A very funny big kiss from Curry to the Lamb Chop puppet. I almost expected Curry to cough up a cottonball after the kiss.
— The return of Eddie’s Buckwheat!
— Eddie’s “O-tay!” gets huge recognition applause from the audience, despite the fact that he had only done one Buckwheat sketch before this. This shows that certain one-off sketches were able to quickly take off among SNL viewers and become widely quoted even WITHOUT the benefit of being able to go viral online. If Eddie’s SNL tenure had been in our current decade, just imagine how much online buzz his sketches would be getting on a weekly basis.
— Took me a while to recognize Tony as Rip Taylor.
— Haha, Tony is a riot as a hacky joke-telling Rip Taylor. I especially loved him holding up a pickle and calling it “Mother’s little helper”.
— Boy, this is a long sketch.
— Liked Joe as Sinatra’s line “Rock singers make me puke”.
— Aww, they couldn’t find a role for Kazurinsky? He was the only cast member not in this (Brian Doyle-Murray doesn’t count).
— Overall, a fun and solid sketch as expected, though I could’ve done with this being trimmed down to a shorter length.
STARS: ****

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Promised Land”

SNL NEWSBREAK
BDM & MAG argue about each other’s news anchoring skills
BDM interviews Prince Charles (host) & pregnant Princess Di (CHE)
JOP talks with Bryant Gumbel [real] & welcomes him to the Today show
Raheem Abdul Muhammed dislikes the Moral Majority’s calls for censorship

     

— Wha…? Mary is re-joining as a co-anchor, after not appearing at the desk for the last few episodes??? Man, SNL doesn’t seem to know WHAT to do with the news segment anymore. This is getting erratic.  At what point do we start getting Christine Ebersole as a co-anchor later in the season?
— Wow, this long opening bickering bit between Brian and Mary is actually openly addressing a lot of problems that SNL Newsbreak has been suffering from. We get Mary calling Brian out on his habit of constantly stumbling over his jokes, Brian riffing on Mary’s too-slow, teacher-esque delivery of her jokes, Brian riffing on the constant unnecessary title changes SNL keeps making to the news segment (“Update, Newsbreak, Upchuck, or whatever the hell they’re calling it nowadays.”), Brian complaining that SNL’s news segment is “old, tired, and needs to be scrapped”, and more. Wow. I guess SNL is fully aware of all the complaints that viewers must’ve had about the sad state that SNL’s news segment had fallen into.
— Mary: “Let’s talk thin: what about your hair, Brian?”
— LOL at Brian unintentionally flubbing his first joke RIGHT AFTER the scripted bit where Mary commended Brian for not flubbing his rant to her.
— A follow-up to the Princess Di pregnancy commentary from a few episodes ago. This time, I can tell it’s Christine playing Di, whereas last time, I had a hard time making out which performer that was in the role and I mistakenly assumed it was that night’s host Lauren Hutton.
— Curry makes a pretty funny Prince Charles, though I prefer Eric Idle’s take on him during the original SNL era.
— Heh, Curry’s Prince Charles saying “What, me worry?” with a goofy grin seemed to be an Alfred E. Neuman reference (they’re both goofy-looking and have big ears, after all), but it absolutely DIED with the studio audience.
— The return of Joe’s SNL Sports commentaries. I’m surprised they haven’t been doing these too often this season. I had gotten so used to it appearing on a weekly basis in season 6.
— Bryant Gumbel cameo.
— Loved Joe’s delivery of “Damn!” when being told he couldn’t have Gumbel’s old job.
— Eddie’s appearance makes me realize that he didn’t appear in the last episode’s Newsbreak, after his streak of appearing in the first five Newsbreaks of the season.
— Loved Eddie’s “Shut up! I’m mad!” to the audience when they applauded his entrance.
— I’m surprised to hear Eddie make a passing mention of ABC’s sketch comedy show “Fridays”, SNL’s competition at the time.
— Eddie’s angry message to Jerry Falwell is great.
— Overall, a better SNL Newsbreak than usual, even if Brian and Mary’s actual jokes were still pretty weak. They won me over with that opening self-aware bit mocking themselves over how bad the news segment has gotten. That being said, I expect SNL Newsbreak to go back to fully sucking in the next episode.
STARS: ***

FRANK & PAPA
Frank stays with his Italian father after a fight with his wife

   

— Strangely, I think this is Kazurinsky’s first appearance of the whole night.
— The return of Tony and Tim’s Italian father-son duo from the season 6 finale. I’m about halfway through Tony’s short-lived SNL tenure, and I’ve been surprised to see that he hasn’t been playing as many Italian stereotype characters as hearsay had me expecting him to. Maybe he plays more of them in the second half of the season.
— Like last time, I’m loving the fast-paced arguing sessions between Tony and Tim.
— Tim’s “What is this, The Wizard of Oz?” complaint during Tony’s story was pretty funny.
— Haha, Robin as the Italian mama showing up out of nowhere to join in on Tony and Tim’s heated argument is hilarious.
— Decent ending with all three of them happily singing the Flintstones theme song while watching TV.
— Overall, much like the last time these characters appeared, this was a very long sketch where my interest started wavering towards the end. However, I can appreciate the authenticity in Tim and Tony’s performances, the humor, and the realistic slice-of-life aspects of the sketch.
STARS: ***

THE ZUCCHINI SONG
host & audience sing ribald ditty “The Zucchini Song”

  

— Heh, “The Zucchini Song”. I can already tell this is going to be dirty.
— I like how he’s actually going into the studio audience mid-song.
— Great touch having the audience sing along to the lyrics that are displayed on the big board next to Curry.
— Overall, a very fun number and a wonderful performance from Curry.
STARS: ****

TIM AND MEAT’S ONE-STOP ROCKY HORROR SHOP
host & musical guest advertise Tim & Meat’s One Stop Rocky Horror Shop

     

— Another fun premise tonight, and a nice involvement of Meat Loaf.
— I’m really liking Meat Loaf’s energy here.  This is probably too obvious a comparison, but his energy in this is starting to remind me a little of future cast member Chris Farley.
— Ha, Kazurinski doing a walk-on in the Frank-N-Furter outfit.
STARS: ****

IN THE NEWS
Liz Taylor’s marriage history is documented

   

— Amusing rundown of Elizabeth Taylor’s various marriages.
— Loved the narrator’s random “Then Liz got fat!”
— Overall, an interesting segment that felt a bit out of the ordinary for the show.
STARS: ***

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Bat Out Of Hell”

IF REAGAN HAD SURVIVED THE ASSASSINATION
Dan Rather (JOP) & others ponder If Reagan Had Survived The Assassination

 

— I’m guessing this must be a take-off on some kind of “If JFK Had Survived the Assassination” TV special that aired at the time, because otherwise, this premise seems too random.
— That being said, the premise IS quite interesting, presenting us with an alternate universe where the infamous assassination attempt on President Reagan was successful and his VP George Bush took over his place as president.
— Still don’t know what to make of Joe’s Dan Rather impression. Years ago, I used to always think Joe was a strong impressionist, but after recently discovering his subpar Rather, Ted Koppel, and Jerry Lewis impressions (there’s probably one or two more weak impressions I’m forgetting), I’m starting to realize that as an impressionist, Joe was kind of a poor man’s precursor to Phil Hartman and Darrell Hammond.
— This sketch just seems to be an excuse to passive-aggressively call out Reagan on his many questionable decisions as president. There are a few okay jabs in there, though.
STARS: **½

GOODNIGHTS

 

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— Great episode, with a very fun vibe and lots of strong segments. Pretty much how I always imagined a Tim Curry-hosted SNL from the early 80s would be. Nothing was too weak tonight; even SNL Newsbreak was passable.
— This was the first episode of the season that didn’t have a huge number of segments. I guess long sketches like “Mick!” and “Frank & Papa” is the reason for the much-lower-than-usual sketch count.

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Bernadette Peters):
— a step up

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW:
Our Christmas episode of the season, hosted by Bill Murray.  I’ve always been curious to see this one because I remember hearing that the show bizarrely gets interrupted at one point by some kind of special report about Poland being invaded, or something like that.