October 23, 2004 – Jude Law / Ashlee Simpson (S30 E3)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

HARDBALL WITH CHRIS MATTHEWS
Ed Gillespie (SEM) smiles & Zell Miller (WLF) fumes

— Seth’s overly smiliness as Ed Gillespie is pretty funny.
— Mary Beth Cahill? Okay, I’m assuming that’s a real person Amy is playing, and not just SNL making a very random meta reference to a certain obscure short-lived featured player from season 17.
— Wow, Darrell badly screwed up his Bush/“beer night” joke, but swiftly tried to get a laugh out of the flub by making gibberish sounds.
— Amy’s various crude lesbian euphemisms all throughout this sketch, in regards to Dick Cheney’s daughter, had me howling back in 2004. Not sure how to think about it today, especially considering how BEYOND burned out I’ve become by this SNL era’s overabundance of unflattering gay material that now comes off badly dated and hacky.
— Oh, fuck yeah! Here we go, the debut of Will’s legendary Zell Miller!
— Will’s insane ranting as Zell Miller is absolutely PRICELESS, as is the great visual of Will’s face genuinely turning purple and veiny over the course of his yelling throughout this sketch. Simply classic.
— The “PISTOLS AT DAWN, MATTHEWS!” bit was a fantastic ending to the Zell Miller interview.
STARS: **** (This would’ve just been three stars until Will’s Zell Miller came along and bumped it up a full star. He was THAT good.)

MONOLOGUE
via song, MAR, TIF, RAD, AMP dub host The Most Beautiful Man In The World

— Meh, a song-and-dance monologue.
— I like Rachel’s “I wanna be against the law… Jude Law, that is!” line during the song.
— Another funny Rachel line, with her rhyming the name Jude with “about to be screwed” before getting panickedly cut off by Jude.
— Ashlee Simpson’s appearance here feels kinda awkward to watch in retrospect, given what we now know will be happening with her later in this episode. She actually made two additional sketch appearances in dress rehearsal. I wonder if at least one of those two sketches was scheduled to air late in the live show, but had to get cut after what happens with Ashlee later tonight (we’ll get there, folks).
— I like the song suddenly turning into a sampling of “Hey, Jude”.
— Overall, I wasn’t crazy about this song-and-dance monologue as a whole, but Jude came off fun enough and there were a few good parts during the song.
STARS: **½

GREEN SCREEN
actor (host) is vexed while shooting Sky Captain-ish green screened movie

— When Jude says he’s never worked with a greenscreen before, I like Seth’s director character attempting to calm him down by telling him “And I’ve never worked with live actors before.”
— The fireball part of the movie filming was pretty funny, especially Jude later questioning why he would bite a fireball.
— Seth, when directing Jude on how to act throughout a scene that’s currently being filmed: “Not so gay.” Ugh. Oh, early 2000s SNL and your endless gay jokes…
— Meh at the “These are my street clothes” ending with Will.
STARS: **½

THE DYSON TOILET
James Dyson (FRA) has invented a toilet that doesn’t employ suction

— Fred’s doing a good impression of the guy from the real Dyson commercials.
— This unfortunately continues this season’s theme of low-brow commercials, after stuff like Dr. Porkenheimer’s Boner Juice and Short & Curly.
— I would say this is a unique and funny concept, but this concept feels kinda reminiscent of the Mike Myers-starring Jonathan Pryce toilet commercials from a season 19 episode. I doubt the similarity is intentional, but either way, I feel those Pryce commercials did this concept better.
STARS: **½

NINTH PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE
George W. Bush (WLF) & John Kerry (SEM) rehash themes in ninth debate

— OH, GOD.
— The fact that SNL buried this debate sketch right in the middle of the show instead of placing it as the cold opening like the first two Bush/Kerry debate sketches probably shows that even SNL has become fully aware of how tepid these Bush/Kerry debate sketches have been.
— I guess SNL calling this the “Ninth Presidential Debate” and treating it as if a whole bunch of wacky antics happened during the third-to-eighth debates (in reality, there have only been three Bush/Kerry debates) is SNL’s way of working around the fact that the REAL third Bush/Kerry debate, which this sketch is parodying, actually aired the previous week when SNL didn’t have a new episode. Instead of spoofing a debate that’s over a week old, SNL just shouldn’t have even bothered with a debate sketch this week. Ain’t like we’re waiting with bated breath over SNL’s take on the third debate anyway, given how hugely disappointing all the other debate sketches have been this season.
— Once again, OH, GOD. We get more cheap jokes tonight about Dick Cheney’s daughter being a lesbian. (And yes, I know that aspect of this particular sketch is referencing the real John Kerry’s mentions of Cheney’s daughter’s lesbianism during the real Bush/Kerry debate. Still, enough is enough.) By the way, has there been a gay joke in EVERY SINGLE SKETCH tonight so far? I didn’t mention it earlier, but the monologue had one too.
— The audience is getting a much bigger kick out of this sketch than I am. I haven’t had a single laugh yet.
— A particularly groanworthy and lazy part of this sketch right now, with Seth’s John Kerry retelling the famous long-winded urban legend about a construction site mishap.
— I finally got my first laugh of this sketch, from Will-as-Bush’s goofy, over-the-top delivery of “ex-agg-er-a-tions”.
— Ugh, make this sketch end already. I can’t take anymore.
— Mercifully, this has now ended, thus also ending SNL’s run of presidential debate sketches this season. Congratulations, SNL – you’ve dropped the ball with every single debate sketch you’ve done this season. Wow. This is the first election season in SNL history where NONE of the presidential debate sketches were a hit. (Season 22 doesn’t count, for reasons I mentioned in my review of the “debate” cold opening of this episode.) This is especially a shame when considering the reputation SNL has long had for being really “on” when covering elections. What the hell happened this season?!?
STARS: *½

PARIS HILTON APOLOGIZES
Paris Hilton (MAR) apologizes for using the n-word, lists hot black guys

— Blah, a cheap attempt at a laugh by having Jude, of all people, play Nicki Hilton. This casting decision also feels a bit like a possible attempt to imitate another “two famous young singers or socialites deliver an address to the nation together” sketch: the “A Message from Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson” sketch from the preceding season, in which Justin Timberlake dressed in drag to play Jessica Simpson alongside Jimmy Fallon’s Nick Lachey (but at least THAT sketch was actually funny).
— So far, I’ve gotten only one laugh in this sketch: George Hamilton being included as one of the black guys who Paris finds hot.
— Overall, this sketch did almost nothing for me.
STARS: *½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Pieces Of Me”

WEEKEND UPDATE
ghost of Babe Ruth (HOS) let Boston Red Sox escape Curse Of The Bambino

— Some really weak jokes so far tonight.
— Okay, Tina’s black voters joke just now made me laugh.
— Blah, a Horatio Sanz Weekend Update commentary, which almost always spells doom, even without Jimmy Fallon there anymore to indulge Horatio in his unprofessional antics.
— This Babe Ruth commentary of Horatio’s is painful and completely laughless so far.
— Not even a walk-on from Rachel can save this Horatio commentary.
— Oh, god, and now there goes Horatio cracking up at himself for no reason, AS USUAL. (*sigh*) It really is something how unwatchable this guy has become in these later seasons of his.
— After a more professional performance in the Update from the preceding episode, Amy has unfortunately gone back to her cutesy, silly, giddy persona from her first Update, which is such an ill fit for this format.
— Didn’t care for Tina and Amy’s goofy bit with the bananas.
— Just now, Tina and Amy, together, do a variation of Jimmy Fallon’s recurring “You’re welcome” routine from some of the preceding season’s Updates (in which, during a joke about people receiving STDs, the punchline would be Jimmy looking into a side camera and delivering a sly “You’re welcome”). At the very end of Tina and Amy’s variation of that routine tonight, Tina even slips in a “Hi, Jimmy” into the camera.
STARS: **

BUSH/BLAIR PRESS CONFERENCE
Tony Blair (host) follows George W. Bush’s (WLF) lead at press conference

— Meh, I’m burned out on seeing Will’s Bush tonight after that horrible debate sketch earlier.
— I’m liking the voice Jude is using as Tony Blair.
— Just now, Will’s Bush has repeated his over-the-top delivery of “ex-agg-er-a-tions” from the debate sketch earlier tonight. It was funnier the first time.
— Why has Jude suddenly begun lisping halfway through this sketch?
— I’m enjoying the interplay between Will’s Bush and Jude’s Blair throughout this sketch, and Jude’s performance is fun, but the material itself is kinda washing over me.
— I like Will-as-Bush’s random nicknames to the reporters, such as him calling Rob Riggle’s reporter character “Sasquatch”.
— This sketch has ended without Fred or Finesse getting to do or say ANYTHING at any point during the sketch, even though they can be seen throughout this sketch as two of the reporters (Fred can be seen to Rob’s left in the second-to-last above screencap for this sketch, and Finesse can be seen to Amy’s right in the last above screencap for this sketch). What’s up with that? Why were Fred and Finesse reduced to playing silent background extras in this sketch? Were they just thrown into this sketch at the last minute because SNL felt bad that neither of them had anything else to do tonight? (Sure, Fred starred in that Dyson Toilet commercial, but it was pre-taped. Finesse, on the other hand, has NOTHING tonight, live or pre-taped. After receiving tons of airtime in the preceding episode, I see things have sadly gone back to status quo for Finesse.)
STARS: **½

TRUMP PROMO
Donald Trump (DAH) tapes a Halloween-themed promo for The Apprentice

— The first of several sketches this season with Darrell’s Donald Trump filming a commercial. I recall these sketches being popular among online SNL fans when these originally aired, so it will be interesting to revisit them.
— Darrell’s Trump voice sounds like it’s gotten even more accurate since the preceding season. Maybe working with the real Trump when he hosted in the preceding season (*shudder*) has made Darrell perfect his imitation of Trump’s voice.
— Lots of laughs from so many of the dumb things Darrell’s Trump is doing throughout this. Very fun sketch.
— A lot of SNL’s old Trump material from older seasons such as this one can be hard to laugh at in retrospect nowadays, due to… well, you know. This particular sketch, however, is just good ol’ timeless silliness that still holds up, at least in my opinion.
STARS: ****

JANE EYRE
Jane Eyre’s (RAD) employer Mr. Rochester (host) keeps booty call in attic

— Funny performance from Rachel, who always cracks me up when playing Victorian-era women like this.
— Some funny dialogue here and there, but something about this sketch isn’t fully clicking for me.
STARS: **½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest aborts “Pieces Of Me” & walks offstage

— Welp, here we are, folks…
— After a gaffe in which a vocal track from the song that Ashlee Simpson performed earlier tonight, “Pieces Of Me”, has mistakenly begun playing here, exposing Ashlee as lip syncing, Ashlee awkwardly stops dead in her tracks for a long time (the first above screencap for this musical performance), then randomly dances around in a very goofy manner (the second above screencap for this musical performance). After a few seconds of this goofy dancing, she stops, helplessly wanders around the stage a bit while playfully laughing at the whole crazy situation that’s happening, then finally just slowly walks offstage (the third above screencap for this musical performance).
— Now Ashlee’s band, left alone onstage while still playing the instrumental to the song, starts really jamming on their instruments while occasionally looking at each other with awkward smirks (the last above screencap for this musical performance).
— And now a Jude Law SNL bumper photo has abruptly showed up, followed by an unscheduled cut to a commercial break.
— Well, now that that’s over, I just have to say: OH. MY. FREAKIN’. GOD. Wow. Just wow. What a disaster. Never before in SNL history has anything on this level happened.
— As much as I wish I could say I saw this piece of SNL history when it happened live, there’s actually a pretty funny story about that. I did watch this SNL episode while it was airing live, but back in these days, I would always tune out whenever musical performances were on. So during the live airing of tonight’s episode, as soon as I saw Jude Law say “Once again, Ashlee Simpson” and the camera then showed Ashlee onstage doing some bizarre pseudo-rockstar dance moves while her band starting playing, I rolled my eyes at Ashlee and turned away to do stuff on my computer, located next to my TV. Ashlee’s musical performance was mere background noise to me as I was busy on my computer, but then I noticed in the corner of my eye that a Jude Law SNL bumper photo was on the TV screen while instrumental music from Ashlee’s musical performance could still be heard off-camera. I then turned fully towards the TV in confusion and wondered to myself “Why is SNL showing Jude Law’s bumper photo only 40 seconds into this musical performance? Why is instrumental music from the musical performance still playing off-camera? What happened?!?” And then SNL cut to a commercial break, and I was absolutely baffled. I said to myself in my thoughts “What the fuck?!? Were there technical difficulties during the musical performance, and SNL was forced to abort the performance and cut to commercial early? Has that EVER happened in the history of SNL? Hmm, come to think of it, I never heard Ashlee singing while this performance played on the TV as I was on the computer.” Thankfully, I had been recording this episode on my VCR (as I did every week back in this era), and thus, I stopped the VHS tape I was recording this episode on, and then rewinded the tape a little bit to answer my burning question of what the hell could’ve happened during Ashlee’s performance that would warrant SNL cutting it off after only 40 seconds. And as I watched the tape, boy, I will never in my life forget my reaction. I. Was. Absolutely. FLOORED. I could not believe that something like this had just happened on SNL.
— Needless to say, the media and general public’s reaction to this whole Ashlee Simpson incident was HUGE. I remember it being heavily featured on news broadcasts and entertainment shows the next few days, and people on the internet could not stop talking about it. (Just imagine if Twitter was around back then.) Speaking of the internet, after the aforementioned thing where I replayed my VHS tape right after Ashlee’s performance to see what had just happened, I immediately rushed to my computer to go to the (now-defunct) saturday-night-live.com message board, so I could see what everybody was saying about the Ashlee mishap. And, as you could imagine, the message board was absolutely FRENZIED with activity at the moment, as tons of board members were simultaneously posting about the Ashlee incident. In fact, there were so many board members simultaneously posting that it caused the board to crash for a while. (Besides this instance, the only two later instances I can remember in that message board’s long history where the board crashed due to too many board members simultaneously posting about something HUGE that had just occurred on SNL is 1) when Jenny Slate accidentally dropped an f-bomb in her very first episode, and 2) when SNL’s big 40th Anniversary Special was airing.)

BEAR CITY
by T. Sean Shannon- anthropomorphic ursines in a car wreck

— This recurring season 30 piece makes its debut.
— The fact that this is airing immediately after a commercial break shows that SNL must’ve put this on as an emergency after what had just happened with Ashlee Simpson.
— Nice to hear the voice of the great Fred Willard, playing the narrator in the intro sequence of this short.
— I notice the intro sequence of this inaugural Bear City short didn’t include the part where two little kids, who we’re told are the only human survivors on the planet, are attacked by several bears. I guess that part was added into the intro sequence of later Bear City installments.
— I like the detail of one bear giving the other bear an “All Bear Auto Insurance” card after their car accident argument.
— Overall, I actually found this short pretty amusing. I recall absolutely HATING these Bear City shorts when they originally aired, but I can appreciate this type of humor more now. That being said, I have a feeling that these Bear City shorts will come off better left as a one-off instead of a season-long runner. We’ll see. While I have a more open mind about these Bear City shorts nowadays, I can’t help but worry that I’ll do a slow-burn towards them over the course of this season.
STARS: not even sure if these Bear City shorts warrant a rating, but: ***

THE ADVENTURES OF PETER O’TOOLE & MICHAEL CAINE
soused Peter O’Toole (host) & Michael Caine (SEM) are disoriented

— I can already tell from the opening title sequence that this is going to be a fun sketch.
— I love Seth and Jude’s performances as a drunk Michael Caine and Peter O’Toole, randomly treating their visit to this fast-food restaurant as if they’re hosting a talk show.
— Lots of funny odd little talk show segments all throughout this, such as “Guess the Accents”.
— A good laugh from Caine and O’Toole assuming Kenan is Othello.
— Speaking of Kenan, this small role is his first and only appearance all night. His airtime has been pretty bad this season so far.
— Kenan is okay as the straight man here, but I find him to be a much better straight man in more recent years. He still seems a little green to me in this sketch.
— O’Toole ordering a gin-lovers pizza is hilarious.
— Peter O’Toole: “We’d like to thank our sponsors: Walkers Crisps and the planet Mercury.”
— Overall, such a great sketch.
STARS: ****½

BEAR CITY
by T. Sean Shannon- anthropomorphic ursines at the office

— I’m assuming the only reason we’re seeing a SECOND one of these tonight is, again, because the Ashlee mishap threw off the timing of the show so much. I wish I could see what the originally-scheduled live rundown for this episode looked like.
— I’m starting to love that theme song. “Bear City. Bear, Bear City.” Simplistic, but catchy.
— Overall, this made me chuckle, but not quite as much as the first Bear City short.
— At some point this season, I’ll probably stop saying anything about these Bear City shorts, and just give them the Jack Handey treatment (referring to how I usually didn’t review Handey’s Deep Thoughts, Fuzzy Memories, and My Big Thick Novel pieces, nor did I give them a rating), only I guess I’ll actually be giving these a rating, unless someone in the comments section can make a good argument for why I shouldn’t rate these.
STARS: **½

GOODNIGHTS
apologetic musical guest says her band played the wrong song

— For some reason, right after the Jude Law SNL bumper photo that’s shown after the commercial break, instead of SNL going right into the goodnights, SNL shows a “Promotional Services Furnished By Columbia Pictures” screen. (screencap below)

Not sure why they’re showing this promotional screen, unless it’s just because the Ashlee incident left SNL with some unexpected time, so they took this as an opportunity to air a special credit for their promotional services. My memory is fuzzy, but I think the Ellen Page episode from season 33 also has a “Promotional Services Furnished By…” screen shown right before the goodnights, even though, as far as I know, nothing goes wrong in that episode that would leave unexpected extra airtime.
— At the beginning of his goodnights speech, Jude instantly addresses the Ashlee Simpson incident by simply saying “Ladies and gentlemen…what can I say? Live TV.” A mortified and apologetic Ashlee then proceeds to explain to us what went wrong, by blaming her own band for “playing the wrong song” and then telling us she didn’t know what to do, “so I thought I’d do a hoedown.”

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Feels odd summarizing my thoughts on this episode, given how much the Ashlee Simpson incident overshadows everything else. It doesn’t help that a lot of this episode was nothing to write home about anyway, making this young season 0-for-3 in good episodes so far, in my eyes. (Man, even the notorious seasons 6, 11, and 20 had at least one good episode by this point in their seasons.) That being said, most of what DID work in this episode was actually really strong, particularly Trump Promo and The Adventures of Peter O’Toole & Michael Caine, both of which will most likely be going into my end-of-season “Best Of” picks.

MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Queen Latifah)
about the same

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
Kate Winslet