Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
COLD OPENING
Wayne’s World- the annual Best & Worst of the Oscars are announced
— A lot of great comments from Wayne and Garth making fun of Juliette Lewis’ bad cornrow hairstyle from that year’s Oscars.
— Very funny recalling of a famous scene in Silence of the Lambs where a man in a cell flicks his “man goo” (as Wayne puts it) onto Jodie Foster’s face.
— An overall particularly strong installment of Wayne’s World.
STARS: ****½
MONOLOGUE
host keeps studio on edge by setting up for a Basic Instinct leg cross
— Shortly after this monologue turns into a parody of the famous interrogation room scene from Basic Instinct, things get notorious as angry voices from the audience are suddenly heard VERY loudly chanting “Fight AIDS, not women!” Those angry chanting voices are from a gay activist group who got tickets to be in SNL’s audience as an excuse to protest Sharon Stone’s role in Basic Instinct, due to the movie’s negative portrayal of LGBT characters.
— This protesting/heckling incident is very reminiscent of what infamously occurred during Andrew Dice Clay’s monologue two seasons earlier. To Sharon Stone’s credit, she’s handling the heckling professionally, and is keeping a laid-back demeanor as she tries to go on with her dialogue. She occasionally keeps stopping mid-sentence, though, due to the protesters’ loud voices being too much, which is throwing off her set-up to the main joke of this monologue (which is various people’s comedic reaction shots to what she’s saying).
— Just now, while the protesters are still loudly chanting, another voice in the studio can be heard calling out “Security!” (it sounds like Lorne, who is standing nearby as he waits for the camera to show a comedic reaction shot of him later in the monologue), which is followed by the protesters’ chanting voices fading away as they’re seemingly being taken away by security guards. Reportedly, those protesters were arrested after being escorted out of the studio. I recall hearing that part of the protesters’ intended plan was to eventually march to the home base stage where Sharon Stone was and chant right in front of her. Geez, could you imagine if that happened on live TV during an SNL monologue?
— For obvious reasons, the whole protesters portion of this monologue would later be replaced with the dress rehearsal version in reruns. While my above descriptions probably make it sound like the protesting incident lasted a long time, it was actually only a small portion of this monologue. It stopped right as the camera showed Farley’s reaction shot to Sharon (third screencap above).
— The cutaways to various people’s reactions to Sharon are very funny, especially Victoria licking her lips. In Lorne’s cutaway (fourth screencap above), he does a good job not showing his dismay over what had just occurred with the protesters.
— This overall monologue was fine, but comes off funnier in reruns without the distraction from the protesters.
STARS: ***½
JIFFY POP AIRBAG
— Rerun from the Jason Priestley episode.
— During the shot of Tom Davis eating popcorn from the airbag, you can hear the voice of someone live in the studio calling out “Jon Lovitz!” The following sketch explains why.
HITTING ON WOMEN
intimidated (CHF) & (ADS) babble while hitting on (host); JOL cameo
— Farley’s neanderthal-esque babbling while trying to speak to Sharon is really funny, especially his self-deprecating remarks about himself.
— Now Adam’s babbling to Sharon is even funnier, and is an early display of an archetypal Sandler performance. I especially like when he randomly brings out a pencil for no reason.
— Great line from Adam bluntly telling Farley “Forget it, man, she’s a bitch.”
— Excellent twist with Jon Lovitz (in his first cameo of the season) showing up to woo Sharon. I especially liked his pick-up line simply being “Did I mention I have a penis?”
— This entire sketch would later be replaced with the dress rehearsal version in reruns. The most visible difference is the way Jon is dressed in both versions (side-by-side comparision below).
STARS: ****
SEX GAMES
(KEN) can’t lose himself in sex-game role playing with wife (host)
— What’s with the wholesome background music throughout this?
— Some good laughs from how bad Kevin is at sex role-playing, and how he constantly gets angry and drops character at some of the things Sharon mentions. Kevin always excels at pulling off characters like this.
— Kevin, regarding keeping his first name during the sex role-playing: “My last name’s different, though, because I don’t wanna bring my parents into this.”
— Just to show you how bad David Spade’s airtime has been this season, his walk-on in this sketch is his first speaking role in over a month. This also ends up being a typical bit role for him, and is his only appearance all night. It’s easy to see why the poor guy almost ended up getting fired before hitting it big with Hollywood Minute next season.
— Speaking of David’s walk-on in this sketch, at one point during it, a girl in the audience can be heard excitedly calling out “Spade!”, which makes him kinda smile out of character.
STARS: ***½
FLIPPY, THE FLIPPING CHIHUAHUA
Toonces runs over Flippy The Flipping Chihuahua before driving off cliff
— A funny very random concept of a flipping chihuahua.
— A good laugh from the visual of a sad Flippy half-heatedly trying to flip when chained in the backyard.
— A hilarious unexpected part with Flippy suddenly getting run over by a car immediately after being set free.
— Ha, it turns out to be Toonces who runs Flippy over! Great sudden twist.
STARS: ****
LUNG BRUSH
— Another rerun tonight, this time from the Kiefer Sutherland episode
INTERROGATION
Basic Instinct interrogation scene doesn’t discern sex of androgynous Pat
— Second sketch in a row with a surprising unexpected reveal of a recurring character. This one had a great reveal of Pat being in the Basic Instinct interrogation chair, after the set-up made you think it would be Sharon again.
— Classic part with Pat’s “beaver shot” (second-to-last screencap above).
— This setting is offering a nice change of pace to the usual “people ask Pat gender-specific questions to try to figure out Pat’s gender” premise of these Pat sketches.
— For some reason, I got an unintentional laugh from an excited person in the audience randomly cheering “OWW!” after Dana’s intense “I’m gonna figure you out! I’m gonna figure you out, Pat!”
STARS: ****
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Alive”
WEEKEND UPDATE
ROS recounts escalating responses he got during his door-to-door survey
Queen Shenequa- “my ancestors’ labor should exempt me from income tax”
newly-engaged VIJ sings “I Love A Cop” & does a handstand on the newsdesk
— Rob is getting good laughs detailing the increasingly bothered responses he got from a couple he surveyed, especially with the disturbing turns Rob’s actions during the survey keep taking.
— A forgettable Queen Shenequa commentary overall. The only thing noteworthy was that one part of it offered yet another display tonight of mockery towards Juliette Lewis’ cornrow hairstyle.
— A great random bit from Kevin just now, where he says “When we come back, a surprising report from the Philippines” and then the camera zooms out as the Weekend Update theme music plays, as if this is a real news broadcast about to go to commercial, only for Kevin to immediately continue on with Update with no commercial break. I always like when Kevin randomly plays with the Update format with that type of mock-serious spoof of real news broadcasts, which helps differentiate him from his predecessor at the Update desk, Dennis Miller.
— Kevin seems particularly stumbly with his delivery of jokes tonight. Quite a number of his jokes are also getting a very tepid audience reaction.
— After having a rapidly diminishing presence in the back half of this season, Victoria gets her first big live thing to do on the show in months.
— Fun turn with Victoria breaking out into a catchy “I Love a Cop” song after announcing she got engaged to a cop. This is surprisingly her first Update song in YEARS, after being a frequent feature of the peak years of Dennis Miller’s Weekend Update.
— And now, Victoria reprises her classic Update handstands.
— Nice how Kevin incorporated Victoria’s “I Love a Cop” commentary into the first news joke after her commentary ended (third-to-last screencap above).
— An overall fairly subpar night for Kevin, though he almost redeemed himself with some pretty strong jokes at the end.
— According to GettyImages, the extremely underused David Spade had YET ANOTHER Update commentary that was cut after dress rehearsal (pic here). I lost count of how many of his Update commentaries have been cut after dress this season. Also, it’s odd how this ALREADY jam-packed Weekend Update was originally going to have as much as FOUR guest commentaries.
STARS: **½
SECURITY CHECK
male airport security guards abuse their authority & make (host) undress
— Something about the New York(?) accent Kevin’s using sounds odd and forced.
— Funny part with the security guys just waving off Farley and telling him to go ahead when the alarm keeps going off on him.
— I love how after Sharon complains “I’m gonna miss my flight”, Phil as the pilot is suddenly revealed to be standing to the side, saying in a professional, deadpan tone “This plane ain’t going anywhere. Now, please, for the love of humanity…. take off your shirt.”
STARS: ***
ERNIE’S
shopkeeper (CSR) bombards his wife (ELC) with participle-based insults
— Interesting format with most of the dialogue only consisting of Rock’s endless succession of name-calling related to what Ellen is doing at the moment.
— I like the fake-out with Rock taking a sip of water as if he was finished with his insults, only to immediately continue afterwards, as well as him momentarily stopping mid-insult to look up something in a dictionary/thesaurus when having trouble coming up with one particular word.
— This sketch ended up being the perfect length and didn’t go on longer than it should’ve.
STARS: ***½
TAYSTER’S CHOICE SPERMICIDAL JELLY
(host) borrows Tayster’s Choice Spermicidal Jelly from neighbor (DAC)
— Something about Dana looks a bit unusual in this, especially his hair and eyes. He probably had just recently removed his wig and dark makeup from the Security Check sketch, which would explain his somewhat unkempt hair and face in this sketch.
— I’m aware this mini-sketch is a word-for-word recreation of a real series of Taster’s Choice ads, only replacing “coffee” in the dialogue with “spermicidal jelly”. This spoof isn’t funny to me, not even after having once been provided a YouTube video of the real Taster’s Choice commercials. And unfortunately, this is only Part 1 of a runner throughout the back half of tonight’s episode.
STARS: *½
PHIL HARTMAN CREATIONS
PHH demonstrates the many uses of his wigs
— Here’s the sketch that I mentioned can be seen getting cut at the last minute during the Zoraida sketch in the Susan Dey episode.
— Fun premise with Phil as himself advertising his line of men’s wigs.
— Phil’s “Troy” wig looks almost like Al Franken’s Stuart Smalley’s wig (first screencap above).
— I’m enjoying the accompanying picture and varying background music for each wig that Phil details. The music played during the part with the foreign guy wig is particularly funny.
— An overall great showcase for Phil as himself.
STARS: ****
TAYSTER’S CHOICE SPERMICIDAL JELLY
Tayster’s Choice Spermicidal Jelly borrower will repay neighbor later
— Still not funny.
— An awkward, unflattering-looking freeze-frame of Dana at the end (screencap below).
SNL would later fix this bad freeze-frame in reruns by showing the dress rehearsal version of this sketch.
STARS: *
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Porch”
PORNO COUPLE
(PHH) & fiancee (host) come clean about their pornography-based lives
— Phil’s initial confession of acting in porno movies is fairly funny.
— Aaaaaand the joke quickly dies off with the increasingly less funny confessions of other porno-related secrets.
— Weak newspaper ending.
STARS: *½
TAYSTER’S CHOICE SPERMICIDAL JELLY
Tayster’s Choice Spermicidal Jelly borrower meets neighbor at party
— Ugh, a THIRD one of these.
— As no surprise by now, I’m still not getting any laughs from these.
STARS: *
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— An episode that started off with a lot of solid things in the first half, then got more average around the middle, then died a miserable death towards the end with the endless number of unfunny Spermicidal Jelly mini-sketches along with the terrible Porno Couple sketch. An overall mixed bag of an episode, but had a good-enough number of solid highlights in the first half.
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Mary Stuart Masterson)
a mild step down
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Jerry Seinfeld
Victoria is still married to the cop today–apparently she lost a lot of the SNL money in her divorce from her first husband. I remember in the SNL 25th anniversary show, Tom Hanks saying Victoria divorced a fire-eater and married a cop, which when I was younger, I thought was a joke, but was real.
This episode is one of those examples of the ups and downs of showbiz – Sharon Stone probably would have been sitting in the audience for most of her career, and here she is hosting thanks to Basic Instinct. I thought she did a decent job with what she was given, which for the most part felt like one “male gaze” sketch after another after another and some other random recurring bits.
I really didn’t care for the security sketch at all, between Dana’s Indian routine and that the whole thing basically just consists of men leering and cajoling until she takes off her top, with nothing else going on. The bar sketch veers the same way towards her just being an object, but the ending, where she gets to do some funny reactions to Lovitz, is decent. Of all the sex-related sketches in this episode I liked her bedroom talk with Kevin the most as it was much more character-based, and the idea of him getting too caught up in his own fantasy and worrying that his fantasy prostitute was being exploited was clever and well-acted.
Hard to believe within a few years we’d go from Spade not getting on WU to Spade getting on WU to do bits like “I’m in a cult” and “Let me do the world’s worst Jeff Foxworthy impression.”
I love the Phil wig sketch, and the Toonces sketch is incredibly clever. The moment when Flippy gets run over is a real shock, yet then you think to yourself, “Toonces!”
Victoria being willing to play the lesbian attraction surprised me.
Agreed on the security sketch, it’s honestly way too creepy for me to find funny. It’s close to a * for me personally.
I’d probably go with a * too, I kind of hate the sketch (which disappoints me as 91-92 is a season I have a lot of nostalgic fondness for).
(not saying this to ask for a review change or anything along those lines, in case I am giving that impression)
Sharon Stone was thought of as a sex object. In comedy, you have to acknowledge the truth of what the audience is thinking or it doesn’t work. They wisely wrote sketches that played off of her specific image with the public at that time. If they’ve got an idea for a sketch like the airport one, there aren’t many actresses they could do it with. It won’t work for Roseanne Barr. So you’re going to use it when you’ve got someone like Sharon Stone on the air. Sharon had already chosen to play these types of parts, so they weren’t asking her to do something she’d be uncomfortable with.
Besides, the real message of the sketch is how jerky the guys are. It isn’t a negative on Sharon at all. Finally, the male gaze is a good thing, as is the female gaze. Audiences want to see good-looking people in entertainment. So we get Sharon Stone, Denise Richards, Patrick Swayze and Chris Hemsworth, and so on. They like looking good and we like looking at them. So why anyone would try to interject into this happy contract and place a judgment on it is always baffling. Obviously there is lots of room in entertainment for people who don’t look good, especially in comedy. But Sharon was in this business because of her looks far above all else. The show would have been foolish to not use that fact in its sketches with her.
This episode is too one-note for me; with nearly every single sketch consisting of the guys ogling Sharon Stone…it got old. And the Porno Sketch…?…yikes…a rare dud for Phil.
Where can I find the live version of this monologue? I’ve looked everywhere for it.
I’m curious too. This blog seems to have had access to a lot of original airings that aren’t available online now (also the original airing of the Susan Dey episode to name another one). Not sure if they were from his personal collection or if they had been traded online at some point.
After acquiring the “live” version and comparing the two, I can say that in the rerun, the dress rehearsal version stops as Lorne appears. I can’t quite tell if the short of Lorne in the rerun is a match to the live version, but after that, the live version and the rerun match up.
Also Googled an article about the protesters from a Buffalo newspaper. They said they snuck in “through the makeup room,” pretending to be crew members. 6 of them were arrested afterwards.
Sharon made several appearances in the new episode (Aubrey Plaza) – one of the more surprising one-off host returns.
Despite a great performance from Phil, I think the airport security sketch is one of the most offensive things snl has ever done. There are many sketches that I will defend against charges of offensiveness but this is not one of them. I understand JediJones point that the men are supposed to be the butt of the joke and that probably was the intent but I don’t think it plays that way. The sex game and bar sketches are much more successful at using Stone’s beauty to make a point or provide humor. By contrast, it made me uncomfortable to see a sexual assault played for laughs in the airport security sketch, along with the brazen abuse of authority. Plus the lecherous Indian character Dana is playing really rubs me the wrong way. Im usually much less offended than most at an actor playing a different ethnicity but this one really crossed a line for me. Carvey is one of the best snl cast members ever but this was a misjudgment on everyone’s part.
Couple that genuine offensiveness with Eddie Vedder’s insufferable self righteousness and you get some of the worst of both worlds in this episode. Im as pro choice as they come but good God Pearl Jam are such tryhard moralists sometimes.
I think these sketches go to show the “frat bro” style that was gradually taking over the show (and would completely sour it by 94/95). One commenter here suggests that Stone was put into these dodgy premises because “comedy is about truth” and “she was only in the business for her looks”. That seems pretty disingenuous to me, because it’s clearly just an excuse lol.
The show could easily have just…done something else, or used her in different ways that weren’t just the same creepy note over and over. A few sketches do that, so it’s a shame there wasn’t more of it.