Tag: Live

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February 15, 1997 – Chevy Chase / Live (S22 E13)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

NIGHTLINE
Madonna (ANG), Debbie Reynolds (CHO), Courtney Love (MOS)

— This is the first time Darrell’s Ted Koppel has appeared all season, which is surprising, considering the frequency of his appearances in the preceding season.
— Interesting seeing Cheri playing Debbie Reynolds outside of a Leg Up sketch.
— Funny little part with Darrell’s Koppel scoffing at the Golden Globes when it’s compared to the Oscars.
— A good throughline with Molly’s now-straitlaced Courtney Love slowly relapsing to her former self over the course of the sketch.
— Maybe it’s just me, but Ana seems kinda miscast as Madonna.
— A big laugh from Debbie Reynolds telling Madonna “Nice try, venereal girl.”
— I love the part with Darrell’s Koppel going on about the pleasure he got from fantasizing about Carrie Fisher in Return Of The Jedi.
— A dark but funny cutaway to Madonna having hanged herself.
STARS: ****


MONOLOGUE
CHC brings his alleged family on-stage after thanking them for their love

— Seems like we’re in for another genuinely sentimental Chevy Chase monologue, like his last one in season 21 where he gave a heartfelt reminiscence of getting ready for the first SNL episode’s cold opening.
— Ah, we end up getting a comedic turn with Chevy’s obviously-fake family joining him onstage. A mildly funny gag, but wasn’t worth such a long, serious set-up.
STARS: **½


HOME SECURITY DECOYS
Rerun from 10/19/96


CLINTON’S ITINERARY
petty money-making ventures dominate Bill Clinton’s (DAH) itinerary

— Funny opening visual of Darrell’s President Clinton chowing down on some pancakes in the Oval Office.
— Very funny part with Mark having paid five dollars to “kick Clinton in the ass”.
— I believe Tim’s small appearance would later be removed in Comedy Central’s 60-minute version of this episode. No idea why, unless they just needed to trim a few extra seconds to get the episode down to 60 minutes.
— Chevy is pretty sloppy with some of his lines here.
— Funny part with a Thailand real estate agent wanting Clinton to wear an S&M outfit.
— Solid turn at the end with Nom’s Bob Dole temporarily taking over as the president.
STARS: ***


O.J. SIMPSON PUNITIVE AND COMPENSATORY DAMAGES TELETHON
O.J. Simpson (TIM) emcees telethon to raise money for civil suit damages

— A funny opening announcement of the line-up of guests (e.g. The Banana Splits, Herb of Peaches & Herb, etc.).
— This is the only time I can think of where Will ever plays Harry Caray outside of Weekend Update and the “Space: The Infinite Frontier” sketches.
— Harry Caray’s trombone-playing is cracking me up.
— I like Tim’s O.J. threatening a phone caller by bluntly asking “How’d you like it if I come over there and cut your head off?”, then turning to the camera and casually saying in a light-hearted manner “But seriously, folks…”
STARS: ***½


BIRTHDAY MEDLEY
Marty & Bobbi sing a coming-of-age medley at niece’s 16th birthday party

— The Culps officially become recurring characters.
— As usual, I’m being tickled by Will and Ana’s opening banter and statements to the off-camera audience.
— Funny hearing Will singing “Lay, Lady, Lay”, considering a sketch he would later do with Robert Duvall the following season, in which Will sings “Lay, Lady, Lay” to Duvall as a hospital patient.
— As always, a fun and amusing medley of Will and Ana singing operatic-sounding versions of hit songs. I especially like them singing the theme from “Rocky”.
STARS: ***½


SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT
20th anniversary re-release of Smokey & the Bandit contains a Yoda scene

— Funny fake-out at the beginning, where the opening narration made you think they were talking about the original Star Wars movie, only for it to turn out to be another 1977 movie: Smokey And The Bandit.
— A laugh from Yoda randomly being shown as one of the truckers.
— Overall, this was decent, but forgettable and too brief. I wanted this to go further.
STARS: ***


CHARLIE ROSE
Goat Boy, Cow Man (CHC), others discuss legal system

— Oh, that’s right, Chevy Chase is tonight’s host. The last sketch he appeared in was so long ago that I almost forgot this episode even had a host.
— Goat Boy’s shtick has now gotten to the point where I’m completely stone-faced during it.
— On a similar note, Chevy as “Cow Man” is doing absolutely nothing for me.
— Boy, the combo of Goat Boy’s braying and Cow Man’s moos is grating on my ears. It doesn’t help that Chevy is putting zero effort into his performance.
STARS: *½


WEEKEND UPDATE
COQ thinks that Bill Clinton’s infidelities should be no big deal

 

— One of my all-time favorite offensive Michael Jackson jokes from Norm, with the punchline being that MJ’s three-day-old son is such a chip off the old block that he’s already molesting a one-day-old boy.
— They seem to be making it a regular thing for Colin to do Update commentaries as himself with a graphic of celebrity pictures being displayed next to him.
— An overall pretty good commentary from Colin tonight.
STARS: ****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Lakini’s Juice”


7 ACTION NEWS
news anchor (CHC) returns to the desk following a credibility breakdown

— What was with Chevy’s random mumbly, half-assed pronunciation of “Barnum & Bailey Ringling Brothers Circus”? Was that yet another instance of Chevy’s long-standing habit of trying to make a “funny” bit out of a flubbed line? (*groan*)
— This sketch isn’t doing much for me so far. I blame Chevy’s performance. This seems like the type of sketch that 1970s Chevy Chase could’ve gotten some laughs out of, back when he was in his prime, but not 1990s Chevy Chase, who is beyond checked-out.
— An interesting, out-of-the-ordinary casting of Colin as a news station boss.
— Overall, blah. Didn’t care for this sketch.
STARS: *½


PLAYING FIRST DATE
Zimmermans (CHK) & (CHO) spice up their marriage by playing “first date”

— The debut of Chris and Cheri’s sex-crazed couple, the Zimmermans.
— I’m getting some laughs from Chris and Cheri constantly censoring themselves on saying “fuck” during their dirty talk to each other.
— Good characterizations from Chris and Cheri here.
— An oddity about this first Zimmermans sketch is that the Zimmermans are alone. Part of what makes the subsequent installments of this sketch work is that each of them have another married couple for the Zimmermans to play off of.
— Good twist at the end with it being revealed that the Zimmermans have a baby in the other room and were merely playing “first date” with each other. By the way, the aspect of the Zimmermans having a baby would be dropped from all subsequent installments of this sketch.
STARS: ***


FITTING ROOM PEEPHOLE
department store employees (WIF) & (CHC) peep at (MOS) in dressing room

— Interesting casting of Norm in a normal straight man role.
— During his excited exclamations while peeping on Molly, I love Will saying at one point “Heeeey, Macarena!”
— A few laughs here and there, but this sketch isn’t anything great so far. Even Norm’s straight man performance isn’t making me laugh quite as much as I expected it to.
— While a cheap gag, I did kinda laugh at the ending with Will and Chevy agreeing to let Will peep on Chevy trying on a women’s bathing suit.
STARS: **


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Heropsychodreamer”


CHOPPER 4
newsstand owner Andrew (MAM) is obsessed with fog-penetrating Chopper 4

— This is remembered by a number of SNL fans as a rare Mark McKinney season 22 showcase, and possibly the last great SNL sketch he ever does where he plays an original lead character.
— Great voice and characterization from Mark.
— (*groan*) I see they’re having Chevy do his old “constantly calling people by the wrong names” routine, which stopped being funny ages ago.
— Mark’s bizarre Chopper 4 obsession is getting big laughs from me.
— Funny stock footage ending of Mark happily riding inside a Chopper 4 that he stole.
STARS: ****


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A pretty “meh” episode. Some good stuff, but I was not crazy about this episode as a whole. I’m having a hard time even remembering a lot of the sketches I just watched. A big part of the reason for the “meh” feeling of this episode is Chevy Chase, who came off even more disinterested and bland as a host than he had ever been prior to tonight’s episode, and that’s saying something. It also didn’t help that things weren’t too pleasant behind the scenes during the week of this episode. Chevy’s notorious habit of pissing off the SNL cast and staff whenever he comes back to host came to a head this week, in an incident during rehearsals in which he reportedly smacked Cheri Oteri in the head when she flubbed a line. I believe this is widely considered to be the straw that broke the camel’s back in regards to Lorne’s tolerance for Chevy’s asshole-ish behavior, as this would end up being the final episode that Chevy would ever host, though he would still make occasional cameos.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Neve Campbell)
a step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Alec Baldwin

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January 21, 1995 – David Hyde Pierce / Live (S20 E11)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

ALLOWED EVIDENCE
Judge Ito (MIM) decides what evidence will be allowed in the O.J. trial

— For some reason, the way Farley looks as F. Lee Bailey cracks me up.
— A good laugh from Mark high-fiving his opposing team after the Pamela Anderson announcement.
— Just now, a mysterious blue light flashes onscreen from off-camera (first screencap below). No idea where that blue light came from (somebody snapping a photo, maybe?), but SNL would later hide this in reruns by substituting this small portion of the cold opening with the dress rehearsal version, a substitution that’s very noticeable, as the wig that Mark wears throughout the sketch is suddenly missing and he’s sporting his normal hair (second screencap below).

— Very funny line about a request to show Mandingo and the whipping scene from Roots.
— Poor Laura, being stuck in yet another non-speaking role in what ends up being her only appearance of the entire night.
— I guess it’s nice that Mike gets to say “Live from New York…” on his final episode as a cast member, whether they know he’s leaving or not.
STARS: ***


OPENING MONTAGE
— The theme music would later be replaced in reruns with the dress rehearsal version. Same goes for the following monologue.


MONOLOGUE
host sings variant of “I Am The Very Model Of A Modern Major-General”

— Very interesting, out-of-the-ordinary format for this monologue. I love this. This has always been one of my favorite monologues of this season.
— Very catchy song with funny lyrics.
— David Hyde Pierce’s timing seems a little off and shaky with some of his lyrics.
— Just now, Pierce completely misses his musical cue to start singing a verse, so he just stays silent and does a goofy little finger dance while waiting for the next go-around in the music to sing his verse. This, along with his aforementioned shaky timing earlier in this monologue, is presumably the reason why this monologue would be replaced in reruns with the dress rehearsal version.
STARS: ****


AMAZIN’ LASER
lawn care barely taps the potential of the Amazin’ Laser garden gun

— Years ago, I used to dismiss this as a poor man’s hybrid of two classic commercials from the late 80s/early 90s years: Happy Fun Ball and Yard-a-Pult. I would later come around on this commercial and realize how unfair I was in my dismissal of it.
— Elliott is perfect for this.
— A lot of laughs from the disclaimers shown throughout this, even if it does have somewhat of a Happy Fun Ball-esque vibe.
— Towards the end, you can hear a voice in the studio loudly yell “Ten secoooonds!”, which is presumably the stage manager alerting the performers on when the next sketch is about to go on air.
STARS: ****


POETRY CLASS
(CHF) & (JAG) use rock song lyrics to do well in (host)’s poetry class

— One of the more popular sketches of this troubled season.
— I’ve always noticed that the leather jacket Farley wears in this sketch seems to be the same one he wears in another popular classroom sketch from earlier this era, French Class with Alec Baldwin (side-by-side comparison below). I wonder if this connection between both sketches is intentional or just a coincidence.

— The reveal of Farley’s poem being lyrics from “You Shook Me All Night Long” is absolutely hilarious.
— Is Janeane trying not to laugh during the part with Pierce having her and Farley stand with him together in front of the class?
— Janeane and Adam’s poems also being from rock songs are funny as well. Adam’s delivery of his poem is especially priceless.
— Pierce is helping sell the joke with his obliviousness to all the plagiarism.
— Good turn with Pierce mistaking Adam’s “Jump” poem as a cry for help.
— Great line at the end with “Wanna go fire up a doobie?”
STARS: ****½


TALES OF LITTLE WOMEN
prim kids turn nasty after falling through the ice

— I’ve always felt this sketch was highly overrated. To me, this is just one of a billion tired season 20 Chris Farley yelling sketches, which I’m noticing the show has been relying particularly heavy on these last two episodes.
— Much like the Mystery Dinner Theater sketch in the preceding episode, I probably would enjoy the turn with Farley’s prim 19th century character yelling a whole bunch of crude things had this sketch appeared in one of Farley’s earlier seasons, before the days of him screaming his way through every single sketch.
— I think in the “Live From New York” SNL book, Janeane discloses the fact that she was very bothered by the audience laughing and applauding at Farley calling her a “stupid whore”.
— The other performers joining Farley in the “yelling crude things” bit isn’t helping at all. Pierce is actually pretty good at the crude yelling, but the other performers’ attempts are kinda cringeworthy to me, especially Janeane’s.
— Oh, and goody goody, we end the sketch with a child rape joke! Ugh. This is exactly the type of unnecessary, unfunny, tasteless humor that season 20 has a reputation for over-relying on.
STARS: *½


SCOTTISH SOCCER HOOLIGAN WEEKLY
rowdies Andy (MIM) & Ian (MAM) talk shop

— The opening theme song is in the same melody as the theme song from the later recurring sketch Dog Show, from the Will Ferrell era.
— Very interesting pairing of Mike and Mark, one of them a veteran cast member in his final episode and the other a new cast member in his second episode, both Canadians, and both have the initials MM. This sketch feels like it’s intended as a passing of the torch between the two performers.
— We get a random part with Mark throwing a dart at someone off-camera, because we apparently needed to hear Farley screaming YET AGAIN tonight. Admittedly, his off-camera yell in this sketch used to crack me up when I was younger.
— I’m liking the way Mike and Mark are playing off of each other here. Makes me wish Mark joined earlier in Mike’s SNL tenure, so they could’ve done other sketches where they’re paired together.
— Even though this sketch features Mike ONCE AGAIN treading old ground by playing a character with a U.K. accent, I find that this sketch actually has a fairly fun and enjoyable vibe. Even the typical season 20 over-reliance on blood and gore is coming off tolerable in this.
— I like how we see during the camera pull-out at the end that this sketch’s set is placed on the Tales of Little Women set (screencap below).

— And with the end of this sketch, we officially reach the end of the Mike Myers era of SNL.
— SNL would end up bringing back this potentially-recurring sketch a few years later when Mike hosts in season 22, where Mark would still be a cast member.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “I Alone”


WEEKEND UPDATE
TIM & entire African-American community are glad the hockey strike’s over
JAM’s Wacky Sports Bloopers consist of crudely-manipulated videotape

— Nice to see Tim “Little Hockey” Meadows doing a follow-up to his hockey commentary from earlier this season. Solid bit from him tonight.
— I liked Norm’s “I’m afraid to know why you’re applauding at that” ad-lib after some audience members applaud a joke about gays only being allowed at a parade so they can get beat up.
— Interesting seeing Jay doing a commentary as himself.
— Jay’s doing a variation of Rob Schneider’s sports bloopers commentary from the preceding season. This at least has a different spin on it, with the gimmick being that the “bloopers” are just manipulated videos of normal sports plays. I used to really like this bit when I was younger, but now it feels kinda on the hacky side to me.
— I love Norm’s amusement at Jay showing a “real” sports blooper, with a basketball player’s missed dunk.
STARS: ***½


ROBOT SPY
the crew of a spaceship suspects nerdy (host) of being the robot spy

— I could do without Ellen’s constant repetition of “freakin’”, which started out funny but is increasingly getting old.
— Overall, not really sure what to say about this sketch. I’m not too crazy about it and I didn’t get too many laughs, but it wasn’t horrible and it was adequately performed.
STARS: **


NERVOUS HABITS
(MMK) dislikes fellow lawyer’s (host) nervous habit of sheep shearing

— A very funny casual reveal of Pierce’s nervous habit being sheep shearing, of all things. I really like this absurd premise.
— Haha, things are going off the rails with Pierce struggling to keep the sheep from roaming around the set, and the camera (unsuccessfully) trying to hide that by doing a clumsy zoom-in to a close-up of Michael. At one point, you even see a stagehand accidentally enter the shot when trying to handle the sheep (on the lower half of the screencap below).

— As this season progresses, it’s becoming more and more awkward and sad to see Kevin “Oh, He’s Still On The Show?” Nealon pop up in a sketch at this late stage in his SNL tenure.
— Good ending with the insemination of a pony.
— I love how at the end, the sheep from earlier can be seen in the background just randomly wandering back into the scene.
— Unfortunately, I believe SNL would later replace this sketch with the error-free dress rehearsal version in reruns, robbing us of the funny animal bloopers.
STARS: ***½


BROKEN ENGLISH
Jersey kids’ (ADS) & (DAS) fun with foreigner (host) makes instant karma

— Solid characterization from Pierce here.
— Adam and Spade’s nonsense translations to Pierce’s sentences are providing good laughs.
— Great twist at the end.
— A weird little overall piece, but it really worked. I used to kinda hate this sketch when I was younger and dismissed it as typical lousy season 20 fare, but I now have much more appreciation for what this was going for.
STARS: ****


PERSPECTIVES
urban community programming with Lionel Osbourne (TIM)

— I’m very happy to see the debut of this Tim Meadows sketch.
— I love Tim’s constant “If you’ve just tuned in…”s and reintroductions.
— Some good laughs from the dryness and blandness of this interview, and from Tim’s bad interviewing skills.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Selling The Drama”


INTERNET CHAT
Claire (CSE) finds an unwilling Internet sex partner in Darrill (MAM)

— Ladies and gentlemen, SNL has officially entered the internet age. An important milestone, as this is the very first SNL sketch centered around the then-novelty called the internet.
— Our very first instance of Mark bringing a Kids in the Hall character to SNL.
— Speaking of Mark, he’s been getting a lot of airtime tonight, which is great to see, especially after he made only one brief appearance in his debut episode the preceding week. The way Mark’s being utilized tonight is how it should regularly be for him on SNL, but sadly, his tenure would instead go in pretty much the opposite direction.
— It’s funny in retrospect seeing internet terms like LOL and ROFL being treated as such a novelty that Janeane’s character doesn’t understand what they mean and Darrill has to explain them to her.
— I love the inclusion of Elliott as a sleazy, naked, hairy perv (is he wearing the same fake body hair from the Bad Striptease sketch earlier this season?). Ever since December, we’ve been getting an oddball Chris Elliott character piece on a weekly basis, and I, for one, could not be happier about that.
— This sketch really feels ahead of its time.
— Some really good laughs from the Elliott/McKinney online chat, especially the “How big is your hard drive?” innuendo.
— Janeane must be uncomfortable being “naked” at the end, as she can be seen quickly putting her robe back on before the sketch even fades to black.
STARS: ****


MOVIE NEWS
small print reveals the “show” to be a vehicle for Disney ads

— The constant disclaimers of “(insert company here) is a subsidiary of Disney” are getting repetitive and are not that funny.
— Okay, the disclaimers are now getting funnier, such as the one about Sharon Stone.
— I got a chuckle from a female audience member being heard screaming in excitement at the mere mention of Sylvester Stallone.
— Funny gag with the person who’s typing the disclaimers making Pierce say something ridiculous about Arnold Schwarzenegger.
STARS: ***


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A solid and consistent episode, and I feel it’s definitely one of the better episodes of this troubled season. There were some really strong sketches, some pretty good sketches, and very few sketches that I disliked. The post-Update half in particular had a nice run of sketches ranging from decent to strong once they got the Robot Spy sketch out of the way.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Jeff Daniels)
a step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Bob Newhart