The Definitive Guide to Comedy
The 39th season of Saturday Night Live reminds me a little bit of the New York Jets, which for those of you don’t follow football, does not mean to break out into an S-N-L, S-N-L, SNL SNL SNL chant; but rather, it’s one week’s great, the next week’s not-so great …
If you thought the timing of casting Kerry Washington as guest host of Saturday Night Live seemed suspicious when you first heard about it a couple of weeks ago, then seeing what happened live on Saturday night on NBC…wow. Just wow. Before you launch into your arguments about how SNL …
Sometimes a show gets defensive before you have a chance to criticize it accurately, and pulls out a series of unnecessary stops to make you stop and think, why does this need to be happening? That’s the thought that dominated this installment of Saturday Night Live. Why are Alec Baldwin …
Last week, NBC carried college football past 11:30 p.m., delaying the live start of Saturday Night Live in the Eastern and Central time zones (you Mountain and Pacific people, and people everywhere else, well, you saw SNL whenever you saw it, so you know who you were when you were …
Few people who have talked about Miley Cyrus and what she did at the 2013 MTV Video Music Awards ever mention that her whole to-do began with an introduction by Vanessa Bayer as the version of Miley we thought we knew before that night. So returning to the scene of …
Saturday Night Live has a big new cast for season 39. In case you didn’t know that or hadn’t heard, SNL wasn’t afraid to remind you again and again in the first half-hour that times continue to change because that’s how time works. It doesn’t keep slipping into the future. …
As the thirty-eighth season of Saturday Night Live comes to a close, it’s time to say goodbye to longtime cast members Fred Armisen and Bill Hader, quite possibly a fond farewell to one or two others, and to reflect upon the season just passed. What sticks with me, what sticks …
The return of a longtime favorite cast member as host of Saturday Night Live almost certainly calls for a trip down memory lane of that actor or actresses most popular recurring characters from SNLs past. Kristen Wiig’s first-time hosting SNL, one year removed from her “graduation,” did not depart from …
Zach Galifianakis is back for his third time as Saturday Night Live host in as many years. Or in as many movie installments of The Hangover. That’s something. A vote of confidence in stand-up comedians joining live sketch comedy. Or merely a reflection of the inevitability of movie-making and big …
Is Vince Vaughn still money to you? How you answer that question will sway how you felt about this week’s episode of Saturday Night Live, which featured Vaughn as host for his first time back to the studio since Swingers was his main credit. If, for you, Swingers remains his …
