For 40 Years Saturday Night Live has entertained the masses
by providing countless memorable catch-phrases, characters, sketches, and
jokes. It is only because of SNL that people want more cowbell and wish to
avoid living in a van down by the river. It is only because of SNL that people
when annoyed by other people will say “Buh-by!” SNL has provided us with
Wayne’s World, Pat, Mr. Bill, the Blues Brothers, the Bass-O-Matic, Deep
Thoughts, the Church Lady, Seinfeld (indirectly), Adam Sandler, the Hanukkah Song,
Jebidiah Atkinson, Chippendales, Rosanna Rosanna Danna, Jeremy Renner’s
rendition of “The Avengers” theme song, Two Wild and Crazy Guys, Justin
Timberlake’s Soup Can, Ashlee Simpson’s Lip-Sync debacle, What’s Up With That,
Celebrity Jeopardy, The Californians, and the Weekend Update. Most of these
memorable moments, sketches, and characters were paid tribute this past Sunday
(February 15) during the SNL 40 show, which was a 3 ½ hour special dedicated to
remembering the past 40 years. Going into the show, I was unsure about how they
would pay tribute to these classic and timeless memories, but luckily, I was
pleasantly surprised. Using a combination of live sketches, monologues, and
video highlights the people at SNL successfully paid tribute to SNL itself in a
hilarious and heartwarming way. I could probably write a dozen blogs about this
special, but I will limit myself to talking about the Weekend Update, and how
it exceeded my expectations.
First I’ll start off with a basic summary of the Weekend
Update on Sunday, then go back over the best moments. Amy Poehler, Tina Fey,
and Jane Curtin shared the Weekend Update desk on Sunday and told some normal
Update jokes, mainly relating to how times have changed over the course of the
show. Then they invited some current celebrities to pay homage to their
favorite SNL characters, which included Emma Stone as Rosanna Rosanna Danna,
Edward Norton as Stefon, and Melissa McCarthy as Matt Foley, Motivational
Speaker. Tina Fey was eaten by a shark and then they showed a montage of many
Weekend Update moments and jokes that were just swell! After this, Kevin
Nealon, Norm Macdonald, Seth Myers, and Colin Quinn (former Weekend Update
anchors) lined up shoulder to shoulder from tallest to shortest to introduce
the original Weekend Update anchor: Chevy Chase, who thanked everyone while
aided by Garrett Morris who yelled the message for the hearing impaired.
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| Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, and Jane Curtin team up for the win! |
Now, let’s start the in-depth discussion with the Jane
Curtin/Amy Poehler/Tina Fey portion of the Weekend Update tribute. It was great
to see Jane Curtin, one of the old-time anchors, reading the news again
alongside Amy Poehler and Tina Fey, who were two of the funnier anchors. I’ll
list some of the best jokes told here:
Amy Poehler: “Saturday Night Live turns 40 years old this
week with a live 3 and a half hour broadcast that won an Emmy in the first 10
minutes then lost it somewhere in the middle.”
Tina Fey: “Viewers of Saturday Night Live span several
generations, from the Baby Boomers to Generation X all the way to whatever you
call the little dummies who are live-tweeting this right now instead of
watching it.”
Jane Curtin: “Over the course of Saturday Night Live’s 40 year
history, 11 films have been made based on its characters, which adds up to a
record-breaking 22 thumbs down!”
Amy Poehler’s joke was a clever reference to SNL’s
well-documented history. SNL won Emmys in 1976 and 1977 for “Outstanding
Variety, Music, or Comedy Series” and “Outstanding Writing for a Variety,
Music, or Comedy Series” and Chevy Chase and Gilda Radner won the Emmy for “Outstanding
Individual Performance in a Variety or Music Program” in 1976 and 1978
respectively. However, during the early 80s, Lorne Michaels (the original
creator of SNL) left the show, was replaced by Dick Ebersol, and the show
entered what many refer to as the “Dark Ages” of SNL, and while the show found
its footing in the late 80s and early 90s, many consider the original cast from
1975 to 1980 to be the best.
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| Eddie Murphy kept the show alive during the Dark Ages of SNL by being the only funny part of the show. |
Tina Fey’s joke was just plain funny.
Jane Curtin’s joke was an obvious reference to SNL’s movies,
which include The Blues Brothers, It’s Pat, Wayne’s World, and MacGruber. Most
of SNL’s films have received mass criticism for not being very good (though I
would definitely disagree, as Wayne’s World is a clever and hilarious movie).
Actually, in truth, Wayne’s World and The Blues Brothers were generally
successful and received positive reviews, leading to each getting a sequel. So
I’d probably rephrase the joke as “18 thumbs down and 4 thumbs up!” but again I’m
not a comedic genius who was an original cast member on one of the greatest
television shows of all time renowned for its originality and comedy, so my opinion
doesn’t really matter.
Now, moving on to impressions of characters. Emma Stone and
Melissa McCarthy were hilarious as the characters they played, and this of
course stems from their respective characters being hilarious. To be honest, I
never found Stefon, played by Bill Hader, to be a funny character, so I wasn’t
too fond of Edward Norton’s impersonation of him, but it was fun to see Seth
Myers back at the Weekend Update desk to confront Stefon. Anyway, back to the
good characters.
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| Edward Norton and Bill Hader as two Stefons. Gosh, this is terrible. But Seth Myers is there so that's good I guess. |
Gilda Radner originally portrayed Rosanna Rosanna Danna on
the Weekend Update as the consumer affairs reporter who gave editorial replies
to current issues. She would often go on tangents in reply to mail from Richard
Feder, who usually had a serious issue. On one specific appearance, Radner’s
Rosanna Rosanna Danna responded to Feder’s letter about quitting smoking in
which he listed all the side-effects he was having from quitting. This past
Sunday, Emma Stone did her impression of Rosanna Rosanna Danna giving this same
monologue of Mr. Feder’s condition. Here are the links to the original
monologue and Emma Stone’s rendition:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/4147 (Just watch the whole video. It’s great.)
http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/snl40-weekend-update-with-tina-fey-amy-poehler-and-jane-curtin/2847149 (Skip to 1:45 in the video, and then finish
when Emma Stone leaves.)
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| Gilda Radner as Rosanna Rosanna Danna, a hilarious over-the-top character. |
Emma Stone’s rendition, while not perfect, was very funny to
watch, with her doing really well with the voice and getting the monologue down
pretty well. Of course, nobody could match Gilda Radner’s perfect
characterization of Rosanna Rosanna Danna, but Emma Stone did a very good job.
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| This "Nerd" Emma Stone pays tribute to Gilda Radner by portraying Rosanna Rosanna Danna. Bravo to Emma Stone. |
Edward Norton then impersonated Stefon. How is this character
funny? I don’t get it. Please let me know in the comments if you disagree with
my opinion about Stefon.
After this, there was a knock on the door, which a paranoid
Jane Curtin thought was a shark. This, of course, is in reference to the Landshark,
as seen in this video, made after the original Jaws.
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| The Landshark strikes again! |
The Landshark is an intelligent creature that can disguise
its voice and travel on land to kill people. It generally knocks on doors, in
the guise of a plumber or a telegram or candygram delivery man, or even as a
dolphin. A young, single woman is often his target, fooled by his voice into
answering the door. Jane Curtin is one of the victims of the Landshark, who
opens the door when he knocks and says he is the Landshark. She mistakenly
thinks that “Walter” is playing a joke on her, and pays the price with her
life. So Curtin’s current-day fear of doors is well founded, but luckily, it is
just Melissa McCarthy as Matt Foley, the Motivational Speaker portrayed by
Chris Farley.
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| "Now you kids are probably asking yourselves: Hey Matt, how can we get back on the right track?" |
In 1993, SNL did a sketch featuring the late Chris Farley as
a motivational speaker named Matt Foley. In case you haven’t witnessed this
piece of art, here it is for you to enjoy.
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| Chris Farley as the original Matt Foley causes David Spade and Christina Applegate to cover their faces as they laugh. |
Now, if you haven’t seen this before, you HAVE NOT LIVED. You’ve
probably been out of the loop, LIVING IN A VAN DOWN BY THE RIVER! Anyway, a
family, including the hilarious Phil Hartman and the now-famous David Spade,
has a family talk in which Matt Foley confronts the kids (Spade and Christina
Applegate) about smoking pot. The sketch is perfect because of Farley’s raw
energy and hilarious delivery, which causes Spade to laugh throughout the
sketch and make it all the more classic. So when Melissa McCarthy came onto the
Weekend Update to impersonate Matt Foley, I was thrilled. She nailed his
mannerisms, including adjusting his belt and diving into a table/desk. She also
did a pretty good impersonation of his yelling voice and got all the important
lines, such as living in a van down by the river and amounting to jack squat. I
would highly recommend watching the original sketch above (I provided 3 links
because, you know, there’s 3 times the chance it will work) and then watching
McCarthy’s impression below. Now, her characterization of course could not live
up to Chris Farley’s pitch-perfect delivery, but it was a great tribute to a
great character.
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| Melissa McCarthy as Matt Foley, who LIVES IN A VAN DOWN BY THE RIVER! |
http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/snl40-weekend-update-with-tina-fey-amy-poehler-and-jane-curtin/2847149 (Skip to 4:15 and watch until the end of the
video)
Then, of course, the Landshark appears and eats Tina Fey.
After that was a montage of clips from the Weekend Update. My
favorite two were Jebidiah Atkinson yelling “Next!” and Norm MacDonald’s joke:
“F. Lee Bailey says if the defense only knew what Ron Goldman’s
last words were, they might be able to find the real killer. You know, if you
ask me, Ron’s last words were probably ‘Hey, you’re OJ Simpson!’”
Of course, I loved the Jane Curtin-Dan Aykroyd exchange, but
I figured that actually typing it here could be considered inappropriate, so
instead you can watch it at your own risk:
http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/saturday-night-live-40th-anniversary-special-part-2/2846552 (Skip to 5:30 in the video to see the
montage.)
See, I have deniability because YOU chose to watch the video.
Not my fault if they said anything offensive. I will say I disliked the honoring
of Stefon, Drunk Uncle, and Kristen Wiig as I never found those characters to
be even remotely funny. Colin Jost’s joke they showed was one of his halfway
decent ones: “This Wednesday was National Hug Day. Dad.” Seth Myer’s joke was
of course funny, as was the Chevy Chase one. My favorite, like I said before,
was Norm MacDonald’s, as it perfectly fit in with his persona. Norm always
would say that OJ Simpson was guilty of murder and constantly made fun of him
for that, which is actually why MacDonald was fired.
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| In order of height: Kevin Nealon, Norm Macdonald, Seth Myers, Colin Quinn. In order of best humor: Norm Macdonald, everyone else. |
Luckily, Macdonald was there on Sunday as the Weekend Update
was honored, and he was there with Kevin Nealon, Seth Myers, and Colin Quinn to
introduce Chevy Chase. This segment was short but quite funny, especially since
Kevin Nealon appeared as his character “Mr. Subliminal.” This Weekend Update
character would give subliminal messages throughout a monologue, such as “I don’t
know anyone else who would go out and purposely try to hurt someone –LAPD – and
instead of hounding this very respectable couple –senile – that are no longer
in public office –thank God – I think people like Kitty Kelley might do well to
focus our attention on America’s real problems – Kennedys – Now…”
Kevin Nealon used this kind of monologue here as such: “You
know, I’m going to be totally honest with you – embellish – I had nothing to
complain about while I was here – Norm Macdonald - … and to be on this stage
with these guys – hacks – is pretty special.” This was hilarious to see, as was
Norm Macdonald’s demeanor of seeming almost drunk and saying “We gentlemen here
are mere utility infielders,” causing Seth Myers to bust up laughing for some
reason. Then, of course, they actually introduced Chevy Chase.
When he hosted the Weekend Update, Chevy Chase explained at
one point: “And now as a public service to those of our viewers who have
difficulty with their hearing, I will repeat the top story of the day aided by the
headmaster of the New York School for the Hard of Hearing: Garrett Morris.”
Chase then read a headline while Garrett Morris, framed by an oval, shouted the
headline at the top of his lungs in hilarious fashion. Here you go!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=butZyxI-PRs
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| News for the Hard of Hearing. Of course, since you can read the picture's text, you already knew that. |
So when Chevy Chase was introduced and was able to say a few
kind words, naturally Garrett Morris made an appearance to help the hearing
impaired. ”Thank you guys for that uh, uh, lovely tribute. It really made me
feel loved and appreciated.” All this was said with Garrett Morris repeating it
and yelling, causing loud audience laughter. Chevy Chase ended his kind words
with his normal Update conclusion of “Good night and have a pleasant tomorrow,”
followed by Morris.
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| Even today people are hearing impaired and need Garrett Morris' help. |
So now, hopefully, you understand the context and hilarity of
the SNL 40 Weekend Update tribute. If you do choose to go back and watch it, I’ve
provided the link below, and now you understand it! I could write all day about
the SNL 40 show, because it had so many funny moments, from Sean Connery
mispronouncing “Who Reads?” to Justin Bieber not knowing who Tom Sawyer is to
Bradley Cooper and Betty White making out (seriously, that happened, and it was
weird) to Bill Murray singing the Jaws love song to Mike Meyers and Dana Carvey
reprising their Wayne’s World characters. If you have any comments, questions, answers,
or opinions about SNL, SNL 40, The Weekend Update, this blog post, this blog as
a whole, or anything else, please leave them in comments below. In about a week Dakota Johnson will host SNL, so let's hope she does a good job and that the writing can be up to expectations coming off of this 40th Anniversary celebration. To conclude, as Chevy
Chase said best: “Good night, and have a pleasant tomorrow.”
Links: (Scattered Throughout the Post)
Actually, you know what, you can click on the links throughout the post yourself. It's not my responsibility to put them all here for your convenience. So there!
Actually, you know what, you can click on the links throughout the post yourself. It's not my responsibility to put them all here for your convenience. So there!
Fine, I'll cave in. Here are the links for the whole episode. That's it for you!
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