Live from London, it’s Saturday Night, mate!
By Dan Brown Although he mostly stays out of the spotlight, there’s one thing we know for sure about Saturday Night Live executive producer Lorne Michaels: He loves to put his name on other TV shows and movies. How else to explain the news last week that Michaels will be the executive producer for a British version of the sketch-comedy program starting next year? Even in our modern global communications environment, it’s going to be hard for Michaels to, you know, actually produce a TV show while living on another continent. Maybe the Canadian funnyman plans to jet over there to launch SNL UK in person. In the past, though, he has never strayed far from the NBC studio at 30 Rockefeller Plaza where the program he founded in 1975 is still broadcast weekly. Despite all of the side projects, including movie adaptations like Coneheads, It’s Pat and MacGruber, SNL is his baby and he’s protective of it. You would be, too, after 50 years on the air. Which doesn’t stop him from attaching his name to everything from last year’s Mean Girls reboot to a Nate Bargatze comedy special to the cult classic series Portlandia. In 1993, Michaels famously did Conan O’Brien a solid when the ginger comedy writer took over Late Night, loaning his on-screen credit to the incipient talk show to help give the untested O’Brien an extra push. Was Michaels actually involved on a nightly basis? Not really, but even back then he was a draw all on his own. Despite the majority of SNL sketches failing over the years, Michaels is viewed today as having as close as it comes in the entertainment industry to a golden touch. We Canadians remember how he was involved . . . somehow . . . when Kids in the Hall broke through around the same time as Conan’s show. But the question in front of us is: Does Michaels have enough influence to make a British-based SNL a hit? According to the Associated Press, the new show is being made in association with Sky Studios, and will feature an all-British cast using the same format – celebrity host, musical guest, parody news segment. It looks like it will be broadcast from London. Unseen by me, French, Japanese, and Italian iterations of SNL have failed quickly – strangely, a Korean version of SNL is still going strong. Longtime TV watchers will note that historically, it’s British shows that get remade for the American viewing public, not the other way around. It’s also worth noting that when the American version of SNL pokes fun at, say, the British Royal Family, those jokes fall flat – unless you happen to be a British subject living here in the colonies. Yanks just don’t know enough about British culture, as Canadians do, to appreciate the humour in those comedic jabs. Perhaps the Saturday Night Live brand, as opposed to Michaels’ own personal pedigree, has enough resonance abroad to ensure the spinoff stays on the air, once launched. Viewers across the pond have wide-ranging tastes – they are the ones who made shows like Spitting Image, Monty Python’s Flying Circus, the Young Ones, and The Office cultural touchstones. Surely American politics will be a staple every week, but do Brits really want one of their own mocking Donald Trump? I’ve seen the This Hour Has 22 Minutes Trump parodies, and they are not as funny as those that come live from New York every weekend. If it does come and go like the other foreign SNL versions, you can rest assured Michaels will not suffer. There have been rumbles about him retiring (I can’t see it happening), but the safe money is riding on many more years or even decades of Michaels slapping his imprimatur on TV shows, comedy specials and movies. A few of them may even be worth watching. Dan Brown has covered pop culture for more than 32 years as a journalist and also moderates L.A. Mood’s monthly graphic-novel group.
The Time is Right for an SNL Network
NOTE: Dan Brown’s column will now be appearing twice a week on the website of L.A. Mood Comics & Games; on Tuesdays, he’ll write about graphic novels, and on Thursdays he will cover other pop-culture topics. The Time is Right for an SNL NetworkBy Dan Brown How much SNL is too much SNL? I know I can’t be the only one who was wondering that a few weeks ago. You may have noticed in February how, over the span of a few days, the U.S. network NBC pulled out all the stops to mark Saturday Night Live’s 50th season on the air. And I mean all the stops. The celebrations included:*A re-broadcast of the comedy show’s first episode from 1975.*A four-hour live anniversary special.*A three-hour concert special featuring former musical guests from SNL history*A three-hour documentary directed by Questlove on SNL’s musical impact*A four-part docu-series called Beyond Saturday Night focused on the show’s cast of comedy performers. The only thing missing was a documentary about all the comedy catchphrases the show has generated, from “You look mahvelous!” to “Isn’t that special?” to “Party on!” I kid. You would have to be an SNL fan of the highest order to make the time to watch all of that programming. I’m not, although I did make it through the re-airing of the inaugural episode, as well as the overlong anniversary broadcast. That’s enough SNL for me. Created by Canada’s own Lorne Michaels, who still serves as executive producer, SNL is as close as it comes to an institution on television – even if the truth is there have been more sketches that were misfires than hits over the last five decades. If SNL was a pro baseball player, it would have a handful of home runs yet a surprisingly low batting average. Legend has it Michaels was turned down by the CBC before he took his idea for a late-night variety show to New York all those years ago. NBC may have gone over the top last month because of the threat now posed by streaming services like Netflix to its bottom line. The hours and hours of content NBC commissioned will also be used to draw eyeballs to Peacock, its own streamer. But instead of feeding the streaming beast, why not just create an old-fashioned specialty network out of all that old content? Yes, I know SNL has a YouTube channel, but it’s mostly there to generate viral videos from current episodes. And I realize I’m not a very subtle thinker, but hear me out. Think of it: The SNL Channel. There are 50 years of programming to draw monologues, comedy sketches and musical interludes from. That’s more than 900 episodes, with each running 90 minutes. There’s 24 hours a day of programming right there. Nor does it take much brain power to imagine how they could supplement all those episodes with other comedic content. For starters, an SNL Channel could also run movies starring characters that were invented on Saturday Night Live. That’s everything from the Blues Brothers to the Wayne’s World movies to Coneheads. You could bolster those with other movies starring SNL cast members playing non-SNL characters – for example, Dan Aykroyd alum did a memorable turn in Driving Miss Daisy that was nominated for an Academy Award.. Or extend the concept to all the other projects Lorne Michaels has also served as executive producer on, which opens up episodes of shows like Kids in the Hall and Late Night With Conan O’Brien. The new network could likewise feature movies starring famous hosts, like 16-timer Steve Martin and 10-time host Tom Hanks. Heck, you could also include last year’s Saturday Night, the Jason Reitman comedy/drama about how the first episode was put together. And that’s not even taking into account new programming that could feature former SNL cast members. There’s enough comedic infrastructure that’s been built up around SNL over the last 50 years to support new productions, and I’m sure there are folks like Kate MacKinnon, Kyle Mooney and Vanessa Bayer who would have ideas for interesting shows. Admit it: This isn’t the worst pitch for a new channel you’ve ever heard! Dan Brown has covered pop culture for more than 32 years as a journalist and also moderates L.A. Mood’s monthly graphic-novel group.
