December 12, 1981 – Bill Murray / The Spinners (S7 E8)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
SNL sponsored by Phone Company- “Faking progress so we can charge more”

— Decent tagline, but I’m still finding it kinda lazy to use these quick disclaimer gags as a cold opening. Hope there’s a change with these in the second half of the season.
STARS: ***

OPENING MONTAGE
— Announcer Mel Brandt’s gruff-sounding fill-in from the last episode is doing the announcements again tonight.
— This fill-in announcer still sounds ridiculously out of place in this opening montage. Like I said in the last review, it’s almost comical in itself.
— I think this is the very first instance of Eddie and Joe receiving noticeably more audience cheers than the rest of the cast.
— A lot of special guests credited tonight.

MONOLOGUE
BIM has nothing but good things to say about Santa Claus (Andy Murphy)

— There’s no Talent Entrance tonight.
— A more tame, straightforward entrance from Bill this time, compared to the usual high-energy entrances he’s made in his monologues from other episodes he’s hosted.
— Good concept with Bill bringing out Santa Claus as a special guest. This is one of the most well-known roles for frequent SNL extra Andy Murphy.
— I’m loving Bill’s very Bill Murray-esque rapport with Santa. Lots of fun lines from Bill here.
STARS: ****

TALES OF THE UNLIKELY
Libyan terrorists try to assassinate the president

   

— Interesting concept and intro to this.
— The pamphlets bit with Joe is pretty funny.
— Bill: “[Reagan] likes expensive gifts”. Tony (playing Reagan’s national security adviser): “Well, don’t we all?” *big laughs from the audience* I don’t get it. Must be a very topical political reference. Reminds me of how overly topical the constant Trump material on modern-day SNL is. (Imagine future SNL fans 30 years from now trying to follow those Trump sketches in reruns; it’s gonna be HORRIBLY aged and hard to follow).
— Overall, a pretty solid sketch.
STARS: ***½

HOTEL ROOM
a washed-up Tom Snyder (JOP) has delusions in a dumpy hotel room

   

— First time we’re seeing Joe play Normal Tom Snyder, after his funny appearance as Spanish Tom Snyder earlier this season.
— I kinda knocked Joe as an impressionist in my last review (calling him a poor man’s precursor to Phil Hartman and Darrell Hammond), but I admit he does a good Tom Snyder, especially the trademark Snyder laugh.
— I like how Joe’s Snyder is deliriously treating his room visitors as famous interviewees on his show “Tomorrow”.
— Pretty funny sequence with Joe’s Snyder interacting with the spirit of Rona Barrett.
— The ending actually kinda came off touching.
STARS: ***

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
The Spinners perform “Then Came You”
The Spinners perform “I’ll Be Around”
The Spinners perform “Working My Way Back to You”

MX-5 TAMPONS
Father Guido Sarducci endorses MX-5 tampons

— The return of Father Guido Sarducci. Can’t say I’m thrilled; the oversaturation of him in seasons 4 and 5 permanently ruined him for me. It’s hard for me to even laugh at this character anymore (and he was never all that hilarious to begin with, honestly).
— All that being said, this commercial with him is actually funny. Hilarious concept with randomly having him tout a brand of tampons.
— Overall, short and sweet.
STARS: ***

DESIGNER FAIRY TALES
elves make clothes for Ralph Lauren (BIM)

     

— Another SNL parody of Brooke Shields’ famous Calvin Klein commercials from those days.
— I was about to say that Gail Matthius’ Brooke Shields was more attractive to me, but honestly, Mary looks good in this. Mary can surprisingly be quite attractive in certain roles, like this and Marilyn Monroe.
— Oh, this is segueing into a sketch. I thought it was just going to be a straightforward Calvin Klein Jeans fake ad.
— Isn’t there a story about how they weren’t able to remove makeup that Eddie wore for an earlier Muhammad Ali appearance in time for this sketch? I do notice that there’s a few weird light-skinned splotches on his face in this, and it looks like he’s kinda trying to hide some parts of his face from the camera. Bill gives him a funny look at one point. However, the copy of the episode I’m watching hasn’t even HAD a Muhammad Ali bit yet. I guess the order of sketches has been shuffled around in the rerun version I’m watching (which is very common for this season).
— The increasingly ridiculous contorted poses Mary’s Brooke is shown in whenever the camera cuts back to her are really funny.
— Overall, a pretty good sketch. Not much else I can say about it, though.
STARS: ***

SNL NEWSBREAK
the many spellings of “Kaddafi”
footage of an early JOP interview of Cassius Clay (EDM)
JOP asks Muhammad Ali (EDM) if he’s taken too many punches
MAG asks jaded children about the meaning of Christmas

         

— My copy of this episode is missing the beginning of SNL Newsbreak and starts towards the end of Brian’s sign-on. Anyone know if this opened with the “falling logo letters” gag once again? Also, is Mary even there? The camera has just been on Brian in my copy of this Newsbreak so far.
— Uh-oh, Brian’s long-winded joke about the spelling of Khaddafi seems to be our very first instance of the “long screen crawl gag”, which is something I’m aware becomes an UNBEARABLE regular part of SNL Newsbreak for the remainder of the season. Ugh.
— That being said, I admit to laughing at some of the ridiculous Khaddafi misspellings, and this particular screen crawl didn’t go on TOO long. I know it gets worse later this season, though.
— The audience loved the “Khadaffy Duck” comic book bit, but I personally found it to be lame.
— I guess Mary really isn’t at the desk tonight. Brian has been the only one doing jokes in tonight’s Newsbreak so far. So SNL has ALREADY re-removed Mary from the desk, after going through the trouble of re-instating her as an anchor in the last episode? This is insane; SNL doesn’t know what they’re doing with this segment anymore.
— Okay, here’s the Muhammad Ali bit I mentioned earlier. However, this segment is clearly pre-taped, plus Eddie’s not even wearing any special kind of makeup here. This can’t be the bit that caused the makeup mishap in the Designer Fairy Tales sketch.
— Eddie’s impression of Young Ali (Cassius Clay) is hilarious.
— Ah, now we’re getting a live interview with Eddie as Older Ali. So THIS is what the aforementioned makeup mishap was all about. And oh my god, Eddie looks unrecognizable under all that makeup.
— Eddie’s voice as Older Ali is cracking me up.
— There’s Mary, doing a pre-taped remote on what Christmas means to children.
— The first kid being interviewed is a young Seth Green! (second-to-last screencap above)
— One kid complains that people have started putting Christmas decorations up way too early. Interesting how that was a complaint even back in those days; I thought that only started in more recent years.
— There’s the same curly-haired little girl from the Hidden Photo sketch from earlier this season.
— The whole “What Christmas Means to Me” segment is funny, with the children’s adult-esque grumpy complaints.
STARS: **½

PREDICTIONS
BIM talks with Father Guido Sarducci about his psychic predictive powers

— Another segment with Father Guido Sarducci tonight. Is this REALLY necessary?
— “Chicklets”?
— (*sigh*) This seems to be turning into the usual long-winded Guido Sarducci bit.
— Some of the psychic predictions are mildly funny.
— God, this is starting to get really long and boring. Sarducci made an actual FUNNY appearance earlier tonight that was short and sweet, so why’d they have to ruin it by following it up with one of his typical long-winded, never-ending talkfests? Until now, it had been refreshing no longer having to worry about reviewing these Sarducci bits on a regular basis after I finished my coverage of season 5. (Then again, I do have to worry about his semi-regular appearances in the upcoming season 11).
— Loved Bill’s random dig at the New York Post.
— Okay, Sarducci’s “The waves are gonna be bitchin’” comment got a chuckle out of me.
STARS: **

MICHAEL DAVIS
in response to a fan letter, Michael Davis [real] juggles 3 bowling balls

     

— Great opening stunt, throwing a red ball in the air and catching it on his nose while perfectly balancing it.
— Ha, turns out the red ball is a clown nose.
— Funny reveal with the fan who unsuccessfully tried to juggle three axes signing his letter to Michael under the name “Lefty”.
— Loved Michael’s “or does the earth suck” line during his bowling ball gravity test.
— Some good laughs from his difficulties in lifting the three bowling balls off the floor.
— And now he actually juggled the three bowling balls successfully. That was great.
STARS: ****

FRACAS
by Timothy Hittle- a battle between a man & a claymation foe

     

— Hmm, a claymation short.
— Haha, I got a big laugh from the part with the clay figure stabbing the guy’s foot with a fork, making the guy scream hilariously.
— Overall, I found this film to be very funny.
STARS: ****

THE ECONOMICS OF CHRISTMAS
(JOP) & (CHE) explain trickle-down economics to Honker via a song

   

— The return of Bill’s Honker character!
— Looks like this has turned into our obligatory season 7 musical sketch of the week. Considering this is the Christmas show, I can excuse it this time.
— Overall, nothing really to say about this, but this was fine for what it was.
STARS: ***

AT HOME WITH THE PSYCHOS
a nuclear family is prepared for the blow hole

       

— Oh, I’ve been looking forward to this. This is known as a very dark, controversial Michael O’Donoghue-written sketch that has a lot of notoriety, and I believe is one of the things that contributed to O’Donoghue’s mid-season firing over the Christmas break. I’m eager to finally see this insane sketch for myself.
— Loved Bill’s casual “Hey, what’s eating you?” after Christine randomly shot a rifle at him.
— Mary’s pretty funny as the blind ballerina daughter.
— Holy hell, that father-daughter make-out session between Bill and Mary…
— Oh my god, Christine’s randomly bleeding hands…
— I like Eddie’s walk-on as a dynamite-covered militant son.
— Boy, this is one hell of a dark, crazy, unsettling sketch as expected. The studio audience doesn’t know WHAT to make of this.
— Aw, damn NBC censors. Thanks to them, we can’t even see the blowhole prop that Bill is displaying to Brian.
— Speaking of NBC, this is a good time to mention that back in the original airing of this episode, this sketch got interrupted at some point for breaking news about Poland being invaded by Russia; news that no doubt must’ve really startled viewers back then. The copy I’m watching of this episode doesn’t have the breaking news report, but supposedly in the old Netflix/Seeso version of this episode, they bizarrely left the breaking news report intact!
— By the way, I believe this is the only time in SNL history where a live episode got interrupted by a breaking news report. During the summer of 1997, an NBC rerun of a then-recent season 22 episode (Rob Lowe/Spice Girls, I believe) was interrupted for breaking news of Princess Diana’s death.
— Nice touch with the green nuclear glow in the room during Bill’s whole mock-dramatic speech at the end.
— Overall, wow, that sketch DEFINITELY lived up to its bizarre reputation. I liked this sketch overall, though I wonder if I enjoyed it more for how daringly strange it was than for how good it actually was (which is how I felt about O’Donoghue’s equally-strange Nick the Knock sketch earlier this season).  I will say that Bill was perfect for this sketch, and took charge of it better than most hosts would’ve.
STARS: ***

THE YALE WHIFFENPOOFS
Yale Wiffenpoofs perform Christmas carols with host & cast

     

— For some reason, this is reminding me of when The Singing Idlers performed on the show back in season 1 (Jill Clayburgh episode).
— The singers’ SAT scores randomly being displayed onscreen has some pretty funny jokes (e.g. “Dates Kennedys You’ve Never Even Heard Of”, “Dad Made a Few Calls”).
— Hey, now Bill and the SNL cast have joined in on the song.
— Uh, why do the cast have sped-up chipmunk singing voices?
— Boy, is Tony hamming it up.
— There’s Robin’s Laraine Newman-esque hairstyle again. I keep having to do a double-take whenever I see her hair like that, because it keeps initially making me think I’m watching the original SNL cast again.
STARS: N/A (not a rateable segment)

GOODNIGHTS
BIM expresses solidarity with Poland in wake of martial law

  

— My copy of this episode abruptly joins these goodnights in progress while Bill’s in the middle of awkwardly addressing the Poland situation. Bill somberly says, among other things, “There’s still a bargain to be had in Fort Lee, New Jersey” and “Our hearts should be with, are ARE with, the good people of Poland. God bless them.”
— My copy is missing an interesting-sounding comment that Bill supposedly made about the Poland situation early on in these goodnights: “I guess that means this is World War III.” However, I’m not sure if that comment from Bill even occurred; I heard it as a recounting from someone who saw the original airing of this episode as a little kid, and I think his memory of it is understandably a little faulty.
— After Bill’s somber announcement, Christine noticeably looks very emotional. Damn.
— Aww, now I noticed Robin looks really sad too.
— Geez, what a depressing end to a Christmas episode.

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— An overly-average episode. Most of the sketches were decent, but nothing in the show stood out at all aside from the monologue, the Michael Davis spot, and a claymation short that wasn’t even originally aired in this episode (it was added for the rerun). Not even the insane “At Home With The Psychos” sketch could garner more than an average three-star rating.
— The overly-average, nothing-special nature of this episode is evidenced by the fact that I had a hard time coming up with stuff to say about some of the sketches. At least this episode never really bottomed-out too hard, though; the only thing I came close to kinda hating was the overlong Father Guido Sarducci psychic predictions sketch.

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Tim Curry):
— a fairly big step down

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW:
We enter 1982, with host Robert Conrad