Pete Martell

Jerry Minor interview about his career (including SNL): https://www.vulture.com/article/jerry-minor-snl-interview.html Brendan Fraser and Adam Sandler interview each other. New animated show featuring Bobby Moynihan and Taran Killam, among others: Ana Gasteyer, Fred Armisen, Melissa Villasenor and Rachel Dratch were on Jimmy Fallon's show, That's My Jam. Fred was also on Seth's show recently. Amy Poehler and Maya Rudolph in the new season of Baking It: They also appeared on Seth's show recently, as well as the Rockefeller Center Tree Lighting. Ana appeared and Amy presented at the People's Choice Awards, hosted by Kenan. Al Franken, Sarah Silverman and Leslie Jones, among others, will be guest-hosting The Daily Show. https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/the-daily-show-chelsea-handler-kal-penn-guest-hosts-1235276195/

James Anderson, who used to write for SNL for about 20 years, came back as a guest writer. I assume he was involved in this as he used to write or co-write many of the soap parody sketches and camp sketches that are homages to TV (like the time Cecily and RuPaul played Julia Sugarbaker). I can definitely see them not being able to resist the idea of Keke as Dominique. Punkie co-wrote this, apparently. I wonder if they ever thought of her being paired up with a woman. Maybe they thought it would confuse the song too much, I don't know.

Beyond Julia and Eddie, Sam Jay is also in this film.

James Austin Johnson does an audio cameo as Trump in She Said. Ana Gasteyer briefly appeared on the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Jane Curtin will appear on The Conners. https://tvline.com/2022/12/01/the-conners-jane-curtin-cast-dan-mother-in-law-season-5-photo/

Horatio Sanz and the woman suing him for sexual assault allegations have settled out of court. https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/29/entertainment/horatio-sanz-lawsuit-dismissed/index.html

I remember Steve and Martin were thinking of appearing in Selena Gomez's episode - they did of course, but with very curtailed appearances due to COVID being bad in the building that week. I wonder if this is to make up for that. I know some people were disappointed Austin didn't host the premiere. This might be another week with a Tom Hanks cameo. Good picks, overall.

Recent interview with Paul Shaffer, featuring Tom "Bones" Malone.

Very sorry to hear about Nicki. She was a wonderful actress, beautiful and extremely charismatic. The first 4 seasons of the show were my favorite of SPN, by a long shot, but that first season within them was very special in its own right. Nicki was a big reason why. Meg the demon was pure evil, yet when we saw the "real" Meg, our hearts broke for her because Nicki was so good at playing her pain and horror. If this genre had more respect within the industry I think she would have gotten more recognition. I'm glad she is now at peace.

I agree, it's just one of those weeks where I think speculation is inevitable because people were going around claiming so and so was boycotting.

I take that as partly a sign of how gassed out they are. They aren't as openly tired (Colin seemed completely done to me last season), but it's still there. One of the positives of all the new people at the desk is they can balance the vibe more than, say, Baby Yoda appearing yet again (sorry, Kyle). I think Andrew was too. This definitely seems like a week where there would have been a divide in the cast given that Chappelle is still loved by many...yet also disliked by many. I give Ego a lot of credit for having to be a backbone in a number of his sketches in some thankless roles, as I have no real idea what her opinion of the matter was. Cecily is incredibly good as Kari. Maybe her best political work ever on the show. Oftentimes when she plays politicians she will go broader, but her Kari is restrained and terrifying in her delusions. This is how you take an impression and make it your own. (there was a Herschel Walker sketch cut last night - love you, Kenan, but I'm not sorry that was cut...I think Dave's monologue summed that part up well enough anyway)

The gossip going around about writers boycotting (which Chappelle himself denied) cast a pall over the episode, because I saw people saying oh they quit and he sure showed them. That's one of the many downsides of chasing controversy with a host pick. I didn't want the show to have a bad episode, because I have a lot of fondness for the show, but I did go in expecting a dead vibe, due to how lethargic and forced the promos felt. I was surprised at just how strong the episode was, especially as there were no outside writers on most of the pieces. I guess Dave may have helped (as @SHD mentioned he had fairly light roles all night, but I felt his presence much more than I did the last time he hosted), but still, this episode had some strong concepts, well-executed, less padding, less incoherence, more energy. Black Heaven and Barber Shop were two of my favorite sketches of recent seasons, and Update also had a great deal of verge due to Marcello and Sarah (Sarah getting a spontaneous applause break at one point was oddly sweet). Other than the monologue and maybe the House of Dragons sketch, there wasn't anything I didn't enjoy. The downside is this goes along with a monologue that was queasily compelling to watch but also left me uncomfortable, and so many questions hanging in the air about cast use. Was his presence the reason we barely saw Cecily, Chloe or Bowen most of the night? Or why some writers didn't get pieces on? I was very happy the newer cast members got so much focus, but if they only did because of longtime names stepping back out of disgust, then it casts something of a pall. I was also curious about the Please Don't Destroy short, as there were rumors they weren't going to be around either. They were, yet we saw none of them with Dave, and instead Molly got a showcase, using their pronouns, dressed in male attire, I thought this piece was fine, but I wondered if it was a message to viewers to try to contrast the rest of the night. I'm glad the show is starting to trust its younger cast more, and trying to let on some different material. This was one of the better episodes of the last 3-4 years. I just wish we didn't have all the baggage and all the people hurt along the way.

Keke is one of those celebs I thought would have hosted a few years ago. Glad she finally is. I think she will click with this cast.

Drake and 21 Savage released a video where they perform on a mock SNL stage. They are even introduced by a host (I'll let you just watch to see who the host is - no one SNL-related).

Tonight's "Vintage" is the Kieran Culkin episode.

Will Forte appears in Weird Al's new biopic. Maya Rudolph interview with the Wall Street Journal. Sasheer Zamata is joining the MCU.

Writers for the week.

If anything on SNL ever came close to putting me off in regard to COVID, it was when they had what felt like dozens of pieces about well-off people drinking their way through the pandemic and talking about how they sat at home for months and months doing nothing. I thought it made the show look really out of touch, which, of course, it is, it's showbiz, I get that, but I didn't need to be reminded of it so many times. When this popped up I thought to myself, "I don't want to see more COVID pieces," but I liked that they tried a different take, and I liked that some of the cast who go more in the "weird" realm of the show, like Sarah and seemingly Michael (who really is starting to clean up those bigger roles), were leads in this so that we would be reminded we weren't meant to identify too much with their characters. I'm not a big Amy Schumer fan, but I have to give her kudos for managing to perform through a very busy night in spite of worrying about her son. There were a number of sketches I enjoyed, more because of the performances than the writing in several cases (like penis therapy and that Looker pre-tape), but I did think the tailgate sketch was good, a nice throwback to stuff they did 25-30 years ago...and the pre-tape about the feminine hygiene product ended with some of my biggest laughs this season. I have a great deal of respect for Cecily, but even when I share the views of the cast members who go on Update to try to deliver talks about topical issues, it always feels awkward to me, and vaguely patronizing, even when that presumably is not the intention. If the idea is we are meant to see what they are saying is special because they are appearing as themselves, that doesn't work for me, because the version we see of someone on TV is never truly them. I don't understand why they can't just write and perform in a sketch about the topic. The show used to have very rich slice-of-life pieces many years ago. Let's go back to those.

I do think there have been struggles with finding hosts this season, but I don't think Chappelle is one of them. He remains a very popular, influential comedian. with many fans who do not go near SNL most of the time. This seems like a calculated risk to try to get some of those fans while hoping their loyal fans just bear with it. Many hosting choices this season feel like calculated attempts at different demographics due to anxiety about the various cast departures and inevitable ratings decline. I don't think this is a big departure for SNL, given some of its past hosts, and I'm sure many would say this is a great pick (even if many will likely still not watch SNL to see Chappelle). It doesn't affect me very much either way, if I watch or don't watch. I mostly feel bad for the nonbinary people at the show who will have to work with someone who may go up on stage and deride them as part of the "alphabet people." (I think Celeste Yim has already said something without directly saying it in one of their Instagram stories). For their sake, I hope he does what he did last time, and barely show up outside of the monologue. And if they leave the show after this, I can't say I'd blame them. Yim's story:

https://www.king5.com/article/entertainment/television/programs/evening/snl-cast-member-mikey-day-season-48-puget-sound/281-f9803b5b-688d-42d1-9ed2-081b3d78ea7f https://www.wwlp.com/news/entertainment/mikey-day-of-saturday-night-live-reveals-origin-story-behind-halloween-character-david-s-pumpkins/