If you were ever a fan of Saturday Night Live – and let’s face it, many of us were for at least a handful of years – NBC’s more than three-hour Sunday night special SNL50: An Anniversary Celebration was both an original and nostalgic super-sized treat.
And no, I’m not just saying that because of the book I co-authored with my husband, Stephen Tropiano — The SNL Companion: An Unofficial Guide to The Seasons, Sketches and Stars of Saturday Night Live.
The book that is available on Amazon in paperback or on Kindle.
Nor is it because the two of us coincidentally spent part of the end of our first “date” watching the SNL episode hosted by Sean Penn 37 years ago, never realizing that both we (and the series) would still be a thing.
It’s not even due to the nostalgic fact that we each happened to go to an SNL taping (Note: Me during season one; him in season three) in its first five seminal seasons.
It’s that somehow – after so many hits and misses – this particular episode got it exactly right. Or, well, as right as it could ever be.
There are many secrets to SNL but chief among them is its ability to regenerate itself with a revolving cast of comedy performers every few X number of years, some of whom even start as writers. Just when the series isn’t working, suddenly someone or something (Note: Like some ripe-for-parody personality or news event) comes in that makes it work again. Its most popular sketches endure but are seldom done too many times, always leaving room for the newest hot take to cross into the zeitgeist and create some seemingly necessary, key cultural moment.
Rather than rest on its laurels and rely solely on its past, it constantly tweaks its content while remaining true to the tradition and structure of its unique brand of sketch comedy and musical guests. Weekend Update, the host monologue and the singer/band performances may endure and so do the way they are presented and who presents them. Yet what is contained inside and who is offering what is always different. Not to mention the commercial parodies, the music videos, the short films, guest hosts and guest star cameos.
All of this and more were there in abundance on #SNL50. Yet unlike the prototypical evening of clip reels peppered with celebrity or cast member intro and outros, this was instead like watching a gigantic new episode of the series that incorporated reinvented, new versions of a lot of our favorite sketches and characters from each decade, sometimes with new ones, and in others surprise moments with an SNL performer from an entirely different season showing up in their own signature character from an entirely different bit.
Among the best was an unexpected spot by a very game Meryl Streep (Note: Her first ever in the entire 50 years) playing the mother of Kate McKinnon’s alien-abducted Colleen. As it turns out, Colleen Sr. was also abducted by those little men with the big eyes and watching her have her comic way with fellow abductees (Note: Pedro Pascal and Woody Harrelson, each former hosts) was every bit as bizarrely funny as it sounds.
But there was also:
- A new John Mulaney musical tribute to New York City with numerous new and old cast members singing and dancing.
- Amy Poehler and Maya Rudolph reprising their boroughs talk show, Bronx Beat with special guest Mike Myers as his N.Y. Jewish yenta TV host character, Linda Richman.
- Black Jeopardy featuring with contestants Leslie Jones and Tracy Morgan joined by Eddie Murphy playing a fiction version of Tracy Morgan as the third contestant while standing right next to him.
- Original SNL cast member Laraine Newman in a short film doing a nostalgic walk through of Studio 8H memories only to be met by Pete Davidson’s dim bulb Chad persona as an incompetent 30 Rock stagehand.
- A Q&A of little known SNL facts and cutaways hosted by Tina Fey and Poehler, which gave us a chance to see any number of other former cast members and guest stars.
- A tribute to SNL digital shorts with a new one on SNL-performance anxiety led by Andy Samberg and Bowen Yang (Note: Though good as it was it couldn’t outweigh the special version of Samberg and Lady Gaga reworking his and Justin Timberlake’s Emmy-winning “Dick in the Box” two nights before in an SNL musical anniversary special).
- And Adam Sandler center stage with his guitar (Note: Introduced by little-seen these days Jack Nicholson!) singing a new tune he wrote in the tradition of his Chanukah song, but this time in tribute to various SNL performers and crew people (Note: Many behind-the-scenes personnel were given shout outs and brought in front of the camera during the episode), some of which were quite touching without overdoing it.
Instead of allowing a heavy hitter group of live musical acts to take over, they were judiciously spread over the three hours, much like they would be over the course of a single episode. There was Paul Simon, Sabrina Carpenter, Lil Wayne and Paul McCartney (all former guests) but by far stealing the show was a blues rock version of Nothing Compares To U by Miley Cyrus and Brittany Howard. A cleverly reinvented but fitting version of the signature Sinead O’Connor tune, written by Prince, both of whom left us with their own classic SNL performances before their untimely deaths.
It’s tricky to write about 50 years of SNL without leaving so many out from the past, on the special and even in the audience attending the special. But what’s even harder is not devoting some time to its creator, and producer of 45 of those years, Lorne Michaels. He’s been an omnipresent part of everything, referenced frequently and every so often making brief (and very often even silent) onscreen appearances. The latter was exactly the case over this three hours, which at first seemed strange but, by the end, felt only fitting. Mr. Michaels clearly enjoys steering the ship but wisely picks and chooses when and where he appears on camera.
It’s not that he doesn’t know his way around an audience and a teleprompter. Or shy away from taking credit for steering the ship for most of its journey. It’s that on nights where it’s all going the way it should be, it’s best to simply let the work speak for itself.
“Nothing Compares 2 U” – Miley Cyrus & Brittany Howard
notes from a chair 