John Gushue . . . Dot Dot Dot

When you get the giggles ...

... you get the giggles.

I made this gif from one of Bill Hader's appearances as Steffon, the "city correspondent" on Saturday Night Live, whose brief was always, and strangely, to suggest family-oriented fun in the Big Apple ... and of course who never did. An ongoing appeal of the sketches was that some of Hader's lines were always changed at the last moment, often leading to breaks and giggle fits. 

via GIPHY

You can see the full sketch below. It's a Christmas one, too!  

Kylo Ren, Undercover Boss

My son and I wanted this SNL video this morning, and had quite the chuckle.

 

Undercover Boss: Starkiller Base Posted by Saturday Night Live on Sunday, January 17, 2016

The Coneheads series that never was

The Coneheads sketches that aired in the first years of Saturday Night Live were classic. Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin and Laraine Newman played a family that only wanted to fit into the suburbs ... notwithstanding the fact they were aliens. 

Somehow, I did not know that there were plans, or at least hopes, to turn the Coneheads into a series in its own right. Rankin Bass produced the pilot below in 1983, and when it didn't find a buyer, it went to air as a special. 

That was not the end of the Coneheads, of course; a decade later, Aykroyd and Curtin reprised their roles, with Newman playing another part, in a feature film. It bombed, however, which is a pity for those who like things in mass quantities. 

Coneheads [1983][animated][Unsold Pilot] by UnknownArchiveTV

The audition

'I got in an elevator, and there was a guy who was also auditioning, and I thought: “That guy brought a lot of props. I didn’t bring anything.” And he was looking at me, going, “That guy didn’t have to bring any props.” We were just sizing each other up in the elevator. And that was Andy Samberg.'

That's Bill Hader, describing the process of auditioning for Saturday Night Live ... and just one of the anecdotes collected in this oral history on the subject for the New York Times. 

Stefon has a sale

While we were walking back to the subway from the Brooklyn Flea on Saturday, I saw this posted on a utility pole. It made me laugh ... and you should, too, if you're familiar with Bill Hader's SNL character. (It reads even funnier if you say it out loud, in character.) 

 

Finally: the illustrated New York City guide from SNL's Stefon

Stefon, the Saturday Night Live character created by Bill Hader and writer John Mulaney, is always a hoot to watch. That's in part because Hader rarely gets through one of the Weekend Update appearances, in which he purportedly talks about the best places to go, none of them particularly family-friendly, without cracking up. That, as it turns out, is because Mulaney changes the cue cards at the last moment, so that Hader is invariably reading some of the punch lines for the first time.

Another reason is surely the club names, including edgier ones like "... Kevin?" 

Paste magazine took the lot and made this map. You can check out this higher-res version here.  Meanwhile, more on Stefon here. 

The acorn is found near the tree

I found a copy of a DVD of Saturday Night Live commercial parodies in a discount bin. At $2.99, how could I not? I had seen the Will Ferrell-hosted special before, and have seen some of the spots many, many times over the years (including the John Belushi Olympics-themed one below). This evening, Nick and I both howled while watching some of them; I remember when cable was a novelty and staying up to watch SNL was a thrill. Small wonder, then, to hear him laugh so hard at the same stuff. 

 

Stefon crashes the Norman Rockwell feast

I'm told this is the card from Saturday Night Live this Christmas season, with Bill Hader's Stefon character finding that there is face-clasping fun to be had in the most unusual environments. 

Pretty funny. 

 

Call Your Girlfriend

From this weekend's Saturday Night Live, it's Robyn, who's a veteran of the pop industry even though she's still just 32. Comment: those are some shoes. 

Ras Trent

Lonely Island recently posted this 2008 piece - a Digital Short for Saturday Night Live - on their YouTube channel. Rude boys in the shanty-dorms, indeed. (I've met this kid over the years, in several incarnations and both genders, with varying degrees of emphasis on the Rasta bit.)

Houdini

Foster The People performed Houdini as their second tune last week on Saturday Night Live ... with Kenny G (!) (no, seriously, !!!) pitching in. Here's a video from their YouTube channel.

 

Scared straight ... out of a straight face

Bill Hader is not known (like, say, Jimmy Fallon) for breaking character in Saturday Night Live sketches, but this outtake from a rehearsal shows that under the right conditions - like having Kenan Thompson an inch and a half away - it's certainly possible. 

I'll see your four Jay Pharoahs with one Bill Hader

This is a pie chart that has meaning for Saturday Night Live watchers (I think there's still a few of us), with a clocking of the apperance time for each of the cast members for the most recent season. It appeared here, on Splitsider. 

It confirms what I would have thought: Bill Hader really is the utility player of the troupe, and Jay Pharoah (a wicked impersonator) and Paul Brittain have not been much used at all.  

Jay Pharoah goes to the Oscars

Jay Pharoah joined the Saturday Night Live cast last fall; he hasn't had a breakout scene or character, yet, but it's obvious the guy has an uncanny ability to do impressions.

This video was made a couple of years ago, featuring one celebrity after another accepting an Oscar.

Taco Town

This makes Nick laugh, out loud. He saw it on the SNL commercials special a few weeks ago, and after one viewing could recite a few of the lines. I'm posting this in part so I can watch him laugh again, and again ... and so on.

 

Pee-Wee Herman and shots, shots, shots

Too funny. Almost.

Anderson Cooper and Chairy, together at last.

Le dance off

Once in a while, Saturday Night Live makes me laugh out loud. One of those moments was in a sketch that aired late in Saturday's episode, with guest Emma Stone. The dance off kicks in around 1:25 or so.

 

The tune, by the way, is by Camille, one of the singers in Nouvelle Vague.