Tag: Season 8

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May 14, 1983 – Mayor Ed Koch / Kevin Rowland & Dexy’s Midnight Runners (S8 E20)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

OPENING MONTAGE
— For the first time in SNL history, an episode doesn’t have a cold opening, and just goes straight into the opening montage. I’m not 100% sure, but I think the only other instance of this would later happen in the Pamela Sue Martin episode from season 10.


MONOLOGUE
host lists things about Ronald Reagan that bug him

— He immediately starts this off with his “How’m I doin’?” catchphrase, which he also started off his monologue with in the season 4 episode hosted by the Rolling Stones.
— Good premise with him freely saying what he REALLY thinks about the president.
— He’s coming off funny and likable in this.
— Who was he referring to when talking about how someone who once insulted him on the street ended up becoming governor?
— Pretty funny ending with him lamenting having to host this “cockamamie comedy show”.
STARS: ***


WHAT’S THE MOST DISGUSTING THING YOU’VE SEEN IN NEW YORK?
responses to, “What’s the most disgusting thing you’ve seen in New York?”

  

— Some really funny anecdotes here so far. I especially like one person’s answer being seeing Bella Abzug naked.
— Uh, wow at that anecdote about a guy who committed suicide by jumping off a building and had to have his body carried away in multiple bags. The sicko in me kinda likes how that dark story contrasted against all the other stories told here so far.
— What was with the sappy, non-comedic ending with one guy going against the grain by saying there’s nothing wrong with the city and he’s proud to live in it? I guess Koch being in the building tonight had some influence on SNL’s decision to end this film like that.
STARS: N/A (not a rateable segment)


MISTER ROBINSON’S NEIGHBORHOOD
an inventory of stolen goods

  

— At first, I got excited and mistakenly thought this was going to be the installment where Ed Koch fills in for Mister Robinson. I guess that’s from next season.
— They’ve noticeably been relying on this sketch less and less lately. It’s surprisingly only appeared twice all season. Maybe Eddie’s getting tired of doing these.
— A good laugh from “entrepreneur” being spelled “ontapanure” on Robinson’s famous “Word of the Day” board.
— I love the part with him displaying a stolen earring with a chunk of ear still attached to it.
— The fire escape ending felt weak.
— Overall, not one of the better installments of this sketch, though it was still watchable. I wonder if these are running out of steam, though.
STARS: ***


LEDGE
host & Frank Sinatra (JOP) try to talk (EDM) down from a ledge

     

— WTF? Another sketch with Eddie about to jump off a ledge? I liked the first one they did earlier this season, but is this REALLY necessary to turn into a recurring sketch?
— Koch: “How’m I doin?” Eddie: “I’m about to jump off this ledge and you ask me ‘How’m I doin”?!?”
— I like Eddie’s rapid-fire listing-off of all the things he finds wrong with New York.
— Satisfying part with Eddie shoving the Little Orphan Annie girl off the ledge.
— Haha, the quick part with Brad appearing out of nowhere as a ruined stockbroker and immediately jumping off the ledge slayed me.
— Pretty funny random inclusion of Joe’s Sinatra.
— Not sure how to feel about the whole “Start Spreading the News” performance from Koch, Eddie, and Joe. It’s a fun performance, but it’s not comedic, and I was kinda enjoying where this sketch was going before then.
— Since Eddie’s character fell off the ledge at the end (which was a weak and lazy gag), hopefully that’s the end of this recurring sketch.
STARS: **½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Come On, Eileen”


THE ENQUIRER
— Rerun


BALD NO MORE
Bald No More hair stimulant gives host a mane like Don King’s [real]

   

— Koch is getting more laughs here.
— Another Don King cameo, after his appearance in that heavily-hyped Marc Weiner hand puppet boxing match from season 6.
— A good laugh from the sloppy goop being put all over Koch’s head and it dripping onto his face.
— How does Eddie get his tongue to look so freakishly big when he sticks it out like that? He did the same thing in that Casablanca ski lodge sketch earlier this season.
— Fairly funny visual of Koch in the Don King wig.
STARS: ***


LATE NIGHT WITH DAVID LETTERMAN
Gumby visits; Marv Albert cameo

     

— Good to see another sketch with Joe’s dead-on Letterman impression.
— I like the part with him taking us through a tour of the NBC men’s room.
— Him describing SaniWrap as being a “protective shield against god knows what” made me laugh.
— I like how Tom Snyder’s voice was heard from inside the bathroom stall yelling “Get the hell out of here” to Joe’s Letterman and then doing his trademark laugh.
— Gumby returns as Letterman’s guest, after the great sketch they did together in the season premiere.
— Interesting-seeming odd part with a claymation blooper reel from Gumby movies.
— Hmm, the first blooper clip with Marvin Hamlisch wasn’t too funny.
— Okay, the second blooper clip is funnier, especially Gumby’s yell of “Oy!” when seeing boulders falling towards him.
— Overall, a pretty good sketch, but I felt this was a step down from the Gumby/Letterman sketch from the season premiere.
STARS: ***½


HARRY ANDERSON
Harry & Leslie Anderson [real] escape strait jacket & ropes, respectively

   

— Loved Harry’s “I appreciate the estimation” ad-lib to the female volunteer when she gave him too much crotch room when tying the crotch strap part of Harry’s straitjacket.
— Great part with Harry shoving his female assistant’s chair away to prevent her from untying herself before him.
— Overall, as usual, a fun Harry Anderson performance.
STARS: ***½


WHINERS
Wendy Whiner recalls Doug’s experience as a prisoner of war in Vietnam

   

— Ugh, another Whiners sketch ALREADY? Didn’t we just see them a mere three episodes ago when Joan Rivers hosted?
— Because we apparently haven’t gotten ENOUGH offensive Asian stereotypes on the show lately, here’s yet another season 8 sketch with cast members playing cartoonish, over-the-top Asian caricatures. Ugh, you’re killing me with this, Ebersol-era SNL.
— Boy, this overall sketch was fucking TERRIBLE, even worse than the usual Whiners dreck. Not even Eddie could save this.
STARS: *


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “The Celtic Soul Brothers”


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
Patti Lynn Hunnsacker complains about her nightmare prom date
Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer lists ways to tell if you’re stupid
MAG gets her dander up about network programming
Don King [real] promotes upcoming fights while JOP cuts his hair

       

— Oh my god, Brad’s cringeworthy Mexican voice during his Fernando Valenzuela joke made me groan like crazy.
— Julia’s story about her terrible prom date has some okay lines, but as usual with her commentaries as this character, the whole thing is just stereotypical teenage 80s humor (maybe it was funnier to people in 1983 than it is to me in 2019). This character feels like a real waste of Julia’s talents, knowing the comedic greatness she would later go on to achieve in her post-SNL career.
— Here’s Saturday Night News’s obligatory Tim Kazurinsky appearance of the week. For anyone keeping count, this is the NINTH consecutive episode where he does a news commentary. Wow. Let’s see if this impressive streak carries over into the beginning of next season.
— What in the world did I just hear an unseen audience member loudly yelling out at the beginning of the Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer commentary?
— Oh, I see, the audience member yelled the correct pronunciation of Havnagootiim’s name, as a correction to Brad’s (intentional) butchering of the name when introducing the segment. Brad and Tim are doing a good job playing off of that audience member’s interjection.
— Tim’s “how to tell if you are stupid” topic seemed like it would be an interesting change of pace for this character, but this one didn’t end up going as well as the usual Havnagootiim commentaries do. Several parts of his listed-off signs of stupidity fell flat.  Nice ending, though, where they did a clever crossover with Tim’s recurring “Salute to Journalism” commentaries, by having Havnagootiim slam the New York Post.
— All throughout tonight’s Saturday Night News, Brad keeps randomly uttering some weak ad-libs in a silly high-pitched voice. This made me come to a realization that something I REALLY don’t like about Brad as an anchorperson is that he’s too hokey in his delivery and tries too hard when doing some of his goofier bits and ad-libs. Even when intentionally mispronouncing Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer a few minutes ago, Brad delivered it too over-the-top and cartoonish.
— WTF was with Brad’s “The correct time” bit?
— As usual, some good complaints from Mary during her Spittin’ Mad rant. I especially liked her gripe about The New Odd Couple: “Why not do a white Diff’rent Strokes or a Japanese Jeffersons?”
— What was Mary referring to when she explained Laverne and Shirley recently got canceled because “Laverne bit somebody!” Is that referring to something Penny Marshall got in trouble for doing in real life?
— Tonight’s Saturday Night News feels like it’s going on forever.
— Fun payoff to Joe’s SNL Sports commentary with him cutting Don King’s trademark tall hair while King promotes an upcoming boxing match.
STARS: **


BIRTHDAY A GO-GO
a women’s club watches an exhibitionist (TIK) deliver a strip-o-gram

   

— LOL at the part of Tim’s strip act where he did an Egyptian dance while wearing a t-shirt over his head like an Egyptian headdress. That’s been the only part of his strip act that’s made me laugh so far.
— Good twist with Tim turning out to be an escaped mental patient posing as a stripper.
— So this ends up being our final sketch of the season? Not the best note for season 8 to end on, but at least it didn’t end with a repeated fake ad like season 7 frustratingly did.
STARS: **½


GOODNIGHTS

  

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— I pointed out in my last review that SNL has been following a never-ending “fun episode, lesser episode” cycle during the last few months of this season. And since yesterday’s episode was a fun one, I was worried it meant that if the aforementioned cycle continued, tonight’s episode would be a lesser one. Unfortunately, I turned out to be right. This episode was pretty forgettable for a season finale, and despite a few pretty solid segments, I can’t think of anything that stood out as really great. We also had a particularly dreadful Whiners sketch and an even weaker Saturday Night News than usual.
— Season 8 as a whole was surprisingly a blast for me to review. It was FAR from one of the best seasons ever, but there was a more comfortable and assuring feel to the overall show than the preceding season 7 had.   There was also a surprisingly good amount of episodes that had a very fun atmosphere, particularly the Joan Rivers one. This season also had a much more impressive roster of hosts than the preceding season did, especially during the stretch of episodes from December to February where we got a long consecutive string of comedy greats helming the show (The Smothers Brothers, Eddie Murphy, Lily Tomlin, Rick Moranis & Dave Thomas, Sid Caesar, and Howard Hesseman). Another thing that made this season a joy to review is the show’s star Eddie Murphy reaching his absolute peak in both performance quality and airtime. After getting so used to his consistently strong showing this season, I’m sure it’s going to feel a little odd seeing Eddie’s extremely reduced airtime next season while he’s busy filming movies in Hollywood.
— This season was also apparently good enough for Dick Ebersol to make no firings from the cast afterwards, which makes this the first season in years where everybody in the cast came back the next season. Though I do recall reading a Gary Kroeger article a few years ago where at one point, I think, he explains that Ebersol actually originally fired him after this season due to his lack of airtime and not having any breakout roles, before an irate Brad Hall talked Ebersol into rehiring Gary. However, my memories of that story are fuzzy, so I’m not sure how accurate my re-telling is.


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


HOW THIS SEASON STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING SEASON (1981-82):
— a step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
Season 9 begins, with host Brandon Tartikoff

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May 7, 1983 – Stevie Wonder (S8 E19)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

OPENING MONTAGE
— There’s no cold opening in my version of the episode; this just abruptly starts with the opening montage. I’m not sure if that’s how this episode originally aired, or if the cold opening is just missing from my copy. [ADDENDUM: Turns out there IS a cold opening missing from my copy: a promo for a fake miniseries titled “V.D.”] I do know that the following week’s episode also starts with no cold opening, though in that particular case, that’s how the episode originally aired (if I’m not mistaken).
— Tonight’s theme music sounds canned. In fact, I think it’s the same canned theme they used in the two late-October episodes earlier this season that were performed in Studio 3A (Howard Hesseman and Michael Keaton). Considering tonight’s episode is in the usual Studio 8H, I wonder why the theme music isn’t being performed live.


MONOLOGUE / MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “Fingertips”

— Loved Pardo doing a unique intro to Stevie instead of just saying the usual “Ladies and gentlemen, (insert host name here)”.
— Already starting off with a musical performance, right at the beginning of this monologue. Maybe this explains why they used canned theme music in the opening montage.
— Funny how they’re randomly using a high-pitched vocal modifier on Stevie (I guess because Pardo introduced him as “the 12-year-old genius”).


KANNON AE-1
a camera so simple, even host can use it

    

— I remember the first time I ever saw this was in an “SNL Goes Commercial” special (a “best of” compilation of memorable SNL fake ads), way back when I was just starting to get into SNL. Not knowing at the time that this commercial came from a Stevie Wonder-hosted episode, I remember being shocked when I saw Stevie participating in this. I asked myself “How in the WORLD did they get the real Stevie Wonder to make a cameo appearance for a silly little fake commercial like this??? And how’d he agree to participate in something poking fun at his blindness???” I actually started wondering if it was just a really convincing lookalike playing Stevie. It wasn’t until years later that I found out Stevie had hosted the show once in the early 80s and then I realized “Oh, that must be where that camera commercial came from”.
— Love the hilarious concept of a camera that’s “so simple, even Stevie Wonder can use it”.
— Stevie’s bad photography and bad tennis-playing are very funny. He’s one hell of a good sport for doing this commercial.
— His gleeful delivery of the tagline “So simple, ANYONE can use it!” never fails to crack me up.
— A classic commercial overall.
STARS: *****


STEVIE EXPERIENCE
Stevie Wonder impersonator (host) applies for a job, (EDM) gives him tips

   

— Stevie’s nerdy voice is funny as hell.
— I’m enjoying the premise of Stevie badly singing his own songs.
— Ha, Eddie’s having another one of his famous corpsing moments in response to Stevie saying something to him.
— Here’s Eddie busting out his famous Stevie imitation, to show Stevie’s character how to do the impression.
— Great audience eruption in response to Stevie singing “My Cherie Amour” the right way.
— Tonight’s episode in general has really been starting hot so far.
STARS: ****½


COTTON LAND
an opportunity to work off your white guilt

  

— Yet another sketch where I’m liking Stevie’s voice and delivery.
— Pretty funny concept.
— Mary’s testimonial is solid.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “Overjoyed”

— At the end of this performance, while still sitting at the piano, Stevie sets up the following sketch as a segue. This is very reminiscent of the way they segued from musical performances to sketches in the episode that Ray Charles hosted back in season 3.


THE STORY OF STEVIE
scenes from host’s life reveal he was influenced by white musicians

   

— As I mentioned in a recent review, this sketch has yet another instance of Mary Gross in light blackface playing a black role.
— LOL at the little boy in a braided wig and sunglasses playing young Stevie.
— Pretty funny Ed Sullivan impression from Joe.
— Nice to see Michael Davis actually appearing in a sketch as a character while still displaying his juggling skills.
— Another good use of Eddie’s Stevie impression tonight.
— Funny part with Stevie singing a Spike Jones-inspired version of “Superstitious”.
— Ha, Stevie’s now doing a comical English accent, which he reveals as his “real” voice. Man, tonight’s episode is fun.
STARS: ***½


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
Dr. Jack Badofsky lists varieties of impotence
nude, snake-laden Nastassia Kinski (JLD) explains why she’s a star
music critic Roderick Rhythm (host) dislikes songs with a social message

       

— Right off the bat, when flubbing his opening joke, Brad once again relies on his go-to “spouting a stream of exaggerated gibberish” ad-lib to save himself. Like I said recently, that go-to ad-lib was something Chevy did much better and smoother back in the original era. Brad is too over-the-top with it and it never lands with the audience.
— Brad’s random Lee Iaccocca bit was… interesting, I guess.
— Here’s Saturday Night News’s obligatory Tim Kazurinsky appearance of the week. Keeping his record-breaking streak alive, I see.
— Good to see another Dr. Jack Badofsky commentary, since I’ve recently begun appreciating this character.
— Great ad-lib from Tim, after his addendum to the “Chimp-otence” pun received a negative audience reaction.
— Not sure if I should be ashamed to admit I got a good laugh from Tim’s “Skim-potence” pun being for when you make love to a Chinese girl named Lo Fat.
— Another Badofsky commentary with a meta ending where he asks women to contact Tim Kazurinsky for sex.
— Whoa at Julia’s sexy look…
— Julia’s overall commentary was okay, I guess. The audience kinda didn’t seem to know what to make of it, and honestly, I’m not quite sure I do, either.
— Interesting seeing Stevie doing a Saturday Night News commentary.
— Stevie’s still doing the English accent from the end of the preceding sketch.
— Stevie’s overall commentary was pretty solid.
STARS: **½


DION’S
Dion Dion & Blaire (JOP) get very excited when host visits their salon

   

— Ah, we finally get the debut of Joe’s Blair character, the co-worker of Eddie’s recurring Dion Dion character.
— As expected, this is a great display of the fun chemistry that Eddie and Joe always have whenever they’re teamed together.
— Eddie’s over-the-top reaction to seeing Stevie in the store is hilarious.
— I liked Eddie telling Stevie that the peaceful lecture that Stevie’s giving him is “just like one of your Grammy speeches”.
— Funny ending
STARS: ***


BUSBOY
a Quasimodo-like busboy (JOP) gives poor service to (JLD) & (TIK)

   

— Oh… my… god at Joe’s entrance in that insane ogre-ish make-up.
— Joe’s character and actions are pretty funny.
— Is Julia trying to hide her laughing right now? She’s noticeably bowing her head for no apparent reason.
— Funny ending with Tim frantically trying to prevent Joe from retrieving his and Julia’s car.
STARS: ***


HITLER: THE SECRET DIARIES
Hitler (TIK) enters his first meeting with Eva Braun (ROD) into his diary

   

— A fairly funny concept with Tim-as-Hitler’s teenager-esque diary entries.
— Oh, we’re getting a flashback?
— I laughed out loud at the casual, friendly “Hi, Hitler!” greetings and salutes from everyone in the diner when Hitler enters.
— Robin’s accent is funny.
— The overall sketch wasn’t too great as a whole, but it had its moments.
STARS: **½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “Go Home”


MICHAEL DAVIS
Michael Davis & Greg Dean [real] do some slapstick with a broom & a chair

     

— Very interesting, unique intro from Stevie and Brad.
— Good to finally see Michael Davis again, after a year-long absence.
— Funny reveal that the blindfold Michael’s wearing had a secret eye hole in it the whole time.
— Good visual of him stuffing his mouth entirely full of grapes.
— Ha, he’s now trying to chew all the grapes as grape juice pours out of his mouth.
— Hmm, strange turn this has taken with a partner randomly joining Michael.
— I’m really liking the old-timey Vaudeville-esque comedy act between Michael and the aforementioned partner, and it appeals to me as a fan of classic slapstick comedy teams of this nature (The Three Stooges, Abbott and Costello, etc.). It’s a big deviation from Michael’s usual stuff on the show, but it’s working well.
— Overall, this was another great Michael Davis piece and it was nice to see him change his normal routine up a bit. Does this end up being his final SNL appearance?
STARS: ****


GOODNIGHTS

 

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— As I was expecting with Stevie Wonder as a host, this ended up being a fun episode, much like the enjoyable one that Ray Charles hosted. And much like Ray Charles in that episode, Stevie Wonder displayed a great sense of humor tonight and helped give the episode a consistently likable atmosphere with his sketch work and musical performances. He also seemed to appear in almost EVERYTHING tonight (even the pre-taped fake ad and Saturday Night News), which is noteworthy because most hosts in this era don’t appear all that much compared to later eras where it’s pretty much an unwritten rule to put the host in everything except the cold opening, Weekend Update, and some of the pre-taped segments.
— Lately, I’ve been noticing a pattern where a fun, above-average episode is immediately followed by a lesser episode, and then the cycle repeats all over again. The fun Howard Hesseman episode (the one from February) was followed by the fairly mediocre Beau & Jeff Bridges episode, which was followed by the fun Bruce Dern episode, followed by the average Robert Guillaume episode, followed by the VERY fun Joan Rivers episode, followed by the forgettable Susan Saint James episode, followed by tonight’s fun episode. Hope that doesn’t bode badly for the next episode, especially considering it’s the season finale.


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Susan Saint James):
— a fairly big step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
Season 8 comes to an end, with host Mayor Ed Koch

Posted on

April 16, 1983 – Susan Saint James / Michael McDonald (S8 E18)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
Velvet Jones plugs his titillating new videotape- “The Exercises of Love”

  

— The opening shot of Velvet Jones laying in that position was pretty funny. Also, his positioning made me think this was going to be YET ANOTHER Calvin Klein Jeans spoof, but this has just turned out to be yet another commercial with him advertising a new book of his. Not excited to see this, considering I feel that the only strong book commercial he did was his classic first one (“I Wanna Be a Ho”).
–At least this is somewhat different from his last few book commercials, with him demonstrating various love-making positions, which is fairly funny, though nothing great.
STARS: **


OPENING MONTAGE
— For some reason, Don Pardo precedes his usual announcement of “It’s Saturday Night Live” by saying “from New York”. Not sure why. I know the cold opening didn’t end with a “Live from New York”, but neither did several cold openings from earlier this season, and those episodes didn’t have Pardo changing up the “It’s Saturday Night Live” announcement.


MONOLOGUE
(no synopsis available)

— Nice energy from her to start this off.
— She mentions getting married to SNL producer Dick Ebersol and having a child with him in between her previous episode and tonight’s.
— Quick monologue overall. The breastfeeding joke at the end was okay enough.
STARS: **½


SIT ON IT!
panelists JOP, EDM, host identify statuettes with their butts

     

— Interesting to see Brad playing a gameshow host.
— Hmm, the three panelists (Joe, Eddie, Susan) are playing themselves.
— Sitting on a bust to identify it? THAT’S the premise??? What a concept.
— Figures Robin would choose the one black panelist (Eddie) to identify the Louis Armstrong bust.
— Good brief Louis Armstrong vocal imitation from Eddie when he correctly guesses the bust he’s sitting on.
— Susan’s eagerness to return to the show after seeing the flag statue was pretty funny.
— Overall, this was a little better than the initial reveal of the concept had me expecting, though I still didn’t find this all that great as a whole.
STARS: **½


TOOTSIE COSMETICS
Dorothy Michaels’ (GAK) Tootsie cosmetics bring out the woman in EDM

 

— Good to see the return of Gary’s Tootsie impression.
— Second sketch in a row with Eddie playing himself.
— Eddie’s silent, deadpan, uncooperative demeanor during all this is funny.
— This sketch made me come to a second realization that I don’t think Eddie ever dressed in drag in his entire SNL tenure. The first realization I had of that was in this season’s first Howard Hesseman episode where, during the monologue, Howard unfavorably compared this season’s cast to the original cast and asked at one point “When is Eddie Murphy going to start doing scenes in drag??? Garrett did!”.
— Funny in hindsight seeing the ending with Eddie having a big change of heart and starting to embrace doing drag after hearing how much money “Tootsie” grossed. Oh, so THAT’S why Eddie went on to do so many drag movies later in his career…
STARS: ***½


TEXXON
— Rerun


THE LADIES ROOM
(JOP) & (TIK) discover hidden paradise on undercover trip to ladies’ room

     

— WTF? Two sketches in a row centered around men in drag?
— The reveal of what the ladies room really looks like is fairly funny, though the premise of males finding out the ladies room is a heavenly paradise seems pretty cliché. I’ve seen it done in various shows and cartoons.
— I like the part with the guy walking around repeatedly asking “Anyone here for sex?”
— Despite the clichéd premise, I AM liking the commitment to how ambitious this sketch is, with all the various things happening from various people on just one set. Fairly impressive for a live sketch.
— Eddie playing an effeminate hair stylist named Dion? I was about to ask if this is supposed to be his recurring Dion Dion character, but he’s not wearing the wig.
— What was with the screaming running guy in the background in the middle of Susan’s big speech?
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “If That’s What It Takes”


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
TIK reads police reports from Ocean Springs, Mississippi
Dr. Ruth Westheimer (MAG) answers sex questions from SNL technical crew
EDM thanks Chicagoans for electing Harold Washington mayor

      

— In the NYC skyline background, I’m seeing what looks like a tiny King Kong hanging off of the Empire State Building. (you can see it in the upper left side of the first screencap above) Interesting new addition to the set. Is this a random choice, or is it an homage/tie-in to some kind of significance King Kong had this week? I know the original King Kong movie came out in 1933, so considering this is 1983, maybe this week was the 50th anniversary of the movie’s release date.
— Funny seeing a reference to Joan Rivers’ famous reliance on Liz Taylor jokes, after it was on full display in the episode Rivers hosted the previous week.
— Here’s Saturday Night News’s obligatory Tim Kazurinsky appearance of the week. I wonder how many consecutive episodes he’s done a news commentary in by this point; my guess is six or seven. That’s GOTTA be an all-time record.
— The bizarre police reports Tim read off were an interesting change of pace from the New York Post headlines he usually shows in these Salute to Journalism commentaries, but this one felt like it wasn’t as funny as it could’ve been.
— Good part with Mary’s Dr. Ruth responding to the long size of the boom mic guy’s mic by saying “No problem there”.
— They repeated the Dr. Ruth finger-in-hole gesture gag ONCE AGAIN. Why do they always have to do that at the end of every commentary she does? That only worked the first time.
— I’ve been noticing tonight that whenever a guest commentary has ended, Brad does just one news joke, then he ALREADY throws to another guest commentator.
— Eddie’s overall commentary was only okay. There were some pretty funny lines, but this pales in comparison to some of his earlier news commentaries, and his delivery seemed kinda off during this.
STARS: **½


OUR GENERATION
lazy (GAK) ignores motivation from parents, friends, potential fortune

   

— Is Gary’s repeated “Nah!”s going to be his only dialogue in the whole sketch?
— I got a good laugh from Joe’s angry “You go straight to hell” to Gary after failing to get him to do something productive.
— Okay, Gary’s “Nah!”s are starting to increasingly make me laugh more and more, especially the pondering pause he always does right before saying it.
— I love how Gary’s being offered increasingly golden opportunities, only for him to turn them each down with his usual “Nah!”s. Predictable but it’s tickling me.
— The ending with Gary heading up the stairs while letting everyone know “Thought I’d go upstairs… diddle with my fiddle” (which kinda reminds me of a classic moment from a certain famous Joe Montana-involved sketch the show would do four years later) was kinda funny in itself, but didn’t work too well as a punchline for this sketch. However, the reason for that may be because, from what I remember once hearing, the wording of that punchline was originally supposed to be dirtier before the censors made Gary tone it down to “diddle with my fiddle”. I can’t remember what the original wording was supposed to be, but whatever it was, I’m sure it would’ve made the punchline hit harder.
STARS: ***½


STEVEN WRIGHT
Steven Wright [real] does stand-up about his cross-country trip

— Surprised to see a Steven Wright appearance THIS early in SNL’s timeline. I had always been under the impression that he didn’t begin appearing as a stand-up guest on SNL until seasons 10 and 11. I’m very happy to see him, though. He’s always been one of my all-time favorite stand-up comedians.
— If you’re familiar with my reviews, you’ll know that I’m loving the format of this piece with him doing a long string of random one-liners.
— Overall, this was absolutely hilarious as expected. Every single thing that came out of the man’s mouth was funny here. My favorite one-liners were the whole Flintstones bit, the friend who has sideburns behind his ears, the “Breakfast any time” bit, and the punchline to the ski lift ride story.
STARS: ****½


TAKIN’ CARE OF BUSINESS
James Watt (JOP) endorses pro-industry hits

  

— After only one episode, we already have the return of Joe’s James Watt impression.
— Looks like this is going to be yet another variation of the “celebrity spokesperson advertises an album of hit songs modified to fit a theme relating to said spokesperson” type of sketch. SNL’s been going to that well an awful lot lately.
— I got some laughs from the audio sample played of the modified version of “MacArthur Park”.
— This sketch definitely isn’t working as well as the previous sketches in this vein did. This one is getting too one-note.
— Just when I thought the sketch was mercifully about to end, Joe has thrown to YET ANOTHER screen crawl of even more songs from an extra “Beach Boys” album. Ugh, just END this sketch already.
STARS: *½


DUNG IN THE OVAL OFFICE
Ronald Reagan (JOP) communicates with Deng Xiaoping (TIK) via stereotypes

  

— The opening shot of the White House while the “Hail to the Chief” theme played made me initially think this would be another installment of the sketches showing President Reagan’s perspective, before the camera cut to Joe playing Reagan.
— Tim and Brad’s cartoonish Chinese gibberish and accents are just plain cringeworthy here.
— I did kinda like the throwaway line implying that Richard Nixon is now serving as a White House bathroom attendant.
— Wow at the endless amount of Asian stereotype jokes here.
— Overall, good lord, this sketch was atrocious and brought to light some of the worst tendencies of the Ebersol era. I know I was very lenient on those “Old (insert ethnicity here) Beer” commercials in my recent review of the Bruce Dern episode, but at least I found those to have an infectiously silly atmosphere and fun performances from Eddie and Joe that helped me look past the racism. This sketch, on the other hand, had NOTHING to help me look past the racism.
STARS: *


KILLING TIME
EDM wastes some time by plugging 48 Hours & Trading Places

 

— WTF happened? Why has this begun with the audience already in the middle of laughing hysterically?  What did we miss?
— Ha, Eddie now just acknowledged the same question I asked above, by jokingly saying “People at home are going ‘what did he do?’”
— Oh, it’s a “killing time” segment. Eddie’s usually always really good at these.
— He plugs an upcoming movie he’s doing with Dan Aykroyd, the now-well-known “Trading Places”.
— What’s with all the weird jump cuts? Am I watching an edited version of this?
— He also plugs the upcoming Stevie Wonder-hosted episode by doing his famous impression of him.
STARS: N/A (not a rateable segment)


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “I Can’t Let Go Now”


MAGIC FISH
a peasant (EDM) uses lawyers to negotiate wishes from a magic fish (MAG)

   

— Mary briefly breaks character after trying to spit water into Eddie’s face.
— Decent premise with Eddie bringing an attorney to negotiate wishes from the fish.
— I like how Mary as the fish is now smoking a cigarette after the camera cuts back to the negotiations still occurring after a long time.
— I’ve noticed what looks like another sudden jump cut tonight. Is this sketch edited too?
— Mary’s bitter “Damn!” into the camera gave me a pretty good laugh.
STARS: ***


THE WEB
— Rerun


GOODNIGHTS

 

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A pretty unremarkable episode. There were some good segments, but a lot of the episode left me with a “meh” feeling. Not particularly bad, just forgettable.


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Joan Rivers):
— a step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
Stevie Wonder

Posted on

April 9, 1983 – Joan Rivers / Musical Youth (S8 E17)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
the Whiners are in the studio to watch SNL, but they have some complaints

 

— Ugh, another Whiners sketch. I guess Sid Caesar wasn’t successful in his attempts to strangle them to death at the end of their most recent sketch.
— I DO like the meta premise of the Whiners being at SNL, though.
— I got a big laugh from the Whiners saying “I hope Gilda’s on the show tonight”.
— I liked the irony of them complaining that Joan Rivers is so loud and annoying.
— Overall, surprisingly not too terrible for a Whiners sketch. One of their better appearances by default.
STARS: **½


MONOLOGUE
host does self-deprecating stand-up about her childhood

— Immediately starting off with VERY rapid-fire jokes.
— I’m liking a lot of her self-deprecating jokes about herself as a baby.
— Wow, she’s going a mile a minute with these jokes; so much so, that it’s taken me a few seconds to get some of the punchlines, and by the time I do, she’s already done the next punchline. I am getting a lot of laughs here, though, and I love the energy of this.
STARS: ****


THE DAVID SUSSKIND SHOW, PART 1
Buckwheat bodyguard (EDM) tells David Susskind [real]- he was sleazeball

      

— Yet another continuation of the “Buckwheat’s death” saga. I had no idea it ever went as far as three episodes. I was only aware of the first two.  Gotta love SNL’s continued commitment to this story arc.
— Very good blunt delivery from Eddie of the reveal that “Buckwheat was a sleazeball”.
— Eddie works in another funny n-word drop.
— I’m really enjoying the behind-the-scenes video of a candid Buckwheat acting like a sleazy diva.
— Susskind throws to a mid-show “commercial”, which I guess counts as a separate segment, and then I assume they’re going to come back to Part 2 the Susskind sketch. Interesting format break for SNL.
STARS: ****


THE ENQUIRER
the paper for people with enquiring minds

    

— A lot of funny, silly humor & animated graphics here.
— Love the random inclusion of Mary’s Alfalfa at the end of this.
STARS: ***½


THE DAVID SUSSKIND SHOW, PART 2
back on Susskind show, Buckwheat impersonators (TIK), (GAK), (EDM) argue

 

— Fast costume change for Eddie.
— LOL at Eddie’s dignified, accented voice as a Buckwheat impersonator. I feel like I’ve heard Eddie do this voice before, but I’m not sure which sketch it was in.
— An overall okay sketch, though a step down from Part 1 of this sketch.
— Poor Gary Kroeger was wasted in yet another sketch. They didn’t let him really do anything in this. That’s especially a shame considering we’ve seen before (in the Lily Tomlin cold opening this season) that he can actually do a decent Buckwheat impression.
STARS: ***


OSCARS
Oscar statuettes await their category backstage

   

— Mixed feelings about this concept. It’s a somewhat unique idea, but it also has too much of the type of cutesy, corny feel that I used to always negatively associate the Ebersol era with years ago. (As it turns out, I haven’t been finding this era to be QUITE as corny as I used to feel)
— That gold face paint oddly makes Julia look kinda like a black woman.
— Some highlights here, but the overall sketch wasn’t too great as a whole.
STARS: **½


JOAN VS. JOAN
host & crossdressed JOP have joke-telling contest to identify real Joan

   

— Nice to see the return of Joe’s Joan Rivers impression. It’s not the best Joan Rivers impression I’ve seen (it’s basically just Joe’s normal deep-ish voice talking in Joan Rivers’ vocal pattern), but he plays the role so over-the-top that I can’t help but always crack up.
— I like this premise of a Joan Rivers contest between Joan and Joe.
— Heh, boy, Joan can’t even keep a straight face ALREADY.
— The joke about a guy being “so dumb, he couldn’t count to 21 unless he was naked” took a few seconds to for me to get, but when I did, I laughed out loud for several seconds.
— Joe already used the “Why can’t you be more like Sheila? / Sheila had died at birth” joke in the Speaking As a Woman sketch from earlier this season where he did his Joan Rivers impression opposite Gary as Dustin Hoffman’s Tootsie.
— This sketch is very fun to watch so far. I’m having a blast, and clearly, so are Joan and Joe themselves.
— The ending with Joan’s husband (wearing a bag over his head) having to decide by feel which one of the two Joans is the real one was okay, but I felt it took away from where this sketch was going when it was just Joan and Joe playing off of each other.
STARS: ****


CALVIN KLEIN JEANS
Industrial Strength Calvin Klein Jeans- Liz Taylor (host) reminisces

  

— Oh my god at Joan in that getup…
— More fat jokes about Liz Taylor. Feels redundant to place this sketch right after the Joan Vs. Joan sketch which also had a string of fat Liz Taylor jokes.
— This turns out to be yet another Calvin Klein Jeans parody. SNL seemed to do a lot of these in the 80s.
STARS: **½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Pass the Dutchie”


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
a list of cooperative events China will be boycotting
a raging MAG gives an alternate Academy Awards list
Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer talks about things that make him angry
James Watt (JOP) sings “Barbara Ann” with BRH & GAK

       

— Chilling in hindsight to hear a joke about Space Shuttle Challenger, knowing what would infamously happen to it three years later.
— Oh, COME ON, a return of the dreaded “long screen crawl gag” from the previous season’s SNL Newsbreaks?!?!? It’s official: this season DEFINITELY must be occasionally using leftover Brian Doyle-Murray scripts from season 7. Ugh.
— Wow, the audience is really starting to get worked up during tonight’s Spittin’ Mad Mary Gross rant.
— This is the first Spittin’ Mad Mary Gross rant that ended with her concluding it on her own instead of getting cut off by Brad.
— Here’s Saturday Night News’s obligatory Tim Kazurinsky appearance of the week.
— Tim’s Jodie Foster/John Hinckley joke actually received boos from the audience.
— Tim’s overall commentary was okay, but not as strong as his usual Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer appearances.  There weren’t any particular lines that stood out this time.
— Ha, Joe as the infamous Secretary of the Interior James Watt.
— Love how Joe and Brad randomly broke out into an out-of-place performance of the song “Barbara Ann”, especially when Gary literally popped up from under the desk as himself to join in on the singing. Very fun bit.
STARS: **


OLD AGE HOME
in the year 2040, old folks host & EDM remember their glory days

 

— Interesting seeing a sketch taking place in the year 2040, and I like the futuristic look of the set.
— Wait, Joan’s playing herself? Did anyone in 1983 REALLY think she’d still be alive in 2040? Wouldn’t she have been well into her 100s even before that decade?
— I always like seeing futuristic sketches taking place decades later where hosts play themselves as elderly. Robin Williams does a great one in season 13, and Lady Gaga does one in season 39. I think I also remember seeing one with Paul Simon in season 11. There might be others I’m forgetting too.
— Julia: “Your husband Edgar’s not coming.” Joan: “Tell me something new.”
— LOL, Eddie playing himself as an old man. I also love his random choice of portraying his elderly self as having an old white Jew voice for no apparent reason.
— Heh, Joan has once again started cracking up in the middle of a sketch.
— Yet ANOTHER slam at Liz Taylor in tonight’s episode. She must’ve been Joan’s favorite punching bag back in the 80s.
— Overall, another fun sketch tonight.
STARS: ***½


CLUB DOOLITTLE
E. Eppy Doolittle (EDM) does ad for his club while avoiding (JOP)’s food

     

— Oh, I’ve been looking forward to this sketch all night. You’ll see why soon.
— Clint Smith makes his second appearance of the night.
— I’m really liking Eddie’s intentionally-bad stilted delivery.
— Joe’s ALREADY trying to make Eddie laugh during their scene together. But that’s just a small hint of what Joe ends up doing to Eddie later in the sketch.
— Yes! Here it starts, with Eddie randomly getting whipped cream and cake thrown at him from an off-camera Joe while Eddie’s in the middle of addressing the viewers.
— Haha, this is starting to turn into a full-out food fight between Eddie and Joe.
— And here’s the legendary part that propels this unscripted whipped cream/cake incident into an all-time classic, where after struggling to keep the sketch going while dodging Joe’s thrown food, Eddie finally drops character and yells to an off-camera Joe “THIS IS LIVE TELEVISION!!!! This show’s live!” I can barely even type out this stuff right now because I’m laughing so hard.
— Now I’ve begun laughing even harder just now with Eddie opening his mouth wide to try catching a piece of cake thrown at him. He misses, as the cake piece hilariously ends up bouncing off his mouth. All of this priceless stuff is absolutely SLAYING me.
— Overall, oh my god, that was simply epic. This is a rare, Debbie Downer-type example of unprofessionalism actually making a sketch much funnier. I highly doubt this particular sketch would stand out at all if it hadn’t gone completely off the rails and was instead performed straight.
STARS: *****


JOAN RIVERS STAND-UP #2
host does stand-up about the birth of her daughter, ugly rock stars

— This feels like a throwback to the first two seasons, back when stand-up comedian hosts (George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Robert Klein, etc.) were given multiple spots throughout the show to perform their stand-up instead of just relegating it to the monologue spot.
— Joan mentions her then-14-year-old daughter Melissa, who would later become well-known.
— More rapid-fire funny jokes from Joan.
STARS: ***½


CARIBBEAN GYNO
on the island of St. Chuck, (host) visits a Caribbean gyno (EDM)

  

— Right out of the gate, I already love Mary’s voice and accent in this.
— Interesting lower-key character for Eddie.
— Great part with Mary singing the theme song for Eddie’s character.
— Eddie’s pronunciation of “umbrellla” as “oombrella” was a little detail that gave me a pretty good laugh.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Never Gonna Give You Up”


GOODNIGHTS

 

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— I was really looking forward to reviewing this episode, because from my viewing of it years ago (when NBC showed it on “Classic SNL” sometime around 2004 or 2005), I recalled it being a very fun episode. Watching the episode again tonight, I see my recollection was absolutely correct. In fact, the episode ended up being even MORE fun than I had remembered. The overall episode was consistently solid (even the Whiners were half-decent) and had such an enjoyable, loose, ad-libby atmosphere, helped by Joan Rivers’ presence (who I was not expecting to find as likable as I ended up finding). The loose vibe of the night reached its absolute peak with all the legendary antics in the Club Doolittle sketch.


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Robert Guillaume):
— a big step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
Susan Saint James

Posted on

March 19, 1983 – Robert Guillaume / Duran Duran (S8 E16)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
Buckwheat killer John David Stutts (EDM) is profiled, shot Oswald-style

         

— I love how they’re keeping the previous episode’s epic “Buckwheat gets shot” saga going.
— Ha, continuing a repeated gag from last week, Joe’s Koppel still keeps overplaying the Buckwheat assassination clip at every opportunity.
— I like how even the moment of silence is “sponsored” by Mutual Life.
— Love the fictional assassin name John David Stutts.
— Great characterization from Eddie as Stutts, and I like the little detail of him having no eyebrows.
— Who’s that playing the doctor being interviewed right now? (sixth screencap above)
— Wow, this is quite long for a cold opening in this era.
— Great biography video on Stutts, especially the various yearbook pictures of him.
— I saw the Lee Harvey Oswald-esque shooting of Stutts coming, but it was still perfect, especially Eddie’s monotone “Oh, I’m shot”.
— Heh, now it’s the Stutts assassination clip that Joe’s Koppel is constantly overplaying.
— An overall excellent cold opening & companion piece to the previous week’s Buckwheat sketch.
STARS: *****


MONOLOGUE
host & audience recite the creed of moderation

   

— Nice energetic entrance from Robert.
— He’s displaying a very Howard Hesseman-esque way of getting the audience going.
— Come to think of it, this whole premise with Robert getting the audience to pledge about moderation is reminiscent of Hesseman’s “restraint” chant from his season 5 monologue.
— Loved his “Burn this mutha down” line.
— Solid monologue overall, despite the kinda-derivative feeling of the premise. Robert carried this well.
STARS: ***½


CLYSLER-PRYMOUTH
— Rerun


THE MRS. T BIRTHDAY SPECIAL
hubby’s not there & that means trouble

     

— Ha, I wasn’t aware that Robin’s Mrs. T ended up becoming recurring. This sketch seems like it will be a decent-enough showcase for her, even though I’ve always felt that the idea of SNL giving a celebrity impression their own variety show special is kinda lazy. Though at least it’s not as lazy as SNL’s crutch of giving celebrity impressions their own talk show. (ugh)
— I like how to match the glittery set & outfits, even Robin’s mohawk has glitter.
— Oh, here’s Mary’s light-blackface Lena Horne appearance I mentioned in a recent review.
— Mary’s impression is pretty funny.
— Great part with Robin wildly jumping on Joe and kissing him.
— Nice sudden appearance of Eddie’s Mr. T.
— Eddie-as-Mr.-T’s stiff, stern, joyless singing of “Happy Birthday” is really cracking me up.
— Good sketch overall, though nowhere near as strong as the Mrs. T sketch from earlier this season.
STARS: ***


HEIL HITS
Klaus Barbie (TIK) pitches Heil Hits, an album with examples of Nazi Gold

   

— Another sketch in the same vein as the two sketches from last season advertising a record of Christian-ized and hippie-ized hit songs, respectively. Those two sketches were fine, but I feel there’s more potential in this Hitler premise.
— An overall okay sketch, though unlike the Christian and hippie record sketches, no particular song stood out in this one.
STARS: ***


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
TIK points out that current best-selling books have little literary merit
Patti Lynn Hunnsacker trashes Gone With the Wind & The Wizard of Oz
BRH promotes the Brad Hall Anchorman Doll & Accessory Kit

       

— Nice callback to the John David Stutts storyline.
— Here’s Saturday Night News’s obligatory Tim Kazurisnky appearance of the week.
— I like Tim’s slam on the homophobia of the book title “Real Men Don’t Eat Quiche”.
— Good ending to Tim’s commentary with the appropriately soft-bound “Impotence” book.
— Not too excited to see the return of Julia’s teen character.
— Julia’s overall commentary ended up being marginally better than the character’s previous appearance. Her complaints about old movies had a few okay lines.
— Wow, Brad’s Liza Minelli/Sammy Davis Jr. joke completely bombed.
— I’ve been noticing this season that whenever Brad flubs a line on Saturday Night News, he ad-libs his way out of it by exaggeratedly saying a whole bunch of gibberish. He’s done it twice tonight alone. Seems like a poor man’s version of something Chevy Chase used to do funnier during his Weekend Update tenure, where he would save himself after a line flub by ad-libbing a casual stream of funny-sounding Spanish gibberish.
— Interesting-seeming bit with Brad showcasing a “Brad Hall Anchorman Doll”. This feels like the first time that Brad has done a side segment since the first few episodes of the season, back when Ebersol seemed to give Brad more freedom in doing stuff on Saturday Night News besides news jokes.
— A good laugh from Brad’s accidental crotch flash with the doll.
— I like the how the doll set comes with an Update desk and an NBC camera.
— Funny casual mention that Brad wears no pants behind the desk.
STARS: **½


MOTOWN UPON THE SWANEE RIVER
in Old South, Chicken Mel (EDM) thinks Cotton Joe (host) is an Uncle Tom

  

— Strangely, this is this the first actual sketch Robert Guillaume has been seen in all night.
— I haven’t been caring for this sketch so far, and both Robert and Eddie’s delivery is pretty sloppy.
— They repeated the gag from the Louis Gossett Jr. episode where Eddie opens a closet door and yells “Shut up!” to the band inside that’s been playing background music throughout the sketch.
— Eddie has another one of his corpsing moments, with him cracking up in response Robert’s “Tubway” line for some reason.
— I like Eddie breaking out into “My Boyfriend’s Back” as example of “colored music of the future”.
— Pretty weak sketch overall.
STARS: **


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Hungry Like The Wolf”


I MARRIED A MONKEY
hospitalized Madge is suffering from amnesia

   

— Even right from the start with a solemn, bouquet of flowers-holding Tim outside a hospital room, I can already tell this going to be an I Married a Monkey sketch.
— I was right.
— This is the first time we’ve seen this sketch all season. I had felt that this sketch began growing stale during the last two installments, but since it’s been quite a long time since this sketch’s last appearance, I’m a little more optimistic.
— Some laughs from Tim’s anguish over the possibility of male orderlies lifting up Madge’s hospital gown and seeing what’s underneath.
— Pretty funny kiss between Tim and Madge, especially when something dropped out of one of their mouths.
— Fairly interesting twist ending with Brad as Madge’s “other” husband.
— Overall, this sketch wasn’t quite the return to form that I hoped it would be. Madge seemed unusually subdued in this version, which is a shame because the real selling point of these sketches has always been seeing Tim play off of the monkey’s unscripted actions. I’m guessing this is the installment where the (male) monkey playing Madge had to be sedated before the live show because of an infamous incident during that night’s dress rehearsal where the monkey went absolutely berserk mid-sketch, grabbed Tim into a painful tight headlock, then stood on the bed, removed its clothes and diaper, and… well, proceeded to do something to himself that I don’t feel like repeating here. Tim talks about the whole crazy incident in the “Live from New York” book. I believe during that same portion of the book, Tim also talks about how, IIRC, he eventually quit doing these I Married a Monkey sketches for good when he found out Dick Ebersol had secretly taken out life insurance on him in case he was ever seriously harmed by the monkey.
STARS: **


OIL IS US
Saudi Arabian, Iranian, Nigerian deny that OPEC is a cartel

   

— I like concept of Joe’s Arab character going through all the cliches of a “Crazy Eddie”-style pitchman.
— Funny voices from from Robert and especially Eddie.
— Poor Gary Kroeger, just NOW making his first (and maybe only) appearance of the night, and it’s just a small (albeit pretty funny) walk-on role. It wasn’t until the backstage cold opening he did in the last episode that I started realizing  how underused he really is.
— I like the casual reveal that the three guys’ names together are Manny, Moe, and Jack, the same names of the Pep Boys.
STARS: ***


PUDGE & SOLOMON
Solomon doesn’t want to go live with his gynecologist nephew (host)

 

— I liked Eddie’s “He lookin’ at crotches for a livin’” line regarding Robert’s gynecologist character.
— Eddie’s fake mustache is starting to look weird, like it’s almost about to fall off.
— Another solid Pudge and Solomon sketch overall.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Girls on Film”


WRONG NUMBER
(BRH) dials a wrong number & tells (JLD) he’s breaking up with her

— Julia’s increasingly disgusting descriptions of herself are really funny.
— Decent twist with Brad turning out to have called the wrong girl.
STARS: ***


GOODNIGHTS

 

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A pretty average episode. Most of the sketches were decent, the cold opening was terrific, and there wasn’t too much that fell flat, but I dunno, the overall show still kinda felt like it was lacking something, like maybe an exciting feel. While the episode as a whole was okay, I’ll probably barely remember anything from it after I’m finished with this season.


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Bruce Dern):
— a step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
Joan Rivers

Posted on

March 12, 1983 – Bruce Dern / Leon Redbone (S8 E15)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
a drunk GAK laments his lack of inclusion in sketches

   

— Nice to see a cold opening centering around the running gag of hapless Gary Kroeger always getting a raw deal on SNL.
— Tim: “Hey, Gary, what’re you doing here? Did ya come to watch the show?”
— Hilarious how increasingly worse Gary’s situation keeps getting.
— Nice passionate angry outburst from Gary (“The only joke on this show is MY CAREER!!”).
— Great fake-out at the end, with Gary seeming like he’s about to commit suicide via gunshot to the head while starting to say “Live from New York…”, only for the gun he fires to pop out a flag with the words “It’s Saturday Night” (in the same font as the then-current SNL logo; nice touch). Fun way to change up LFNY as well.
STARS: ****


MONOLOGUE
host blames the moviegoing public for his psycho reputation

 

— WTF at his opening “I almost had to swim here” joke?
— Hmm, after calling himself out on the lameness of his aforementioned joke, he adds an earnest “We almost lost our house a couple of weeks ago.” Did his house recently have a severe flood?
— I like him specifying each of his disturbing movie roles.
— Great dark turn this has taken with his menacing “It’s you!” realization as he points to us viewers.
— His whole psychotic viewer-blaming rant as the camera is slowly zooming closer and closer to him is hilariously creepy. I’m loving his violent threats to us.
STARS: ****


BUCKWHEAT JEANS
they’re “O-Tay”

  

— Good twist with the person in the jeans the camera is slowly panning up to turning out to be Buckwheat. Funny to see him doing a commercial like this (especially when you know what’s going to happen to him later tonight).
STARS: ***


THE CLAMS
— Boy, they’re STILL falling back on this often-reaired commercial from season 7?


DONNY & MARIE ST. PATRICK’S DAY SPECIAL
brotherly love on Donny (GAK) & Marie’s (JLD) St. Patrick’s Day Special

 

— A very pregnant Marie…
— They mention their famous appearance on Gumby’s Christmas special from earlier this season. I always like whenever SNL makes a passing mention of a previous episode or sketch.
— A rehash of the gag where Donny and Marie’s song gradually turns into them incestuously making out with each other. It was hilarious the first time, but is it REALLY necessary to repeat? Though they did kinda up the ante this time by having Julia jumping on Gary during the makeout session, which she didn’t do last time.
— This sketch suddenly gets “interrupted” by a special report, leading us into our next segment.
STARS: not sure if I should rate this, since it’s an incomplete sketch that got “interrupted” as a set-up to the following segment, but I’ll give it a ** rating


SPECIAL REPORT
Ted Koppel (JOP) reports- Buckwheat’s been fatally shot; Texxon sponsors

         

— Ah, this is it, folks…
— There’s the now-legendary “Buckwheat has been shot” announcement & subsequent footage of the incident.
— I criticized Joe’s Ted Koppel impression in some of my earlier reviews (essentially calling his impression just “Joe Piscopo in a wig”), but his Koppel voice seems to have noticeably improved tonight. Or maybe it’s just grown on me.
— Unseen Assassin: “Hey, Mr. Wheat!” (*gunshots fire*)
— Love the wide-eyed, teeth-gritting look on Buckwheat’s face when he gets shot. Good subtle acting choice from Eddie, when most performers would’ve just made a generic anguished face when “getting shot”.
— I like the “America Stunned” graphic.
— Yet another use of SNL’s fake sponsor “Texxon” from earlier episodes.
— Excellent inclusion of Mary as Alfalfa reacting to the tragedy.
— You gotta love how they’re going all out on this whole thing.
— LOL at how Joe’s Koppel is using every excuse in the book to replay the same clip of Buckwheat getting shot. That’s a dead-on spoof of typical news coverage of tragedies like this. I also like how with each repetition, the Buckwheat assassination clip is played in increasingly slower motion.
— Joe’s Koppel has now announced the official death of Buckwheat. Wow.
— A big laugh from Texxon’s addendum to their usual “Life goes on, and Texxon is there” slogan: “Because Buckwheat would have wanted it that way”.
— A funny memoriam montage of Buckwheat.
— Overall, this epic sketch was a masterpiece and flawlessly executed. Truly deserving of its reputation as one of the best pieces in SNL history.
STARS: *****


THE HOME FOR DISGUSTING PRACTICES
host tries to play a “normal” role

     

— Ha, the opening disclaimer (“And now, a scene in which Bruce Dern doesn’t play a psycho”) already has me very interested in this sketch.
— Wow, what an insane concept to this sketch.
— Great individual performance from each cast member playing a mental patient. Everybody’s allowed to shine here.
— Good groaner with Joe’s “They ain’t even been weaned yet” line regarding the puppies in his pants.
— Heh, Bruce is clearly amused by Mary’s performance, as he’s visibly trying not to crack up at her.
— A nice breaking-the-fourth-wall turn, with everyone dropping character and Bruce going back to his menacing viewer-blaming bit from the monologue.
STARS: ***½


THE BUCKWHEAT STORY
a TV movie starring Byron Allen

— A decent quick promo, keeping up tonight’s Buckwheat running premise by showing NBC cashing in on his death by doing a biopic about him.
STARS: ***


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
prominent figures express their sorrow over Buckwheat’s death
a new report includes spy photos of Soviet military secrets
Dr. Jack Badofsky lists varieties of venereal disease
Siobhan Cahill gives tips on how to have a great St. Patrick’s Day

         

— I love that tonight’s Buckwheat running premise is even carrying over into THIS.
— Ha, in Joe-as-Ted-Koppel fashion, Brad uses a cheap excuse to replay the Buckwheat gunshot clip once again.
— At first, I thought the pre-taped segment of celebrities addressing Buckwheat’s death was genuine footage filmed specifically for SNL, when the segment started with Charlton Heston and Henry Kissinger. I was about to say “Wow, SNL is REALLY fully committed to this Buckwheat premise”, but then the next two tribute clips were from President Reagan and the Pope, making it obvious that these are all just unrelated clips taken out of context to make it seem like they’re talking about Buckwheat.
— Hilarious how the Pope’s translated message eventually led to him throwing to yet ANOTHER replay of the Buckwheat assassination clip.
— Brad’s long-winded photo montage joke wasn’t that funny and, again, kinda reeked of something Brian Doyle-Murray would’ve done the previous season.
— I got a good laugh from Brad’s joke about cigarette companies now including a malignant tumor in each cigarette pack.
— Maybe it’s because my negative review of Dr. Jack Badofsky’s last commentary from a few episodes ago received several replies on Twitter (including from “That Week in SNL”) defending the character, or maybe because tonight’s episode has put me in a really good mood, but I’m enjoying tonight’s Badofsky commentary a lot more than usual. I’m actually laughing at these corny puns.
— Haha, I got a good laugh from the audience’s groaning reaction to Badofsky’s “Dacron-orrhea” pun. Tim’s doing a great job playing off of their negative reaction.
— A fun Badofsky commentary overall. I’m glad that I’m starting to come around on this character. Again, special thanks to those on Twitter who replied to my review of his last appearance and helped me understand the appeal of this character.
— Heh, immediately after Badofsky’s commentary, Brad has a groaner of his own, with his joke about the Statue of Liberty being “statutory raped”, which, much like some of Jack Badofsky’s puns tonight, receives audible hisses from the audience.
— Mary was okay in her overall performance here, but the commentary itself featured nothing noteworthy.
STARS: **½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Sweet Sue”


JERRY LEWIS SCHOOL OF MANNERS
Mr. Flang (EDM) & Mr. Caca (JOP) in charge

    

— Good use of Eddie’s great Jerry Lewis impression. This is the third episode in a row that has done a sketch centered around a dead-on impression that Eddie does of a white celebrity, after his Elvis and Humphrey Bogart sketches from the last two episodes.
— Here’s the return of Joe as bitter older Jerry Lewis. Last time he did this impression (that “Two Faces of Jerry” horror movie trailer from last season’s Donald Pleasence episode), he nailed older Lewis’ demeanor, but (much like my former complaint about his Ted Koppel impression) the problem was the voice sounded too much like Joe’s real voice.
— Joe’s impression is coming off okay enough in this sketch. Maybe it’s because I’m in good spirits during this episode that I’m less critical towards his impression.
— Ha, Eddie seems to be trying to crack Joe up.
— It worked. Joe’s visibly smirking out of character now. Gotta love the chemistry that Eddie and Joe always have.
— A decently goofy sketch overall.
STARS: ***


GUMBYS
Gumby interrupts Gumby impersonator’s (host) St. Patrick’s Day story

 

— Hmm, Bruce as Gumby.
— He’s not even doing Eddie’s Gumby voice, instead doing a different type of character voice.
— Ah, here’s the “real” Gumby. Eddie has been absolutely DOMINATING tonight’s episode, even moreso than usual.
— Eddie’s noticeably wearing a lot less face paint than he usually wears as Gumby. I’m guessing they didn’t have enough time to apply the usual full amount of Gumby make-up due to all the various sketches that Eddie’s in tonight.
— At the end of the sketch right before Eddie and Bruce walk off, Eddie randomly breaks into his Jerry Lewis voice that we just heard in the preceding sketch.
STARS: ***


OLD NEGRO BEER
(JOP) & (EDM) are beer-loving stereotypes

 

— Wow, Eddie continues to be ALL OVER tonight’s show. Feels like he’s had a lead role in practically every single sketch tonight.
— I like Eddie’s sudden realization about his “negro” friend Joe: “Hey, you a white cracker!”
— Joe’s facial expression when he and Eddie simultaneously went “Aaahhhh” into the camera slayed me.
— An overall fun silly bit.
STARS: ***


SONGWRITERS
Schleimer & Laub create tunes for (host)’s Depression musical

 

— The return of Joe and Tim’s Vaudeville-esque songwriting team.
— Interestingly, the previous time they did this sketch also happened to be in a Bruce Dern-hosted episode, though Bruce himself didn’t appear in that installment of this sketch. Maybe he liked what he saw that night and asked Joe and Tim if he could appear in the sketch this week.
— I like Joe and Tim’s song “The Window Ledge Polka”.
— Not much to say about the overall sketch, but this was another enjoyable appearance from these characters.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “When You Wish Upon A Star” & “I Ain’t Got Nobody”


RUBIK’S GRENADE
— Rerun


OLD JEW BEER
(JOP) & (EDM) are another pair of beer-loving stereotypes

 

— I oddly love how they’re making this a runner, with Eddie and Joe playing different ethnicities/cultures in each one.
— More fun voices and chemistry between Eddie and Joe.
STARS: ***


OLD CHINAMAN BEER
(JOP) & (EDM) are another beer-loving stereotype duo

 

— Wow, this one is going FULL-OUT goofy and over-the-top with the stereotypes.
— I can see why these racial stereotype beer sketches, ESPECIALLY this Old Chinamen Beer one, wouldn’t sit well with a lot of people, but to me, they’re just silly fun, and are helped a lot by Eddie and Joe’s always-great way of playing off of each other (which we’ve been seeing tons of tonight).
— During the “Old Chinaman Beer” title screen at the end of this, it sounded like Eddie broke out into his Jerry Lewis voice ONCE AGAIN tonight.
STARS: A very guilty ***


VEGGIE BURGERS
nerdy (GAK) finds his equally geeky parents but doesn’t realize it

 

— Strange sketch so far. I get what they’re hinting at with Gary’s character, but I’m not sure where the humor in the sketch is supposed to be coming from.
— Okay, this is starting to get charming.
— I like these characters’ interesting way of speaking, where they precede some of the things they say by declaring what kind of sentence it is ( e.g. “joke”, “question”).
— Overall, a cute, charming, low-key 10-to-1 sketch. The studio audience wasn’t into this AT ALL, though. I feel that this sketch was better than the crowd gave it credit for.
STARS: ***


GOODNIGHTS

 

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A consistently very fun show. I came into this episode expecting the epic “Buckwheat gets shot” storyline to overshadow everything else as the reason to tune in, and while it was by far the best part of the night, the rest of the show was no slouch, either. The overall episode was pretty solid and flowed very nicely, with a lot of fun to be had throughout the whole night. Even some of the lesser segments had an infectiously silly, enjoyable vibe.


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Beau and Jeff Bridges):
— a huge step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
Robert Guillaume

Posted on

February 26, 1983 – Beau and Jeff Bridges / Randy Newman (S8 E14)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
hosts tell embarrassing stories about each other’s childhood

   

— Strangely, this begins with Jeff and Beau being announced by Pardo, followed by them making their entrance on the home base stage. Uh, shouldn’t this be happening in the MONOLOGUE, not the cold opening? Ebersol’s toying around with SNL’s format yet again, I see.
— I like where this is going, with Jeff and Beau telling embarrassing childhood stories about each other.
— Some good laughs from their dad Lloyd Bridges scolding them over the phone and then encouraging them to fight each other.
— What was with that loud buzzer sound when Beau was doing the “Hey, look over there” trick on Jeff?
STARS: ***


MONOLOGUE
hosts duke it out on-stage, egged on by Lloyd Bridges [real] in L.A.

   

— Some technical errors when the thought bubble of Lloyd Bridges first shows up.
— This is the second time this season where a legendary actor makes his cameo in the form of a pre-taped thought bubble giving advice to his son, after Andy Griffith did the same to his TV son Ron Howard in the “Opie’s Back” sketch.
— The Jeff/Beau fight is fairly fun, though nothing great.
— How are Beau and Jeff applying the fake blood on their mouths after each of them gets punched?
— Pretty funny conclusion with both brothers coming together to agree that they hate their father.
STARS: **½


TEXXON
“Do what we say, nobody gets hurt”

   

— The return of SNL’s fake sponsor Texxon Oil, after those frequent “disclaimer gag” cold openings from the first half of season 7.
— The guilt trip messages from the old man, black guy, and little girl are funny.
— Love the ending slogan “Do what we say and nobody gets hurt”.
— Overall, pretty biting satire.
STARS: ***½


PIMPLE
a huge pimple causes many embarassing moments for (JLD) on prom night

   

— I like the randomness of Julia’s name being “Cynthia Marie Laboof”.
— When Julia comes downstairs in her prom dress, you could hear wolf-whistles from someone in the audience before Julia reveals her huge pimple.
— Speaking of that reveal, I saw it coming from miles away.
— Hmm, Beau and Jeff randomly appearing as themselves.
— Great ending with Eddie.
— Overall, the premise of this sketch was too predictable, and I feel like I’ve seen this whole thing (someone having a comically-oversized pimple) pulled off better somewhere else, but I’m not sure where.
STARS: **


RICK’S CAFE
it’s Casablanca in a ski lodge & Rick (EDM) controls the lift tickets

   

— Interesting with Eddie as a Humphrey Bogart “Casablanca”-esque character. Between the Gas Station/Elvis sketch from the last episode and now this sketch, SNL seems to be getting a lot of mileage lately out of Eddie’s knack for doing dead-on impressions of white celebrities.
— A good laugh from Tim’s initial walk-on as a guy impaled with a ski pole. He’s doing a decent Peter Lorre-esque voice too.
— Haha, the Shaft part is freakin’ hilarious.
— A good laugh from Eddie’s big sticking-out tongue.
— I like how Joe’s long listing-off of random minorities eventually led to one of the listed minorities being “Jew albinos with brunette hair”.
— Eddie to the camera: “My, this is a long sketch.”
— While Eddie wasn’t kidding about the length of the sketch, I still found it pretty enjoyable overall, and damn, what a strong performance from Eddie. Probably one of his more underrated, forgotten performances. If the writing of this sketch were up to the same level as his acting, this might’ve turned out to be a classic.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “I Love L.A.”


CHEAP HUNT
Mike Nelson (Jeff) keeps costs down by staying out of water

   

— I like the detail of Jeff having comically-big furry fake eyebrows while playing his father Lloyd.
— I’m not liking where this sketch has been going. Some of the groanworthy random gags are bringing back unwanted memories of that infamous Sunken Submarine sketch from last season’s Robert Culp episode. What is it with the Ebersol era doing bad sketches that have a nautical setting?
— Funny unscripted moment with Jeff pointing out that Tim’s tie is hanging in the bucket of water he’s holding.
— Okay, I am starting to kind of like the meta premise, but the overall sketch just isn’t coming off all that well.
STARS: **


BATTERED HUSBAND
male domestic violence victim (GAK) gets little sympathy from other men

   

— SNL seems to be going to the “the usually meek, soft-spoken Mary Gross playing an aggressive character” well a lot lately.
— Yeah, not too sure about this premise with everybody ridiculing Gary for being beat up by his wife.
— Strange how the two sketches that have used this same living room set tonight (this and the Pimple sketch) both deal with characters entering the house one-by-one and adding ridicule to a character in an embarrassing situation.
— WTF at the ending? Good pratfalls from Gary as usual, though.
— A really weak sketch overall.
STARS: *½


SAUNDRA’S HOUSE OF MASSAGE
(Beau) is surprised to find that masseuse Saundra (Jeff) is a man

   

— Heh, this is getting creepy with Jeff oiling himself up.
— Geez, the increasingly-homoerotic nature of this massage is disturbing when you remember these two guys are BROTHERS in real life.
— LOL at Beau’s sudden jumping-up reaction when Jeff’s hands “slip” down to Beau’s crotch area.
— Overall, very mixed feelings about this. I spent portions of the sketch being really creeped-out by the incestuous undertone of it, but I suppose I got enough laughs from the overall piece. I really have to wonder, though, how the Bridges brothers agreed to perform this.
STARS: ***


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
TIK uses New York Post headlines to tell a story
Howard Hesseman [real] is disappointed by poor response to “moon Reagan”
Dr. Ruth Westheimer (MAG) takes a call from an aroused teenage admirer
JOP asks big-necked Herschel Walker (EDM) about his decision to turn pro

        

— Barely any audience applause for Brad during his intro. Is the audience as consistently bored with him as an anchorperson as I am?
— Tim’s Salute to Journalism commentary so far is an improvement over his disappointing last one from earlier this season. I especially liked the “They’re Free!” headline bit.
— Strong ending to Tim’s commentary, with his displaying a New York Post toilet paper roll.
— Hey, it’s last week’s host, Howard Hesseman! He must be here to do a follow-up to the “moon President Reagan’s face” mail-in contest.
— Yep, he is.
— Howard’s getting some laughs from his perverted desperation to see more mooning pictures, but the material itself isn’t all that funny. Kind of a waste of him.
— Gary’s increasingly-obscene phone call to Mary’s Dr. Ruth is very funny.
— It was unnecessary to repeat the finger-in-hole gesture bit from Mary’s last Dr. Ruth commentary.  Are they going to do that gesture bit EVERY time she’s on?
— Speaking of unnecessary, Brad’s addendum to Dr. Ruth’s commentary was pointless and fell flat.
— Wow, this is one long Saturday Night News. Feels like there’s 50 guest commentaries.
— Eddie’s fake neck as Herschel Walker is a good sight gag.
— Unfortunately, the rest of the Eddie/Joe commentary didn’t go anywhere beyond the sight gag, which lost its novelty pretty fast.
— Lately, Brad seems to have made “Right on!” his new ending tagline. Yeah, not sure I can say that’s a good decision.
STARS: **½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Real Emotional Girl”


GUY CRAZY
National Organization For Women members are “Guy Crazy” for Jeff

   

— A musical sketch. If you’re familiar with how I usually feel towards this type of sketch, then you’d know what my initial reaction is to having to sit through this one. (*hint: it ain’t a pleasant reaction*)
— That being said, I am kinda liking the energy here, and at least Robin is getting a rare big showcase. It’s a shame how incredibly underused that woman’s been this season.
— Jeff: “(singing) I’ll take you to the woods and play ‘house’ in your nest.” Uh, whoa…
— After the dream sequence has ended, the camera cuts back to Jeff continuing to give the speech he was giving before the dream sequence started, but he’s seen re-applying his tie. I don’t know if that’s just a delayed costume change, or if it’s an intentional meta joke.
— Overall, despite me being a little more lenient on this than I usually am towards musical sketches from this era, this still wasn’t anything special.
STARS: **


GOODNIGHTS

 

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A very “meh” episode. Absolutely no sketches stood out as particularly strong, and quite a lot of the show was forgettable. There were a few pretty good things, but not enough to make this an overall passable episode.


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Howard Hesseman):
— a big step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
Bruce Dern, a.k.a. the famous “Buckwheat gets shot” episode

Posted on

February 19, 1983 – Howard Hesseman / Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers (S8 E13)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

DISCLAIMER
DOP relays host’s request that home viewers have a camera ready

— Heh, this is ALREADY making me laugh.


COLD OPENING
cast tries to talk host out of doing controversial anti-Reagan monologue

 

— Good premise with the cast begging Howard not to go through with the controversial monologue he has planned.
— Eddie complaining about Howard’s piece being too hostile towards the president gave me an unintentional laugh, given the fact that, just a few episodes earlier, Eddie did an anti-Reagan commentary on Saturday Night News, calling the president a sleazeball and encouraging viewers to write a letter protesting his refusal to make Martin Luther King’s birthday a holiday.
— Heh, and now Howard himself pointed out the irony of Eddie’s complaint about Howard’s hostility towards the president, by responding “Oh, great, advice from Mr. ‘Kill the White Man’.”
— This is doing a good job of hyping up the monologue and keeping the audience in suspense, even though I personally am already aware of what the monologue’s big reveal is going to be.
STARS: ***


MONOLOGUE
host says “Join me- take photo of yourself mooning Reagan, send it in”

   

— Here we go, Howard’s heavily-hyped monologue…
— Funny unscripted moment with a woman in the audience being heard yelling “Hey, Johnny Fever!” (or was it “Play Johnny Fever!”?).
— Haha, Howard’s big reveal is that his monologue is going to be him “dropping trou and mooning the president of the United States”.
— A brief callback to his “dead Belushi” jokes from the monologue he did earlier this season.
— He invites viewers at home to join in on the “media moon-in of President Reagan”, by taking a picture of themselves mooning the TV set when a Reagan picture will show up onscreen, and then mailing their mooning photo to SNL so they can announce the results. LOL, this is great. I can’t believe SNL is doing something like this.
— The audience is going fucking WILD now that Howard’s about to start his mooning.
— We can’t see Howard doing the actual mooning while the camera is showing a close-up of a Reagan picture, but the audience reaction seems to indicate that Howard is indeed exposing himself right before their eyes.
— The ending of this monologue appears to have been abruptly cut off in the copy of the episode I’m watching (an old recording of a Comedy Network rerun from Canada).
— Overall, a terrific and uproarious monologue. In the three episodes he’s hosted, Howard has shown a true knack for doing fantastic monologues that know how to get the audience really into it.
STARS: ****½


SLEEPY BOY 2000
— I already covered this in my review of the Robert Blake episode. This was actually originally aired in tonight’s episode and was later added to the Blake episode in reruns.


GAS STATION
near Graceland, (EDM) receives Elvis’ soul after being hit by a car

   

— Robin’s exaggerated overbite is a funny little detail.
— Eddie thinking he’s Elvis is a pretty funny premise.
— I’m liking Eddie’s Elvis-esque singing of “Jailhouse Rock” while the other performers wildly dance.
— Felt like this overall sketch could’ve gone more places that it didn’t.
STARS: **½


MAD MAGAZINE THEATRE
Windbags Of War characters bash own TV-movie

     

— Oh my god, is that Joe under all the heavy make-up as Alfred E. Neuman?
— Haha, not only is it INDEED Joe, but he appears to be playing Neuman as Tom Snyder, which is really cracking me up.
— This whole scene with Joe is absolutely hilarious so far.
— Who is Gary doing an impression of? His portrayal seems so specific.
— LOL at Eddie randomly entering the scene as Kunta Kinte.
— Feels weird seeing Brad playing a character like this. This has to be the most deep I’ve seen him go into character.
— Very fast costume change for Eddie, playing two different roles in one live sketch.
— An overall fun silly sketch, and an accurate parody of Mad Magazine’s style.
STARS: ****


WEST HEAVEN
by Judith Jacklin Belushi- a musical farewell to JOB

       

— A film from John Belushi’s widow, Judy, as a tribute to the recently-deceased SNL legend.
— Did I just see John’s brother Jim (who we’ll soon be seeing joining the SNL cast next season) standing next to John in one picture? (fifth screencap above)
— Very nice background music throughout this.
— Overall, this was beautifully done, presenting a touching montage of personal pictures that show a softer side of John that audiences rarely got to see. Considering the strong affinity I’ve recently developed for the original cast when covering their era in my SNL project, this film really got to me personally.
STARS: N/A (not a rateable segment)


THE A-TEAM
Mr. T (EDM) says “watch the A-Team” but Rex Reed (JOP) says it’s no good

— An interesting snapshot of a time when The A-Team was a brand-new series.
— Another entertaining display of Eddie and Joe’s always-fun chemistry.
— Funny line from Joe’s Reed saying Mr. T looks like Tina Turner on steroids.
STARS: ***


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
John Hinckley’s affinity for presidents is documented back to Ike
Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer ponders more mysteries of the universe
Seymore P. Higgins (TIK) clears up misconceptions about George Washington

       

— The montage of John Hinckley in the background of various presidential pictures from over the years was veering dangerously close to coming off like one of Brian Doyle-Murray’s dreaded “long photo montage” bits from last season’s SNL Newsbreaks, but this one ended up having a decent payoff with Hinckley supposedly being conceived in a hotel in the background of an Eisenhower picture.
— Another overall good Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer commentary, especially his “What does a snake use for genitalia?” question.
— Brad’s humorous description of Jerry Lewis was funnier than the actual punchline of the joke.
— I feel dumb for saying this, but I didn’t get Brad’s joke about a Chinese-children-having Mayor Ed Koch getting married again an hour after his wedding. Are frequent marriages a Chinese stereotype?
— What the–? Tim in ANOTHER commentary tonight, as a different character this time? Wow, I know Tim has been a Saturday Night News staple this season, but it’s a VERY rare case to see someone doing two separate commentaries as two different characters in THE SAME edition of SNL’s news segment. The only other instance I can recall of this is Chris Kattan during the Weekend Update in a Jeff Gordon-hosted episode from season 28.
— At the beginning of this commentary, Tim is still seen wearing his mustache from his earlier Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer appearance, then he quickly pulls off the mustache in a hurry. I can’t tell if that was a genuine blooper or an intentional joke. I’m leaning towards the latter, judging from the exaggerated way Tim removed the mustache.
— Brad’s hand can be seen reaching from off-camera to fix Tim’s tipping-over hat while Tim’s in the middle of speaking to us.
— Haha, Brad adjusts Tim’s hat once again. Is this an intentional meta bit or an ad-lib?
— After a while, Tim finally just throws his unstable hat aside.
— Boy, Tim’s commentary seems to have gone completely off the rails. Everything in this is hilarious, though, from the bloopers to the ad-libs to Tim’s humorous scripted dialogue about George Washington.
— Ha, now this has gotten even funnier with Tim flat-out throwing off his entire wig and revealing his Havnagootiim Vishnuuerheer bald cap to the camera.
— Tim’s overall commentary was a riot. I love how much he and Brad were having fun with it. One of the biggest highlights of any Saturday Night News this season.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Change of Heart”


HOLIDAY INN
room service theatrically serves Marvin & Celeste a Fiesta Cheese Platter

   

— This is the second time they’ve done a Holiday Inn sketch in a Howard Hesseman-hosted episode, after that funny Holiday Inn horror movie trailer sketch from his season 5 episode.
— Another return of Tim and Mary’s mousy couple Marvin and Celeste.
— I like Julia’s squeaky-voiced “Arriba!”
— Brad seems to be stretching his acting chops throughout tonight’s episode, playing the type of roles that we usually never see him in.
— Heh, this sketch is getting pretty crazy.
— The pairing of Brad, Julia, and Gary makes me wonder if this is another Practical Theatre Company piece, with Howard Hesseman playing Paul Barrosse’s role. Probably not, though. After all, who would’ve played Tim and Mary’s roles in the stage version of the sketch?
— Funny throwaway line from Hesseman about Tito Puente.
STARS: ***


MY DATE WITH DION
in the salon, Dion Dion & (MAG) tell each other about their nightmares

— Interesting voice on Mary. I’ve never heard her sound like that before.
— The return of Eddie’s Dion Dion character, this time showing him working at a salon, a setting that would soon become regular part of his sketches. Is this going to be the introduction of Joe as Blair, Dion Dion’s equally-flamboyant co-worker?
— Eddie’s naked Rastafarians line was pretty funny.
— Hmm, I guess Joe isn’t going to be in this sketch after all. When in the world does his Blair character make his debut? After being fairly familiar with the Dion Dion/Blair sketches from my past viewings of this era years ago, it feels weird seeing Dion without Blair.
— Decent sketch overall.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “The Waiting”


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— While a step down from Howard Hesseman’s terrific episode from earlier this season, this was still a pretty solid show. Most of the material was good, there were fun moments to be had, and the show never really bottomed-out. Even Saturday Night News was passable. There was also a great energy to the first quarter of the episode that put me in a really good mood.
— It’s a shame that this ends up being Howard Hesseman’s final hosting stint. Judging from the two episodes he’s hosted this season, it seemed like he was on his way to becoming the Buck Henry/Steve Martin/Elliott Gould of the Ebersol era. Why’d they stop getting him after this season?
— My version of this episode ran for only 1 hour and 3 minutes, which is a few minutes shorter than a typical episode from this era. Something must’ve been removed from my copy, but I don’t know what. [ADDENDUM: Looking at the episode guides, my copy of this episode is missing a sketch called “The Laughing Buddha” and a rerun of the “The Khaddaffi Look” commercial from season 7. Strange that they would re-air the latter THIS season; after all, isn’t the jingle in it sung by the recently-fired Christine Ebersole?]


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Sid Caesar):
— a slight step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
Beau and Jeff Bridges

Posted on

February 5, 1983 – Sid Caesar / Joe Cocker & Jennifer Warnes (S8 E12)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
cast wonders how to prove show’s live, host explains “now-was-gonnabe”

   

— Gary being berated for his idea is a funny continuation of the running gag with him being the SNL punching bag.
— Why does the “Saveco” logo hanging on a banner on the background wall seem so familiar to me? (you can see it above Sid Caesar in the second screencap above) Was it used in a previous sketch?
— A good laugh from Eddie’s idea of proving the show is live by just bluntly saying into the camera “It’s crap and it’s live”.
— A VERY strong audience reaction to Sid Caesar’s entrance, which eventually leads to a standing ovation.
— The cast (especially Julia) seems to be really honored to be working with Sid.
— Sid’s whole complicated “when now is over” philosophy is freakin’ hilarious.
— Love the “Let’s pull Kroeger’s teeth out” mantra.
STARS: ***½


MONOLOGUE
(no synopsis available)

— Very short, but it was nice to see sincerity from Sid and he managed to get his usual laughs.
STARS: ***


FUNERAL IN A CAB
(EDM) pitches the inexpensive burial alternative

      

— Eddie’s doing a good job as another fast-talking pitchman, after the Popeil prophylactic commercial from earlier this season.
— The concept of this is funny, and the whole sequence demonstrating the dead body’s journey is hilarious, especially how it ends with the body getting thrown in a garbage truck.
STARS: ****


HOTEL
hotel room time-warp demonstrates 30 year change in male-female relations

     

— Whoa, sudden black-and-white shift.
— Oh, I see what they’re doing, showing how much times have changed between 1953 and 1983 by showing the huge difference in how Sid interacts with his respective love interest in both time periods. I love the clever concept of this.
— Nice touch with 1953 Eddie being a stereotypical Rochester-from-The-Jack-Benny-Show type of servant after we just saw 1983 Eddie as a respectable businessman who seems to be on the same level of importance as Sid’s character.
— I love how they’re constantly going back-and-forth between the 1953 and 1983 scenes.
— This is fantastic so far.
— LOL, is Mary biting Sid’s bare skin while she’s tearing his shirt off?
— Loved Sid’s final line into the camera.
— Overall, that was terrific, and really appealed to me as someone who’s always been fascinated in seeing how much social norms have changed from how they were several decades earlier. I can’t help but kinda wonder what an updated version of this sketch would look like, showing how much times have changed from 1983 to 2019.
STARS: *****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guests perform “Up Where We Belong”


WHINERS
a hospital patient (host) is stuck next to ex-hostage Whiners

   

— Damn, they fooled me at first into thinking this was going to be a funny original sketch centered around Sid as a recovering hospital patient, until I recognized Joe’s off-camera whines and realized this is the dreaded continuation of the previous week’s Whiners sketch that ended with a cliffhanger. Putting up with the Whiners in one episode is bad enough; having to watch them in TWO CONSECUTIVE EPISODES is unspeakable torture.
— Sid’s facial expressions alone are almost saving this sketch.
— Satisfying ending with Sid wrapping his medical tubes around the Whiners’ necks in an attempt to strangle them.
STARS: *½


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
Patti Lynn Hunnsacker (JLD) tells her parents “I’m sexually active”
spittin’ mad MAG tells us which federal agencies should be done away with
Dr. Jack Badofsky lists types of suicide

      

— Julia’s overall commentary did absolutely NOTHING for me. And worse, I think this teen character of hers eventually becomes recurring. Can’t say I’m looking forward to that.
— This is the first time during a “Spittin’ Mad Mary Gross” commentary where she actually describes herself with the words “spittin’ mad”.  Until now, I had kinda been wondering why I’ve always seen SNL fans use the specific title “spittin’ mad” for these commentaries of hers.
— I got a good laugh from Mary’s suggestion to replace the surgeon general with a “chiropractor colonel”.
— Unfortunately, the rest of Mary’s commentary was a step down from her usual angry rants.
— Ugh, ENOUGH with this Dr. Jack Badofsky character already.
— Man, Badofsky’s puns are particularly bad tonight. I cannot believe so many of these groaners are getting big laughs from the studio audience. I guess this shows how different times were back in the early 80s, because I’m trying to picture modern-day SNL in 2019 having a Weekend Update character like Badofsky (I’m not sure who in the current cast would play him), and I don’t see it going over well at all; I can’t picture those corny old-fashioned puns getting laughs from today’s audience.
— Overall, a really bad Saturday Night News tonight, with NOTHING knocking it out of the park.
STARS: *½


HARRY ANDERSON
Harry Anderson [real] does a trick involving red rubber balls & handcuffs

   

— Whoa, how’d he do that marked cards trick at the beginning?
— Funny part with a handcuffed Harry somehow getting tangled around the audience volunteer’s arm.
— Great reveal at the end that he did the handcuff trick with a fake hand.
STARS: ***


CRIME AND SELF-PUNISHMENT
troubled inventor’s (host) silent film biography

         

— I’m slightly wary about approaching this, as I recall hearing that this is a VERY long sketch. I have no doubt that Sid will make it work, though.
— This is doing great at mimicking a silent movie.
— LOL at Sid’s blatantly fake speed-reading through the books.
— Very funny part with Sid repeatedly pulling back up a heart-attack-having Tim to keep him from slumping to the ground.
— I like the random detail of Sid pouring the poison he’s about to drink into a fancy wine glass.
— Overall, this was INDEED a very long sketch (easily one of the longest in SNL history; I would guesstimate that this was around 15 minutes long), and I can see why some people may have a lot of problems with it.  While it dragged in certain spots, I personally can’t complain too much because I still felt that the overall film was interesting to watch progress and, as I expected, Sid made it fun and was tailor-made for it.
STARS: ***


A FEW MINUTES WITH ANDY ROONEY
only his books are worth reading

 

— They’re still doing these? Well, at least they’ve recently been cutting back on the frequency of Joe’s Rooney appearances.
— Heh, is that vagina quote from the Helen Gurley Brown book real?
— All the double-entendres with Rooney’s questions about Gurley Brown’s “book” are very funny.
— This badly petered out at the end, with Joe’s Rooney just saying the titles of his own endless number of books.
STARS: ***½


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
Professor Helmut (host) touts soap operas as the trade imbalance solution

   

— Wait, what the hell??? A second Saturday Night News tonight? This is insane. What, we didn’t get ENOUGH bad Brad Hall jokes the first time around tonight?
— I really don’t understand Ebersol’s tendency to do odd, unconventional things with SNL’s news segment. (I’m aware he would later start doing particularly unconventional things with the news in seasons 9 and 10)
— Hmm, maybe this might be worth it after all. We’re getting a guest commentary from Sid.
— Sid demonstrating the same soap opera scene in various different languages is hilarious, especially the random brief English interjections he keeps throwing in.
— Overall, while Sid’s commentary was very solid, I don’t understand why they couldn’t have just put it in the first Saturday Night News from earlier tonight instead of creating a separate one for it. Oh, Ebersol, you perplex me.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
Joe Cocker performs “Seven Days”


GOODNIGHTS
cast makes host an honorary member of SNL

  

— This is wonderful, with Mary presenting Sid with a plaque declaring him an honorary member of SNL. All the genuine joy and emotions being displayed here are infectious.
— Are Eddie’s tears real, or is he just jokingly acting emotional?

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A very enjoyable episode that got all the mileage out of Sid Caesar that they could. He was utilized perfectly tonight, being given lots of showcases for his trademark comedic style, and he delivered in every single performance. Tonight’s episode was far from perfect, but the show as a whole had a strong feel that I really liked. This is probably the most I’ve enjoyed an episode since the  Howard Hesseman one from all the way back in October.


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas):
— a step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
The recent string of impressive comedic hosts continues, as Howard Hesseman makes his return, a mere four months after his last hosting stint

Posted on

January 29, 1983 – Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas / The Bus Boys (S8 E11)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
Bob Hope (Dave) & Frank Sinatra (JOP) pressure Woody Allen (Rick)

   

— Nice to see tonight’s two hosts front-and-center doing fun impressions right at the start of the show.
— Some funny lines from Rick-as-Woody-Allen’s asides to the camera.
— The Mia Farrow line was great.
— Whoa at Joe-as-Sinatra’s sudden “f**gots” line.
— Good bit with Joe’s Sinatra affecting the outcome of the Super Bowl with one phone call.
STARS: ***½


MONOLOGUE
Bob & Doug McKenzie are mad at DOP for giving their hotel address
the McKenzies visit NYC landmarks

     

— Rick and Dave make their monologue entrance in character as the McKenzie Brothers. Oh, this is gonna be fun.
— I like their summing up the history of SNL’s quality as “It was good, then it went downhill, then it got good again, then it– etc.”. Fellow SCTV alum Martin Short would later say something similar about the timeline of SNL’s quality in his 1996 monologue.
— The bit with them getting revenge on Don Pardo is funny.
— A cutaway to a pre-taped segment with the McKenzie Brothers out in the city. I’m loving this.
— Funny part with them suddenly leaving the clothing store as soon as an employee asks them if they need help.
— This kinda ended abruptly. I had hoped this would go on a lot longer.
STARS: ***½


WHINERS
Doug & Wendy Whiner are taken hostage during a bank robbery

   

— Oh, god, here we go…
— For once, I got an actual laugh from one of the Whiners themselves (usually my only amusement in their sketches comes from the straight man characters playing off of them), with Joe wimpishly telling Brad “I’ll make mincemeat out of you”.
— Unusual ending: after Gary and Brad go nuts and start firing their guns all over the place, the camera does a freeze-frame with the words “To Be Continued Next Week” being displayed onscreen. I’m aware that they DO follow through on this by continuing the sketch in next week’s episode, where we see (I think) Doug Whiner in the hospital recovering from his gunshot wounds (I guess Gary and Brad’s bullets somehow missed Wendy Whiner). While I normally would admire the fact that this is a rare instance of SNL doing a two-part sketch over the course of two episodes, I’m certainly not looking forward to having to put up with the Whiners for the second episode in a row.
STARS: *½


I’LL BE THE JUDGE OF THAT
Tyrone Green on Dick Cavett’s (Rick) game show

     

— After becoming familiar with the blandness of Dick Cavett when I reviewed the original SNL era (Cavett hosted twice in 1976), I’m getting a big kick out of seeing Rick do an impression of him.
— Rick is really good here and is perfectly capturing Cavett’s aura, though the voice isn’t quite as dead-on as I hoped it would be.
— Rick begins his introduction to his next guest with “one of the angriest poets…”, which must mean it’s gonna be… Tyrone Green!
— Yep, I was right.
— Tyrone’s back to having his usual short hair after suddenly sporting long dreads last time we saw him (the famous “Kill All the White People” sketch) . Heh, I guess we’re to believe that in the universe of that last sketch, Tyrone’s dreads were just a wig.
— Robin is really cracking me up in her scenes as Oriana Falacci, and the random sponsors she’s announcing are funny.
— Some good laughs from Eddie’s angry threats to the orchestra.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest & EDM perform “The Boys Are Back In Town”

 

— Very interesting to see Eddie participating with the Bus Boys. I may be forgetting something, but I believe he’s only the third individual cast member in SNL history who got to sing with a musical guest during a musical performance (the first two were Chevy Chase in a Carly Simon performance from season 1 and Bill Murray in a The Amazing Rhythm Aces performance from season 5). I’m not counting the times where a cast member sang with a musical guest while in character as someone, like several instances of John Belushi as Samurai or Joe Cocker.
— You can tell Eddie’s having a lot of fun here.


HITCHCOCK HYGIENE
a suspenseful reminder to see your dentist regularly

     

— This is doing a great job of recreating the aura of a typical 1940s/50s thriller.
— The dentist reveal at the end was a good twist.
— This overall film had almost a Tom Schiller feel to it, though I doubt it was him behind this one.
STARS: ***½


GUY TALK
Liberace (Dave) & Michael Jackson (EDM) recount macho exploits

  

— Fairly funny concept with Liberace and Michael Jackson being the guests on a manly talk show.
— Eddie’s exaggeratedly high-pitched voice is kinda making me laugh, but his general portrayal of Michael as possibly gay would probably be seen as weird nowadays. I guess in hindsight, Eddie’s impression here is serving as a snapshot of a time before Michael became known for a lot of the quirks and oddities that you would later always see in an MJ impression.
— Eddie and Joe seem to be cracking up together during some portions of this sketch.
STARS: **½


PORTA-DISH
Gerry Todd (Rick) recommends a portable satellite dish made of fine china

     

— The satellite dish being a simple dinner plate is KINDA amusing, but I hope that’s not the main joke here.
— Okay, this sketch is getting pretty funny, with the strange channels being displayed.
— I especially got a good laugh right now from the “Dyslexia Channel” which has badly-spelled closed captioning.
STARS: ***½


SATURDAY NIGHT NEWS
JOP predicts the outcome of Super Bowl XVII- Dolphins by 9
Dr. Ruth Westheimer (MAG) talks about how to deal with male impotence
EDM solicits viewer letters asking Ronald Reagan to support MLK holiday
Walter Cronkite (Dave) criticizes BRH’s anchoring style

       

— Immediately after the top story, Brad ALREADY throws to Joe doing an SNL Sports commentary. It’s weird how some of this season’s Saturday Night News quickly go to the first guest commentary after Brad has done only one or two jokes. That’s unheard of in other eras of SNL’s news segment.
— Joe’s fast-talking Spanish outburst was pretty funny, though he already did that in an earlier episode.
— Very quick SNL Sports commentary from Joe, with him basically just predicting the Dolphins will beat the Redskins by 9 points in tomorrow’s Super Bowl.
— The Barbie Hitler pre-taped segment was weak.
— The debut of Mary’s Dr. Ruth impression, which would go on to be a big recurring role for her.
— The ending of Mary’s commentary with Brad stopping her from doing the finger-in-hole sexual gesture was pretty funny, but the rest of the commentary wasn’t really noteworthy. I hope her future appearances are an improvement.
— First time we’ve seen Eddie doing a news commentary as himself in a good while.
— Eddie’s kinda stumbly with his delivery here, but he’s making lots of fantastic and hilarious points during his rant against President Reagan’s refusal to make Martin Luther King’s birthday a national holiday. I especially love Eddie’s line about how Reagan probably thinks Mother’s Day is a black holiday, and the whole part with Eddie asking viewers to mail him letters supporting the idea of an MLK holiday so Eddie can televise himself dropping the letters onto the White House front lawn with a truck.
— They seem to be going really light on the number of news jokes from Brad. Tonight’s SNN is spending far more time on the guest commentaries than Brad’s jokes. No big loss there. At this point, I’m not even sure if I can consider Brad Hall an improvement over Brian Doyle-Murray’s dreadful run as an SNL news anchor anymore. Brad had a somewhat promising start in his early SNNs this season where he seemed to be trying to leave his mark by doing lots of unique side segments (e.g. yelling at James Watt on the phone, singing the bad news of the week in an upbeat folk song, etc.), but it didn’t take long for his SNNs to devolve into stagnant blandness. Supposedly, Dick Ebersol is to blame for this drop in quality, as word has it that he forced Brad to drop his more politically-charged material and interesting side segments in favor of just doing simple “picture gags” all the time.
— Dave’s Walter Cronkite segment is pretty fun, and a good way to close tonight’s SNN.
STARS: **


HELL BENT FOR GLORY
WWII movie characters realize deadly cliches are due

     

— Julia’s role as a “blind beautiful French girl” seems like it will be a rare sample of the type of comedic greatness that we would later become familiar with from her throughout her big post-SNL career. I’ve been noticing that Julia’s been pretty tame during her SNL tenure so far, I’m guessing partly because of her very young age at the time (only 21 years old; she probably hadn’t fully developed as a comedian yet) and partly because the writers probably didn’t know how to use her talents properly.
— I was right, Julia’s getting some pretty good laughs here.
— I’m liking the meta-premise of the characters calling out all the war movie cliches that they fall under.
— Tim: “What happens to me, sarge??!?” Dave: “Nothing, you’re just an extra, get out of here.”
— The ending with Dave “hiding” was kinda weak.
— I like the ending credits sequence, showing the cast of characters one-by-one.
STARS: ***½


RENT ED MCMAHON
rent Ed McMahon (JOP) for your next party & your unfunny jokes will work

  

— I remember reading how Moranis and Thomas didn’t like the fact that Joe wears such a heavy amount of make-up for his Ed McMahon impression in this sketch. Joe DOES tend to go overboard with the make-up in quite a number of his celebrity impressions. I think both he and Harry Shearer are the only two cast members in SNL history who were such perfectionists when it came to going all out in trying to make themselves look EXACTLY like the celebrities they play. And then you have cast members like Phil Hartman and Darrell Hammond who were perfectly content with simply using a wig and a dead-on vocal imitation to pull off their great impressions. (Okay, Hammond did sometimes tend to rely on a few minor prosthetics, but not overly so)
— Decent premise of McMahon appearing at your party to laugh at your bad jokes in order to make them seem funnier to other party guests.
STARS: ***


FIVE MINUTES TO REFLECT
a rabbi (Rick) explains origin of Jewish traits

 

— This sketch is already really funny right out of the gate, especially Rick’s fake sideburns coming off with the glasses.
— Okay, after a while, the humor in this has unfortunately kinda died down, but still decently funny.
— I like Rick’s complaints when they tell him to wrap up the show.
STARS: ***


THE BIOLOGICAL WATCH
the Ronco Biological Watch tracks women’s fertility

   

— Here’s Gary taking a shot at playing the type of manic pitchman role that were usually Dan Aykroyd and Joe Piscopo’s forte.
— Pretty funny commercial so far, especially the various famous songs the watch plays for different situations.
— Gary is doing okay in the manic pitchman role, but definitely not up to the same level of Aykroyd or Piscopo.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “New Shoes”


DON’T HITCH-HIKE
— Rerun


GOODNIGHTS

 

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A consistently pretty solid episode. While nothing stood out as particularly great and the overall show was not quite as strong as I was expecting a Rick Moranis/Dave Thomas-hosted episode to be (I should probably learn to start lowering my standards, considering this is the Ebersol era), this was still probably one of the better episodes in a while due to the consistent quality and Rick & Dave’s always-fun character work. Whiners and Saturday Night News were the only two things of the night that I flat-out disliked.


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


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW:
SNL’s recent string of impressive comedic hosts continues, as Sid Caesar helms our next episode. The show’s booking of hosts has really done an amazing turnaround from season 7, where we were getting “exciting” names like Robert Urich and Elizabeth Ashley.