Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS
George W. Bush’s (WIF) solo negotiation effort produced bad Chinese deal
— SNL’s been going awfully heavy on Bush-addresses-the-nation cold openings lately.
— Of the bold decisions that Will’s President Bush says he made regarding his meeting with the Chinese president, I love one of the bold decisions being “No translators”.
— A lot of things that Bush is listing off in the agreement points he made with China are giving me some really good laughs. The humor in this cold opening has been a step above the last two Bush-addresses-the-nation cold openings.
— A particularly funny bit about an Ed “Too Tall” Jones Appreciation Week.
— An unintentional laugh from Will struggling badly through the line about Darryl Strawberry voluntarily entering a drug treatment “procility”. Considering Will is playing Bush here, it’s hard to tell just what parts of the line Will genuinely screwed up, but “procility” might not have been one of them, as it was probably just supposed to be a typical Bush-ism.
STARS: ***½
MONOLOGUE
Bill Clinton (DAH) mentors recently-divorced host to pursue females
— Feels like there’s been quite a longer-than-usual gap since the last time I covered an Alec Baldwin-hosted episode, compared to the frequency of his previous hosting stints, making me realize that this is the very first time that Alec has skipped more than one calendar year between hosting stints.
— Pretty funny ambiguous mention from Alec of the divorce he had recently gone through at the time with Kim Basinger.
— An interesting out-of-the-ordinary use of Darrell’s Bill Clinton in this monologue.
— Bill Clinton, when pointing out to Alec the opportunities he has with ladies now that he’s single: “You’ve got it made in the shade with pink lemonade… and I do mean pink.”
— I love how Clinton just busts out laughing when being asked “But aren’t you still married?”
— So many funny lines from Clinton in this.
STARS: ****
RELIABLE INVESTMENTS
Reliable Investments broker (host) talks up market while he plummets
— The camera angles and visual style of this commercial are an accurate spoof of commercials in this vein.
— Hilarious turn with Alec casually and happily continuing the phone conversation with Ana as he jumps out of his office window to his death. Alec is selling this very well with his performance.
STARS: ****
THE DELICIOUS DISH
Lynn (RAD) & Margaret Jo are in awe of Pete Schwetty’s wiener
— Well, looks like SNL has dared to do a Delicious Dish sketch in which they replace the Terri Rialto character played by the recently-departed Molly Shannon with a new character, played by Rachel. Can’t say this is a decision I agree with at all. Should’ve let this recurring sketch end gracefully with Molly’s departure.
— And now we see why SNL has revived this sketch, as Alec returns as the memorable Pete Schwetty. Yeah, I definitely don’t agree with this decision. Having Alec do a direct Schwetty Balls sequel that just lazily repeats the same gag, only replacing balls with wiener, is a D.O.A. choice, in my eyes.
— Yeah, so far, this sketch is paling badly in comparison to the original Schwetty Balls classic.
— I kinda like the audience’s groaning laughter during the turn in the Schwetty Wieners conversation where Alec’s character begins to bring up kids.
— Okay, I got a good laugh from the “Maybe we can cut it in half” “I’d rather you didn’t” exchange between Margaret Jo and Pete Schwetty, regarding the wiener.
— A memorable and very funny blooper with Ana mistakenly saying “wiener” as “piener”, resulting in both her and Rachel busting out laughing. Very rare to see Ana break this badly. Also, even as Ana and Rachel are losing it right next to him, Alec stays completely in character and keeps an absolutely perfect stone-faced expression. He does it in a way that almost makes it seem like he’s annoyed by Ana and Rachel’s breaking, but I’m not Alec, so I can’t say for sure.
— Nice ad-lib from Ana after she regains her composure from her breaking: “A little verbal diarrhea there.”
— Ah, as I wondered in my review of the original Schwetty Balls sketch, this Schwetty Wieners sketch contains a “Wow, the phones are really going crazy” acknowledgment that I had incorrectly remembered being in the original Schwetty Balls sketch.
— I do like the new direction this sketch has taken, with Parnell as a caller who’s obviously doing a certain something to himself while breathlessly asking Pete Schwetty to “tell me about your wiener”. (By the way, Parnell’s character should talk to Jonah “Ask me about my wiener!” Hill. Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)
— Overall, yep, a sequel that I found unnecessary and couldn’t come close to living up to the original, but this still had its share of highlights.
STARS: **½
TOUGH GUY
lone Marine (host) tries to rally spyplane crew to attack China
— Great turn with a war cliche character played by Alec suddenly stepping up. I love some of the soldiers’ reaction to his “… or we could take ’em!” suggestion early on.
— Just now, a cue card accidentally blocks the camera during a close-up of Rachel and Will (screencap below).
SNL would later replace this brief portion of the sketch with the dress rehearsal version in reruns. If you watch the rerun version of this sketch, you can tell when the brief dress rehearsal portion comes in, because Will has his real hair in it, whereas he wears a wig in all of the other portions of the sketch (side-by-side comparison below).
— Alec’s various insane suggestions are providing tons of laughs.
— A priceless line from from Alec about China’s womenfolk having sideways vaginas. I also love the intense closed-eyes facial expression he has afterwards during the lengthy audience laughter from that line (screencap below).
— Tracy steals the sketch with his one and only line of the whole thing. This has been quite a good season in general for Tracy lately. He’s definitely gotten to the official point where his onscreen persona is so defined, so comfortable, and such a sure-fire laugh-getter that SNL knows they can throw him into ANYTHING just being his normal self and he’ll kill it.
— The text crawl ending didn’t work for me (though we get a great freeze-frame shot on Alec panickedly lunging at the camera), which is my only complaint about this otherwise strong sketch.
STARS: ****½
INSIDE THE ACTORS STUDIO
Charles Nelson Reilly (host) is feted
— Will-as-James-Lipton’s traditional opening blank stare towards the audience isn’t quite as funny as usual (the first above screencap for this sketch).
— Great reveal of Charles Nelson Reilly being the guest who James Lipton is speaking so glowingly about at the beginning of this sketch.
— Alec’s impression of Charles Nelson Reilly is absolutely hilarious.
— James Lipton’s made-up word to describe Match Game’s perfection: “Scrumtrulescent”. To me personally, that made-up word is on the same level as another made-up word delivered by Will this same season: “Strategery”, even if “Scrumtrulescent” doesn’t seem to be anywhere near as famous to the general public as “Strategery”.
— James Lipton to Charles Nelson Reilly: “I am not alone in thinking that your brilliance is so pure that you make Gandhi look like a child pornographer.”
— I recall hearing that Alec’s next hosting stint the following season was going to have a follow-up to this Inside The Actor’s Studio sketch, with Alec reprising his Charles Nelson Reilly impression in the same setting, but the sketch ended up getting cut after dress rehearsal. Not sure what they could’ve done in a follow-up to the original Reilly Inside The Actor’s Studio sketch, but if it was just a lazy carbon-copy of the original sketch, then it’s for the best that it got cut, if the Schwetty Wieners sketch taught me anything. Then again, there’s a good chance that the cut Reilly Inside The Actor’s Studio sequel went in a new and different direction. After all, that same season (season 27) has an Inside The Actor’s Studio sketch with Billy Bob Thornton that ends up taking a VERY different and unique route than these Actor’s Studio sketches usually take.
STARS: ****½
WEEKEND UPDATE
TRM explains the circumstances behind Darryl Strawberry’s non-kidnapping
I Have An Opinion- JIF tries to analogize the China-spyplane situation
TIF deconstructs & evaluates Hugh Hefner’s young, blonde harem
DAS & Kid Rock [real] trade respective Hollywood Minute & music roles
— Jimmy’s crack punchline about Darryl Strawberry felt very Norm Macdonald-esque.
— Great to see Tracy in his own Update commentary. This feels like the first in quite a long time that he’s done an Update commentary as himself.
— Tracy acting out a hypothetical conversation between Darryl Strawberry and his wife has some laughs, but this segment is mostly falling pretty flat, surprisingly. Not one of Tracy’s better moments.
— Jimmy’s recurring “I Have An Opinion” side segment continues to not do much for me.
— Tina, on one of Hugh Hefner’s seven girlfriends being named Tina: “Wherever two or more whores are gathered, there’s always a Tina. Thanks, mom.”
— I absolutely LOVE this whole side segment with Tina doing a deconstruction of Hugh Hefner’s seven girlfriends. This segment is pure, classic Tina Fey.
— SNL gets in their very first reference to the hot new show at the time, The Weakest Link, which really takes me back to how huge that show was in pop culture for a while (and, boy, did that show’s popularity seem to come and go at the blink of an eye, IIRC).
— Oh, wow. We’re getting the return of David Spade and the Hollywood Minute?
— Oh, it’s just David’s Joe Dirt co-star Kid Rock, filling in for David.
— When Kid Rock hesitates to finish his dirty line about David Spade being “eight inches off my, uh…”, I love Jimmy’s ad-lib where he finishes Kid Rock’s sentence with “….piener?”, cleverly referencing Ana’s memorable gaffe from tonight’s earlier Delicious Dish sketch.
— Boy, Kid Rock’s Hollywood Minute jokes are just plain stupid (though I admit the Britney Spears/Hamburglar one kinda made me laugh in spite of myself). They feel like stuff written by a 10-year-old kid who thinks they’re funnier than they are.
— Ah, THERE’S our David Spade! Don’t understand why he couldn’t have just done a Hollywood Minute himself.
— A fairly fun and energetic ending to tonight’s Update with David and Kid Rock’s little number, even if I’m far from a fan of Kid Rock’s music.
— This was the first long Update in quite some time, compared to the very short Updates from the past few months.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Yellow”
RED SHIPS OF SPAIN
Robert Goulet (WIF) & relatives (CHP), (host), (ANG) create bad theater
— An interesting new setting for Will’s always-funny Robert Goulet impression.
— Announcer: “Robert Goulet: the man Time Magazine… once mentioned.”
— Nice inclusion of Parnell and Alec as two Goulet brothers.
— The negative newspaper reviews of the play are providing good laughs.
— The name Diane Carbonal is used for one of the newspaper critics, which is also the name of an Ana Gasteyer recurring character. I remember pointing out in an older review that the name Diane (or Diana) Carbonal was also used in a sketch that pre-dated Ana’s recurring character, but I can’t remember what sketch it was.
— The disturbing nature of Robert Goulet doing a romantic scene with his own daughter is very funny. And we get some great awkward facial reactions from Ana as the daughter when Robert Goulet tries to pull her closer and kiss her.
— Now the name Tony Dungy is used for one of the critics, which I believe is also the real-life name of an NFL coach.
STARS: ***½
THE BUSH TAX CUT
Tom Daschle (CHK) & Dick Gephardt (DAH) press conference tries too hard
— A good and funny Dick Gephardt voice from Darrell.
— Very funny turn with the reveal that middle-class families will get a dead squirrel for dinner under the Bush tax plan.
— I’m enjoying the answers given to the press regarding the dead squirrel.
— Some laughs from Darrell and Kattan’s teeth-gritted angry voices when “secretly” arguing with each other while having their backs turned to the camera.
— A pretty slow-paced sketch, but it might just feel that way because of the slow way Darrell’s speaking as Gephart.
STARS: ***
LASTING IMPRESSIONS
make your photo classy by electronically placing it into a brandy snifter
— Horatio is JUST NOW making his first appearance of the whole night, in the final sketch of the show. That’s still more than what Maya gets, though, who’s completely absent tonight. Quite a contrast from the preceding episode, in which Maya pretty much dominated.
— Horatio at least makes the most of his one and ONLY line of the whole night: “(delivered in an exaggerated Italian wiseguy manner) What frigging jackass took this picture anyways?!?”
— Fitting character for Alec, who can do roles like this in his sleep at this point.
— The prom picture of Will and Ana (screencap below) is the same one that was used in the I Took A Gay Guy To Prom pre-taped piece from season 23’s Steve Buscemi episode.
— Some pretty good laughs from the examples of things you can put a picture of inside a brandy snifter to make it look classier.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Don’t Panic”
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Not a particularly memorable Alec Baldwin episode, but certainly not bad. One of the more average Baldwin episodes, but there were still some strong pieces in the first half of this episode. Alec did his usual reliable job as a host.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Julia Stiles)
a slight step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Renee Zellweger