Week two of NBC’s sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live was a great improvement over the season premiere episode—and avoided the political partisanship that marred that earlier effort.
After a very uninspired season premiere episode a week ago. NBC’s Saturday Night Live was much improved this weekend. Most of the sketches were at least mildly amusing, especially one depicting jury selection in the current O. J. Simpson trial that exemplified the appealingly zany turn the show’s humor had taken in the past few years.
And although Weekend Update was still supportive of Democrats’ political positions, it wasn’t as persistent about it as the previous installment. A repeat appearance in this segment by Fred Armisen as a discombobulated political comedian was a highlight.
The opening sketch, in which Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain is asked to approve several commercials, is hilarious, and the target is not McCain himself but instead the ludicrously deceptive nature of many political ads.
One sketch stood out as particularly impressive, skewering elites in the way SNL had begun to do more often in the past couple of years. Coming right after Weekend Update and a commercial break, the sketch began with a dynamite premise: a New York Times editor (played by host James Franco) addressing a group of fifty or so reporters being recruited to go to Alaska and dig up muck to throw at the state’s governor, Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.
The comic thrust of the piece comes as the reporters respond to the editor’s description of conditions in Alaska, revealing the vast gulf between their privileged Manhattan existence and the lives of ordinary people.
That’s a very loaded premise indeed, simultaneously acknowledging the essential unfairness and elitist and ideologically motivated nature of the press’s treatment of Gov. Palin. In addition, it’s spot-on in calling the New York Times in particular to task for this effort. For Saturday Night Live to acknowledge and indeed call attention to the Times’s political bias is a moment of serious cultural significance.
It’s a terrifically funny sketch and a huge slap in the face for the New York Times, which richly deserves it.
I did indeed see the controversy, Matt, and am in the middle of finishing a report on it I started Monday. Should be ready to file it soon.
Good stuff – I appreciate it. I’m really looking forward to the full review.
BTW – did you see that the SNL ‘Bailout’ sketch got pulled from the internet? That one was a classic.
Matt–stay tuned; I’ll do a write-up on “Day and Age” as soon as it becomes available. (It’s due for general release on Nov. 25.) In the meantime, I’ll see if I can carve out some time to summarize their career so far in an article here.
For now, let me just say that I don’t see their work as existentialism, but instead see it as fitting in with the contemporary search for meaning exemplified by the popularity of Rick Warren’s The Purpose-Driven Life and its various multimedia accompaniments. With its Vegas origins, the band seems intent on creating beauty while exploring the rise and fall of traditional American values, in both their music and lyrics.
I think that the nostalgia you see is real in that sense, that they see the value of many traditional notions of goodness and beauty, but they seem to recognize also that as circumstances change, the way those things will manifest themselves must change as well. I think their music and ideas are intended to be forward-looking, then, pointing a way to incorporate the best of the past into the present. These, however, are just some preliminary thoughts and merit further exploration.
I haven’t seen the Thursday edition yet either – I’m hoping that they can contain themselves and keep it somewhat balanced. I’m having a mild resurgence of interest in SNL, and I fear they’re going to ruin it for me.
As for the Killers, I caught their new song “Human” on SNL, and I haven’t been able to find anything intelligent written about it. Lead singer Brandon Flowers describes it as “Johnny Cash meets the Pet Shop Boys”, which seems about right.
I’m interested in getting a line on their brand of mass market existentialism. Beck (“Nausea”) transitions from absurdist slacker to Sartre while Coldplay (“Don’t Panic”) grasps for beauty (if not a manufactured significance) on a sinking ship. But I get the feeling that the Killers have a sense that things were not always so bleak. There’s a nostalgic feel to their music in an age where we’re supposed to want to look forward, not back.
But I can’t really peg them yet (you can never be really sure with these musical types), so I thought I’d look you up.
Thanks, Matt. Unfortunately, I was at a dinner last Thursday night and did not get to see the SNL special. Will try to catch it online if possible. What are your thoughts on it?
I like the Killers, and I thought they did a nice job last Saturday night. I find their music pretty creative and interesting.
I like the SNL watch, and will be curious to see your thoughts on SNL Thursday night.
Also, The Killers were on SNL – thoughts?