Brian and I rented Season 1 of Saturday Night Live over the weekend. (Ok, so maybe I surreptitiously added it to our Netflix Queue, and by ‘our’ Netflix Queue, I mean ‘the Netflix Queue that Brian lacks a password for and which only I update’. Just to clarify.) I have always enjoyed watching vintage SNL. I’ve always loved Gilda Radner, Lily Tomlin, Jane Curtain…come to think of it, maybe part of what I love is watching brilliant, hilarious women. So many wonderful female comedians got their start on that show. Sure, I also loved Chevy Chase and Steve Martin…but I couldn’t grow up to be like them. The women of early Saturday Night Live were inspiring because they were rough and tumble and edgy just like the men. They weren’t playing it for sex appeal, and even when the joke was on them, it was funny because of the characters they played, not simply because they were women. I recall disliking the show during the dark days of the early 1990s, when the cast had barely any women and most of the female characters were played by men in drag. There was something lost by not letting actual women in on the joke.
In any event, while my sister and I used to rent old episodes of SNL when we were growing up, after a long hiatus, it was rather jarring to see them again. It’s a little strange seeing legendary comedian John Belushi performing in low-rent, un-hilarious skits, back when he needed a paycheck and was willing to wear a Bee costume. Saturday Night Live has certainly been through rough patches; even classic episodes have their share of drek. But it was fascinating to catch a glimpse of the show’s primordial, formulative episodes. There was a dark, disturbing and poorly written skit featuring Jim Henson’s Muppets, since it was in the days before The Muppet Show earned them a place in the Pantheon of children’s television. There were fake commercials and a raggedy-edged Nightly News sendup. If nothing else, at least the bad skits were short. There were also several monologues by guest host George Carlin, one of which was about how stupid religion is. “Religion,” he says, “is like a lift in your shoe. If you need it for awhile, and it makes you walk straight and feel better – fine. But you don’t need it forever, or you’ll become permanently disabled.”
This blew me away. I know George Carlin has always said whatever the hell he wanted; that’s part of his greatness. But still—can you imagine a comedian on a major Network taking on religion with such frankness? Perhaps I just don’t watch enough Saturday Night Live, or enough comedians on major networks. But it was pretty great.
My favorite part of the episode was the satirical advertisement for the “Triple-Trac”, a revolutionary 3-blade razor. A simple (and very familiar) animation simulated how the first blade lifted a hair, the second primed it for being cut and the third cut it. The very idea of a triple-bladed razor was clearly unbelievably ridiculous—to a 1975 audience. The tagline said, “The three-blade razor— designed for people who’ll believe anything”. I can’t say I didn’t wince at that. How far we’ve come.
-A Ham
-A Shoehorn (unrelated)
-A pair of reindeer antlers on a headband to force the dog to wear, even though he will give us a wounded look and scrape them off in ten seconds but it will still be worth it
I know it’s just because I didn’t get much sleep last night, but right now the idea of dressing up as a turn-of-the century strongman, in a red-and-white striped male unitard with a massive handlebar moustache, wearing big black boots and hefting a giant, extremely old-school and ergonomically nightmarish barbell in a jerky, haphazard fashion, is THE FUNNIEST IDEA EVER.
PS: Merry Festivus, Everyone!
I’m cleaning the house, because I’m hosting my family for Christmas. This is thrilling, and terrifying, like a roller-coaster ride in the dark. With your family.
This weekend I washed the dog, washed the car, washed the couch cover, washed about eight loads of laundry, decorated the tree, made spritz cookie dough, tidied the guest bedroom, swept the floors, and had a minor meltdown.
I knew I needed to slow down a bit this evening, when I went to get a bowl off the top of the highest cabinet in the kitchen. I needed to jump to reach the bowl, and halfway in the air I realized that the bowl likely had two smaller bowls nesting in it that I couldn’t see. I ignored this thought and swiped at the bowl to knock it down . And all three bowls sailed off the shelf and hit me in the head on the way down. I now have quite an egg on my forehead. It’s good to have unexplainable bruises on your face when your family comes to visit you and your boyfriend.
Wish me luck, it’s going to be a Christmas to remember!
Pride and Prejudice!
Netflix queue I love you so
Brian wants you dead
Foreign language films
How come you are so often
Blatant sausage-fests?
I don’t think Brian
Bought a 50″ TV
With these films in mind
Hi-definition
Is for fight-scenes and sunsets
Not male genitals
Did my wild and untamed spirit die the day I bought chocolate Calcium Supplement chews?
I stayed up half of last night reading the second book in the Twilight series. Ogod it is so good. I mean, it’s bad! It’s terrible! I can’t stop reading it and I feel like I’m fourteen years old! What is wrong with me??
Person who sent these books to me in the mail because she knows me all too well: this is all your fault. You know who you are. If I had a sexy vampire boyfriend, I would send him to terrorize you. And then my sexy vampire boyfriend and I would hang out all the time and barely ever touch each other because he’s a vampire but also he thinks I’m sooo special and amazing and Sweet Jesus, how did this happen?
It has been announced that the Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at President Bush faces either jail time, or a monetary fine.
Anyone else want to help chip in to pay that fine?
I Heard Tell 