Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
PHONE SEX
inspired by Monica Lewinsky, Barbara Walters (CHO) tries out phone sex
— Nice touch with the pictures of Cheri’s Barbara Walters all over the bedroom.
— Very funny turn with Cheri’s Barbara calling up Parnell’s Tom Brokaw for phone sex.
— Tom Brokaw, to Barbara Walters: “Harry Reasoner was right. You are a whore.”
— A rare non-Celebrity Jeopardy appearance from Darrell’s Sean Connery.
— Great reveal of the lonely and horny person Barbara calls turning out to be Hillary Clinton.
— When hearing Barbara’s proposal to have phone sex, I love Ana’s Hillary quickly saying “I’ll be the man.”
STARS: ****
MONOLOGUE
host’s TV parents Peter Boyle & Doris Roberts [real] arrive bearing clips
— A lot of funny asides and stand-up comedy from Ray Romano.
— I particularly like Ray’s stand-up bit about ugly twins.
— I’m not too crazy about Ray’s stand-up being interrupted by a cameo from his TV parents, though I can’t complain much about a Peter Boyle and Doris Roberts cameo.
— Awesome seeing a classic clip of Boyle and John Belushi in the “Duelling Brandos” sketch from the season 1 episode that Boyle hosted.
STARS: ****
SPORTSCENTER
Chet Harper’s (host) catchphrases rankle Stuart Scott (TIM)
— Tonight’s show immediately leads off with what would go on to be the most famous sketch from this episode, and a legendary sketch in general.
— I love Tim-as-Stuart-Scott’s constant “BOO-YAH!”s.
— Ray, during his sports commentary: “You gotta get to White Castle before the weirdos show up.”
— There’s the first utterance of the now-immortal phrase “Sweet sassy molassey”.
— So many laughs from how bad Ray is at speaking for athletes in his commentary during sports clips.
— Ray’s various nicknames for Tim’s Stuart Scott are very funny, such as “Stu-pac” and “Stu-manji”.
— Hilarious bit with Ray saying, in regards to hearing Anna Kournikova’s name, “My peenie just went ‘urmp’.”
— Tim: “He shoots, he scores…” Ray: “…and he celebrates, like a slave who made it to the North!”
— During his “poignant” exit speech, I absolutely howled at Ray’s analogy to “a fat girl waving her trophy from the smell contest”.
— Ray: “Lord Sweet Pappy Johnson with an erection, I will be back!”
STARS: *****
VH1
Behind The Music- Meat Loaf’s (HOS) lyrics come from warning labels
— Horatio’s Meat Loaf impression always make me laugh.
— An overall decent piece.
STARS: ***
CARNABY’S
restaurant patrons laugh off Roberto Benigni’s (host) destructive antics
— The opening anniversary bit with Parnell’s character and his wife was pretty funny.
— Ray’s impression of Roberto Benigni is freakin’ hilarious and spot-on.
— A lot of laughs from everybody’s lighthearted reactions to Benigni’s appalling actions, eventually getting to the point where he chops off Horatio’s hand with an axe.
— I usually dislike sketch endings that rely on a newspaper headline, but for some reason, I really like this particular sketch-ending headline stating “Benigni incorrigible!”
STARS: ****½
PIMP CHAT
former NYPD officer (host) discusses new career as whoremonger
— The second and final installment of this sketch.
— Why’d they drastically change the look of Tim’s Pimpin’ Kyle character? (side-by-side comparison between Tim’s look in both Pimp Chat sketches below)
— I’m glad they’re not having Ray playing a carbon copy of the character who Vince Vaughn played in the first installment of this sketch, though Ray’s character isn’t as funny as Vaughn’s.
— Ray, after bringing in his fat ho: “I supersize my bitches.”
— Horatio must be trying to crack Tim up, as Tim busts out laughing out of character right before the sketch ends.
— Overall, ehh. I liked this Pimp Chat installment enough, but it was a big step down from the solid and fun first installment. Can’t say it’s a big loss that they stop doing this sketch after tonight’s episode.
STARS: ***
WEEKEND UPDATE
Monica Lewinsky (MOS) breaks into fits of laughter while claiming remorse
CHO uses Barbie to represent march of women’s progress during the century
— Unlike the last episode, Colin’s jokes are getting really good audience reactions tonight.
— I see SNL is making more of an attempt to have Molly resemble Monica Lewinsky, by updating her look.
— I’m not caring for where this Update commentary of Molly’s has been going so far. It’s kinda bringing out some of Molly’s worst traits as a performer, which makes me dread what’s soon to come with her in the upcoming seasons 25 and 26, as I recall Molly’s worst traits being on full display in those seasons. I got really sick of her when those seasons originally aired.
— Colin’s having a decent night so far. Better than usual.
— Interesting seeing Cheri do an Update commentary as herself.
— Cheri’s commentary about women’s progress has been amusing me, and I’m really liking her little asides to Colin throughout this.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “What Can I Do” & “Haste To The Wedding”
LOCKER ROOM
Suel Forrester gives a college basketball team a halftime pep talk
— This has always been what is probably my favorite Suel Forrester sketch. I love this NCAA setting for him, and some of his gibberish lines in this sketch have stuck with me over the years.
— Tim seems to be wearing his Stuart Scott wig from the SportsCenter sketch earlier tonight.
— The female voice and female gestures that Forrester randomly does just now are hilarious.
— The Forrester gibberish line that came out sounding like “the heart of a tampon” was particularly great.
— The confused facial reactions from the basketball team members are cracking me up.
— Another sketch tonight ending with a newspaper headline. Probably not necessary.
STARS: ****
BIG BABY
adman (host) plays parent during childlike partner’s (WIF) presentation
— Here comes a forgotten Will Ferrell gem.
— Great turn with Will’s mature businessman suddenly going through a childish emotional breakdown when he gets called out on a big mistake he made with his report. Will’s childlike crying is absolutely SPOT-ON, including the way he tries to speak through his crying. I can see this being annoying for some viewers, though.
— More spot-on and hilarious kid imitations from Will, with him now acting out a child’s typical temper tantrum, and then being given a juice box to calm down.
— Funny bit with Ray telling Will “sound it out” when Will’s having trouble pronouncing the word “exploit”.
— Hilarious twist at the end when Ray and Will are left alone. I especially love Will saying “What a bunch of anuses” and Ray saying “Let’s go get a lap dance”. This kinda reminds me of the ending of another great Will Ferrell sketch, Shirtless Bible Salesmen, which makes me wonder if both sketches are from the same writer.
STARS: ****½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “So Young”
QUIT JUDGING MY DREAMS!
GI’s (host) WWII foxhole mates are appalled by his oddball post-war plans
— I like the sudden odd turn with Ray detailing a very unusual hot dog-eating contest fantasy as his post-war plans.
— Ray: “They’re my dreams, man, so lay off it!”
— I love how increasingly disturbing Ray’s dreams are, especially the whole bit about hobo sex slaves.
— After some sketches earlier tonight fell victim to SNL’s crutch of newspaper headline sketch-endings, this sketch displays SNL’s other bad sketch-ending crutch: a text crawl. However, I actually really like this particular text crawl, especially the Shaun Hitler bit.
— Overall, a perfect sketch in my eyes. This is exactly the type of bizarre, oddball sketch that I always find this SNL era great at pulling off, and Ray fit this material to a T.
STARS: *****
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very strong episode, and has always been one of my favorites of this era. Lots of things to love in this episode, including a legendary classic (SportsCenter), a personal favorite of mine (Quit Judging My Dreams), many great sketches, a consistently strong post-Weekend Update half, and an excellent host in Ray Romano.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Bill Murray)
a big step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Drew Barrymore, making her first return since hosting the show as a 7-year-old
I used to have “crying ad exec” as one of the Will Ferrell Top 20 back on my original 1999 website. I’ve always loved that one. Exploot.
A solid episode. By the time Ray came back in 2003, the writing had really suffered.
CC shortened the cold opening, shortened and/or cut the Update, and made the Corrs’ second performance their first. Big oversight for not including Big baby.
Raymond was on fire this whole show, really wish he came back more after this. He did finally host again years later but that episode was mostly disappointed from what I remember, even the sequel to Sweet Sassy Molassey was a bit underwhelming. Speaking of, kinda funny in hindsight how much the “Boom Goes the Dynamite” viral video that became big years later was like a real life version of that sketch.
I sorta remember Tim in an interview around that time mentioning that Pimp Chat sketch and Horatio caused him to break by grabbing his crotch or something like that. Kinda brazen for a first year cast member to screw around that like in the live show, usually seems like the kind of thing a cast member has to wait a few years because of fear of being fired.
Am I nuts, or did Cheri often seem kind of into Colin around this time? Remember it being noticeable in some of her WU appearances over this and next season, as well as often being spotted looking chummy during the goodnights. Don’t think I’m the first to point this out, pretty sure I’ve seen it mentioned by others in the past.
If I’m not mistaken, pretty much all of Cheri’s Update commentaries for the next season and change will have her flirting with Colin.
Remember on the 2000s special Paula Pell said a lot of the female cast and staff had crushes on Colin
“The best-selling author in the world is a woman …”
(Walks Barbie forward) “….But it’s DANIELLE STEEL!” (Walls Barbie backward)
“I’m not gonna pay a lot for this muffler! You are gonna pay a lot! And the cost is gonna be prohibitive!” is something I still bust out when watching sports.
I used to see (hear, I guess) Ray Romano on Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist. I always enjoyed his appearances. Then he got Everybody Loves Raymond, which started out slow but with critical support, had hit the big time by 1999. Unfortunately, by this time I was already tiring of it, mainly because of the unpleasant, sour characters – you can get a glimpse of that here, when the audience doesn’t really react as well as one would expect to Peter Boyle and Doris Roberts crashing his monologue. Boyle and Roberts were first-rate performers – I really hope they are not remembered for that show, which, for something that at the time was hyped as one of the best sitcoms ever, has faded into relative, and deserved, obscurity.
My main memory from this episode was the Roberto Benigni sketch. He had that weird, very brief explosion of fame in the US due to his bizarre Oscar antics. They use that to good effect here.
Other than Pimp Chat, which is just kind of dull and gross to me, and the Kattan shoutfest that I couldn’t really make it through, this was a good episode with various gems. Will is just perfect in the baby executive sketch, and the sports sketch is indeed an all-timer. Update is also pretty good and Colin has some sharp jabs. I wonder if the JFK Jr jokes were edited out for repeats.
Even the cold open is fun – and I wonder if it inspired the Barbara Walters part of the TV Funhouse from the next Christmas episode.
The WWII sketch at the end reminds me of how overwritten the “shocking” material became by these years – we would have got the point of him being a pervert with less piled on. The more that’s piled on the less it becomes about the sketch and more about the writing trying very, very hard to show us how clever they are (and having no trust in viewers to get the joke). It’s too bad, because with more economical writing it would have been a classic.
Ray Ramano was on Fly on the Wall and said he and the writers he brought from Everybody Loves Raymond wrote the SportsCenter and Benigni sketches