Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
COLD OPENING
Burt Reynolds’ ghost (JOP) comes when host tires of being compared to him
— I liked Mary’s dismissive comment about how nobody knows who Robert Urich is anyway. I wonder if that’s a dig at how the second half of this season in general has been having an endless string of bland, forgettable, unexciting hosts, which I complained about in my last review.
— The Clutch Cargo-style moving mouth on the Burt Reynolds picture is pretty funny.
— Who IS that doing the Burt mouth, anyway?
— Very awkward “segue” to the opening credits. That’s the second time I’ve said that in my last few episode reviews. At this point, I can’t wait until they bring back the traditional “Live from New York…” tagline next season, because they’ve noticeably been struggling lately trying to find other ways to end a cold opening.
STARS: ***
OPENING MONTAGE
— Continuing the premise of the cold opening, Robert is pictured here with a mustache and is announced as Burt Reynolds.
TALENT ENTRANCE / MONOLOGUE / ???????
(no synopsis available)
— A very brief segment, with Robert coming out onstage as Burt Reynolds and throwing to Buckwheat’s musical performance.
STARS: N/A (not a rateable segment)
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
Buckwheat sings a Motown medley with the Dupreems
— The whole idea of this is really creative.
— I was just about to ask if this was the first time the credited musical guest of an SNL episode was a character played by a cast member, but then I remembered the Blues Brothers.
— I like how lyrics have now started showing up on the bottom of the screen, and I also like how Eddie has gone into the studio audience.
— Overall, pretty fun musical performance, but not the classic I wanted it to be. Hate to say it, but I think lately, I’ve been starting to get a little tired of the whole Buckwheat routine. Honestly, his whole routine is pretty much a one-joke bit that was only truly hilarious in his very first sketch (the classic “Buh-Weet Sings” Album sketch). I can see why Eddie would later get tired of doing this character and would request that the writers kill him off.
REACH OUT
— Rerun
RADIO NEWS
an in-studio look at a Paul Harvey (JOP) broadcast
— What’s with the big pink smudges on the corners of the screen all of a sudden? (you can see it in the first screencap above) Very distracting.
— What exactly IS the joke of this sketch so far?
— Okay, I’m now finally seeing where this is going. A fairly funny premise, with Joe’s mid-sentence pauses making his statements sound very dirty before he eventually finishes the sentences.
— The ending with Brian was kinda weird.
STARS: ***
FOCUS ON FILM
host mimics Burt Reynolds on Raheem Abdul Muhammed’s show
— Robert Urich makes his first sketch appearance of the night, still keeping up the “Burt Reynolds” facade from earlier.
— Robert’s high-pitched Burt Reynolds laugh is really funny.
— Some of Robert as Burt’s racial jokes to Eddie are pretty amusing.
— Tonight’s Robert Urich/Burt Reynolds running plotline seems to have already ended right now, as Eddie has suddenly removed Robert’s Burt disguise.
— Loved Eddie’s “I don’t need no out-of-work white people on my show!” and “Get a job!” complaints when finding out that Robert is from the canceled series “Vega$”.
STARS: ***½
BUY A BULLET FOR A HUNGRY KID
support American troops in El Salvador & “buy a bullet for a hungry kid”
— A pretty biting premise, but for some reason, the result isn’t doing much for me.
STARS: **
LOW CLASS ITALIAN THEATER
ethnic cliches include a Rocky-inspired Hamlet
— Yet another Italian stereotype character from Tony.
— Oh, Tony’s basically doing Stallone as Rocky.
— Joe’s performance is cracking me up. Unfortunately, those are the only real laughs I’ve been getting from this sketch so far.
— Overall, a really weak one-note sketch.
STARS: *½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
Mink DeVille performs “Maybe Tomorrow”
SNL NEWSBREAK
BDM reveals to MAG that he’s naked below the waist
Pac Man branches out into other fields
Dr. Jack Badofsky defines phobias
Ronald Reagan’s speech about troops in Central America is Kennedy-esque
in response to Rev. Donald Wildmon’s boycott, a list of RCA subsidiaries
— There’s the pink smudges on the corners of the camera again. What’s going on tonight anyway?
— Yet another continuation of the romance story arc between Mary and Brian. Still not working at all. Man, when does Christine Ebersole join as a co-anchor, so I no longer have to deal with this unfunny romance arc?
— A lot of jokes are bombing HARD tonight. Also, way too much reliance on the always-lazy “SNL anchorperson misinterprets a news picture” gag.
— Okay, the segment showing different Pac Man types is actually fairly funny.
— After making his debut in the last episode, Dr. Jack Badofsky ALREADY returns. I see SNL ain’t wasting no time in running this character into the ground.
— Badofsky’s “Mofobia” name for the fear of being insulted by black people was really funny.
— Was Phoebe Snow known for having hiccups while singing? I didn’t understand that joke in Badofsky’s commentary.
— I didn’t get the “Hojophobia” one either.
— The overall Badofsky commentary was very hit-and-miss. Some of the names worked for me, some didn’t. And even most of the ones that worked weren’t all THAT funny.
— Now back to terrible news jokes from Mary and Brian. Again, the studio audience is not into these AT ALL.
— The bit with the JFK clip was awful.
— (*groan*) And now, here comes yet another insufferable “long screen crawl” gag. As if this SNL Newsbreak hadn’t already been dreadful enough…
STARS: *½
GOLDEN AGE SCHOOL OF OBEDIENCE
shut up complaining elderly parents with Golden Age School of Obedience
— I guess we’re going to be seeing those pink smudges on the corners of the screen all throughout tonight’s episode.
— Eddie’s insanely rough, angry treatment of the two old folks is a riot, even if I saw it coming as soon as he calmly walked in.
— The false teeth part was particularly funny.
STARS: ****
FUR: YOU DESERVE IT!
fur-wearing city-dwellers learn their lesson- “You deserve it!”
— This was credited during the goodnights of the last episode, even though it didn’t air. Must’ve gotten cut for time.
— I’m really liking the creepy, mock-tense atmosphere of this so far.
— Overall, wow, this was weird and really dark, but also pretty funny and very well-made.
STARS: ***½
KOALA BEAR
(TOR) discovers wife (ROD) was artificially inseminated with koala embryo
— The koala bear embryo reveal is fairly funny.
— What’s with the abortion part?
— Didn’t like the epilogue ending at all.
— Overall, while this had a somewhat interesting premise and a very good performance from Tony, the sketch had too much of a flat feeling and didn’t work as well as it should’ve.
STARS: **
HAIL TO THE CHIEF
Ronald Reagan hires Dr. Strangelove (TIK) against Ed Meese’s (TOR) wishes
— Feels like Tony has been all over tonight’s episode. With the consistent airtime he usually gets and the solid performances he usually delivers, I really can’t understand why he ends up a one-season wonder. This season’s other one-season wonder (Christine Ebersole), on the other hand, seems to be slowly disappearing in the back half of this season. It feels like the writers are already kinda giving up on her. Where has she BEEN in tonight’s episode?
— Tim entering as Dr. Strangelove is very interesting.
— Okay, I initially thought this premise had potential, but I’m not too sure anymore. This sketch hasn’t been going anywhere great.
— Reagan’s joy at seeing a toy of himself and his horse is fairly funny.
— Overall, something about the execution of this sketch felt really off. My least favorite of all the Hail to the Chief sketches that have aired so far.
STARS: **
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
Mink DeVille performs “Love & Emotion”
JOGGER MOTEL
— Rerun. I’m starting to get just as tired of seeing this as I am of this season’s often-repeated Khaddaffi Look, Reach Out, and Elizabeth Taylor “In The News” pre-tapes. What’s with all these tedious repeats this season anyway? How many actual NEW fake ads has this season had?
HEADLINE CHALLENGE
panelists fail to identify Jose Espinoza (TIK)
— I’m getting an unintentional laugh from Eddie in that big mustache.
— Eddie’s accent is great.
— LOL at Joe receiving a buzzer sound for asking the same question twice.
— After some laughs early on, this sketch has really fizzled out after a while.
— Overall, yet ANOTHER dull sketch tonight.
STARS: **
THE THING THAT DESTROYED TOKYO
by Gary Snegaroff- a hammer wreaks havoc
— The bad Japanese dubbing is kinda funny, I guess, but it’s a cliched gag.
— I’m getting some amusement from the very-obviously-not-Japanese guy playing the boyfriend.
— That’s it??? I was expecting a lot more. This overall film was more weird than funny. Tonight’s episode disappoints yet again.
STARS: **
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A very underwhelming, blah episode. Most of the episode wasn’t even particularly terrible, just very dull… which in some ways is worse, because at least terrible sketches can sometimes have an interesting trainwreck value and it can sometimes be fun riffing on them in my reviews. With dull sketches, on the other hand, what is there to say about them? NOTHING. (Reminds me of a huge gripe I’ve been having with SNL’s current 44th season)
— There was at least an interesting running storyline early in the episode with Urich passing himself off as Burt Reynolds, but they cut it off too early. It might’ve been interesting to keep that storyline going for most of the show, especially considering Urich ended up offering nothing great to any of the sketches where he played normal characters. As I predicted in the last review, he was yet ANOTHER in an endless string of bland season 7 hosts. At this point, Season 8 can’t come fast enough for me. I’m not sure if the writing is any better that season, but at least SNL gets actual interesting and FUNNY people to host that year.
— My copy of this episode is unfortunately missing a reportedly really nice tribute that Brian Doyle-Murray does for John Belushi, who sadly had recently passed away (the very first SNL cast member to do so).
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Elizabeth Ashley):
— a fairly big step down
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW:
Blythe Danner
ANOTHER SPARKLING REVIEW!
To answer your questions, Phoebe Snow didn’t have hiccups, but she did have an interesting, jazzy delivery (remember when she was musical guest back in seasons one and four?).
“Hojo” was a nickname for the then-ubiquitous Howard Johnson’s restaurant chain.
Paul Harvey was a real person with a halting delivery… that was part of the joke (and the other part was that it made things sound dirty, not unlike the unnecessary censorship bit on Kimmel).
The Reagan sketches got less-inspired without O’Donoghue to inspire Nelson Lyon.
Rosato developed a serious drug problem; that’s why he was shown the door.
There was supposed to be another sketch late in the show — promo mashup of “Sharky’s Machine” and “Vega$”?? — with Urich as Burt, but it got cut. I think it ended with Robin Duke discovering he was not Burt. Anyway, if it aired, he would have also introduced Mink DeVille as Burt, and then worn the moustache during goodnights.
The Belushi tribute is on NBC’s website; it was actually suggested by Ebersol with Lorne’s blessing, or vice-versa.
After the Buckwheat performance (in dress?), one of the big RCA cameras got knocked out of whack by the tripod catching on something (an equipment cable?) on the floor, and the technicians couldn’t get it re-calibrated properly all night (hence the pink spots). Wasn’t there also a technician strike during this period? Anyone remember?
I think Tony Rosato had some personal issues and problems with Dick Ebersol, which seems to be a running theme throughout Ebersol’s tenure (to be fair, Lorne Michaels also had a lot of feuds as well).
Christine Ebersole was a fine performer who to me wasn’t quite “right” for SNL, especially this era. She might have done better in a time when female cast members were more prominent or took the lead more in sketches (although you could say this about every female cast member to some extent aside from like Gilda and Jane until the late 80s).
From what the old Backstage book said, Ebersole objected to the treatment of women (like the “Pig” sketch). Rosato later said that getting fired from the show saved his life as being on SNL contributed to his drug problem.
For the benefit of those wondering, here’s BDM’s Belushi Tribute…
https://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/john-belushi-tribute/n8940
Robert Urich was a very droll, charming actor. His TV show Vegas had been canceled the previous season and he was likely there to promote a movie that would quickly come and go. His most popular role would be the lead on Spencer for Hire. I think if the writing had been better he would have been very good – this era tended to sideline the hosts a bit anyway. I wish he’d hosted in the late ’80s.
To tell the truth, I thought Eddie was too cruel to the “old” folks in the Golden Age of Obedience sketch! I must’ve not watched to the end back in the day because I don’t remember BDM’s tribute to John Belushi ad the end. Good thing I managed to watch it on nbc.com several weeks ago…
I meant “at” between “Belushi” and “the”.
You asked who is doing the Burt mouth in opening segment and although I think there’s more than one cast member who can pull off that tone and cadence, from pure sound I initially lean toward saying it’s Joe Piscopo. But then on closer look I feel more confident in saying it’s Joe because watch that mouth and there’s a dimple at the base of his chin that doesn’t appear when the muscles are relaxed but keeps appearing as the mouth moves. During the other sketches when you see Joe’s face in close-up, that dimple shows up when he smiles or talks, but it doesn’t look quite the same as the other chins, like in a close-up of Tony or Brian for example.