Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
COLD OPENING
Dan Rather (JOP) tries to loosen up & ends up emulating Walter Cronkite
— Boy, am I getting tired of seeing Joe’s mediocre Dan Rather impression so often this season.
— Brian’s joke about the difference between Rather and Ed Bradley was funny, as was Joe’s little correction to the joke.
— I really liked the ending, with the reveal that Rather’s makeover has turned him into his more well-liked predecessor Walter Cronkite.
STARS: ***
OPENING MONTAGE
— We seemed to have officially arrived at the point of Eddie’s tenure where his name begins receiving much louder cheers than anyone else in the cast. This would soon get taken to even greater heights the next two seasons, where the announcement of his name in the opening montage practically receives SCREAMS from the audience.
MONOLOGUE
host reads a letter she sent home during her first visit to NYC
— A rare instance this season of no Talent Entrance after the opening montage.
— Just based on her looks, I wasn’t expecting her to have such a scratchy, raspy voice.
— The letter to her mother isn’t all that funny or interesting so far.
— Overall, this was weak. I would’ve gladly taken a plain-old Talent Entrance over this.
STARS: *½
IN THE NEWS: ELIZABETH TAYLOR
— Rerun. Boy, they sure have been airing this A LOT this season. I don’t know what I’m more tired of seeing this season: this or The Khaddaffi Look. Well, at least The Khaddaffi Look has a catchy jingle…
SPEAKING AS A WOMAN
host & other female panelists discuss past loves
— What was that weird audio clip of someone speaking during Tim’s opening speech? Is that a sound glitch in my copy of this episode?
— Robin is hilarious as Shelley Winters.
— Some of the ladies’ catty comments to each other are great.
— The “scratch and sniff” insult about Christine as Britt Ekland was hilarious.
— Mary’s Harriet Nelson listing off famous 1950s sitcom families as her next-door neighbors reminds me of that fantastic Twilight Zone sketch from the Rick Nelson episode in season 4.
— Overall, a strong ensemble sketch for the female cast, with a good amount of funny lines.
STARS: ****
GIRLS TO WOMEN
women’s party conversation mirrors one they had twenty years before
— A nice realistic 1960s scene so far, and this is looking to be yet another good showcase for the ladies of the cast.
— Wow, I love how in the later scene with the female characters as present-day adults, they’re saying the exact same dialogue from the 1960s scene, only those lines take on a whole different meaning in this context (e.g. “Why don’t you tell Mrs. Conner?”, “Guess who finally got their period?”, etc.)
— Very funny walk-on from the adult version of Tony’s now-sleazy-looking boyfriend character.
— Overall, a great and very creative sketch.
STARS: ****½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “You Make My Dreams”
SNL NEWSBREAK
while defending his political stance, Ed Asner (TOR) turns into Lou Grant
a rundown of the many “Ed”s in the news this week
Dr. Jack Badofsky (TIK) lists the many strains of genital herpes
a troubled kid (EDM) recalls the time he brought a gun to school
JOP speculates where the trend of sexuality in sports magazines will lead
after MAG confronts him, BDM agrees to meet her in his dressing room
— First time in a while where Mary has co-anchored two consecutive SNL Newsbreaks. I know it’s not going to last long, though, because doesn’t Christine Ebersole’s stint as co-anchor start very soon?
— For once, I got an actual big laugh from an SNL Newsbreak joke (the one about the cigarette company Newports changing their slogan from “Alive with pleasure” to “Half-dead with cancer”).
— Tony’s Ed Asner impression still doesn’t do much for me.
— The bit with Tony’s Asner slowly turning into Lou Grant isn’t that funny and is too easy of a premise. At least it was a decent excuse to see Mary briefly doing her dead-on Mary Tyler Moore again.
— Oh, no, Brian setting up a listing-off of famous Eds. Looks like we’re getting our obligatory “long screen crawl gag of the week”.
— Never mind, this wasn’t a screen crawl gag nor was it all that long.
— The debut of Tim’s Dr. Jack Badofsky character. No idea how I’ll react to his commentaries, knowing that his “thing” is listing off cheesy play-on-words.
— Badofsky’s “Herpes Duplex” card made me laugh.
— I got another laugh from him naming herpes from midgets as “Twerpes”.
— The overall Badofsky commentary wasn’t too bad for his debut. However, I just KNOW I’m eventually going to get sick of this routine, especially with how frequently they supposedly end up over-relying on this character.
— What the hell? There’s a bizarre audio error at this point in my copy of this episode, where a joke that Brian is telling gets overlapped with louder audio of him telling a completely different joke (something about Liz Taylor’s birthday). WTF has happened? This is similar to the weird audio glitch I mentioned at the beginning of the Speaking As a Woman sketch. What’s going on here?
— Surprisingly, this is the first time we’ve seen Eddie all night. Unfortunately, the aforementioned audio glitch is still occurring, which is making it hard for me to hear what Eddie’s saying here.
— Okay, the audio glitch has finally stopped.
— Loved Eddie’s “I shot the bitch” line.
— Joe’s SNL Sports commentary had an okay payoff.
— Oh, we get a tacked-on follow-up to the romance story arc between Brian and Mary. Still not funny.
STARS: **½
JOSEPH PAPP AUDITIONS
(EDM) takes a hostage in order to audition in front of Joseph Papp [real]
— Looks like a very interesting premise.
— I got a good laugh from Eddie breaking out into “I Am The Very Model Of A Modern Major General”, though he seems to be having trouble delivering some of the words in such a rapid-fire manner.
— Is Eddie cracking up now, right after his song has ended? Hard to tell.
— The ending with Robin doing the same thing as Eddie felt too tacked-on.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “I Can’t Go For That”
HARRY ANDERSON
Harry Anderson [real] explains card trick & does it via pants grappler
— A lot of funny quick gags at the beginning.
— Very funny random bit with the fake headline “World War III Begins, Millions Die!” being seen on the newspaper Harry holds up.
— Interesting how he’s explaining how we can do the card trick as he’s doing it himself in real time.
— Overall, another entertaining Harry Anderson segment.
STARS: ****
AFRICAN TOUR
a cardinal (TOR) daydreams about Pope John Paul II’s (JOP) African tour
— A fantasy sequence with Joe playing the pope in a diva-esque manner? Blah. The studio audience seems to be getting a kick out of this, but this premise is lame in my eyes and this is EXACTLY the type of Joe Piscopo performance that I never did like.
— Tim’s “You’re bigger than the Beatles” line was okay, I guess.
— Surprised to see Eddie in such a dull, throwaway, non-comedic token black role. They really “Garrett Morris-ed” him in this, to borrow a quote that Eddie himself is known to have once said about his early SNL days (I think back when Jean Doumanian didn’t know what to do with him).
— This sketch is going on WAY too long for my likes.
— Overall, didn’t care for this sketch at all.
STARS: *½
LOWEMBRAU
after losing a patient, doctors drink Lowembrau to loosen up
— Oh, god, they’re breaking out into song…
— Hmm, this is actually kinda funny. This appears to be a parody of a specific then-current beer commercial.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling”
GOODNIGHTS
— Who’s the random crew member in the balcony that the camera is randomly zooming in on? Is this his last episode?
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— A pretty good episode, and a step above the bland averageness that the show had been falling into lately. There were some very strong showcases for the female cast members early in the show, and the second half of the show mostly contained good segments as well.
— Elizabeth Ashley was one in a long line of forgettable hosts who gave a blandly average performance. (Yes, I know I’ve been throwing around the words “blandly average” a lot lately, but honestly, do those two words NOT sum up a lot of this season?) Unfortunately, I don’t think the trend of forgettable bland hosts ends any time soon, considering who’s hosting the next episode (listed at the end of this review). Honestly, the second half of this season has what is probably one of the dullest, least-impressive rosters of hosts in SNL history. Did SNL have trouble booking people after the failure of season 6? Season 7 DID have some cool hosts in the first half (George Kennedy, Tim Curry, Bill Murray), but I don’t know what the heck happened after that.
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Bruce Dern):
— a step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW:
Robert Urich