I love the '80s
What's your favorite era of "Saturday Night Live?" TV Squad has conveniently divided the show's history into seven distinct periods. I quibble a little towards the end- I would classify the first two years of the current era as among the cream of the crop, but the last couple years have been in the toilet.Here's my ranking based on their list...
1) Carvey/Lovitz/Miller/Hartman/Myers (1986-91)
Is it just the fond remembrances of youth? Even the Victoria Jacksons and Kevin Nealons were knockouts. They had it all- every personality was distinct.
2) The present cast (2002- )
Overlooked because the women are dominant- Tina Fey, Rachel Dratch, Maya Rudolph in full flower.
3) Will Ferrell/Cheri Oteri (1995-2001)
Ferrell combined Carvey's energy with Hartman's versatility, but this cast had too many recurring characters (cheerleaders, etc.)
4) Billy Crystal/Martin Short/Christopher Guest (1984-85)
Doesn't even seem like SNL now, with all the video segments. Brilliant cast, good season, but too short-lived.
5) The original cast (1975-80)
Deserves points for setting the early pace, but I've always felt that the show's ascension was not as revolutionary as Baby Boomers would have us believe. And this stuff's simply not funny anymore. Maybe I should try acid.
6) Eddie Murphy/Joe Piscopo (1981-84)
Ugly.
7) Sandler/Spade/Farley (1991-95)
Cringe-inducing. Saturday Night Live- The Junior High Edition.
posted by CM @ 7:03 PM
1 Comments:
The Junior High Edition is right now!! I agree with your number 1 cast but would need to make some other corrections to your list.
First of all, the first cast needs way more credit for being groundbreaking than you're giving it. Sure Saturday Night Live borrowed from Monty Python, the Smothers Brothers, Carol Burnett, Your Show of Shows, and a number of other programs so calling it completely original is a stretch, but for pure subversive, the-inmates-are-running-the-asylum entertainment on American television, nothing approaches the early years of this show. This may owe more to timing than anything else, but so be it.
Maybe it's too much of a cliche to point out, but these early episodes and breakout stars still reverberate through the comedy world unlike anything else in 60 years of TV. It may be debatable now where the first cast rates among the slew of talent that has followed, but keep in mind that these years did introduce the peerless comedy of Bill Murray, Steve Martin AND Andy Kaufman to the world. This fact alone puts it over the top, no matter how overrated you may think Chevy, Belushi and Ackroyd were.
You're right to praise the women from recent years, particularly Tina Fey and before that Cheri Oteri and Molly Shannon, but any recent quality on the show certainly disappeared when Will Ferrell left. The show is absolutely unwatchable this year with all the Jimmy Fallon-inspired cracking up themselves and talentless parade of Abercrombie models. Adam Sandler, I agree, is far from the best comic to ever appear on SNL, but I'll gladly take Chris Farley, Rob Schneider and Kevin Nealon, especially considering their years overlapped with much of the Hartman/Myers/Carvey era.
Your assessment of the single '84 season is spot-on, but it's impossible to dismiss the Murphy/Piscopo years for no other reason than Eddie Murphy is still the single greatest performer in the history of the show.
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