As hard as this may be to believe, there have been more things to laugh at on “Saturday Night Live” this season than there have been for quite a few years. And it took a recent appearance by a former cast member to reveal the reasons.
When Phil Hartman returned to host the March 23 edition of NBC’s late-night institution (10:30 p.m., WMAQ-Ch. 5), he brought along some of his old characters, including Frank Sinatra, Charlton Heston, Frankenstein and Unfrozen Cave Man Lawyer (“I’m just a caveman. Your world frightens and confuses me.”).
These are the kind of strong characters that “SNL” had been missing the last few seasons. When executive producer Lorne Michaels set out to form a new cast before the current season got under way, one of his missions was to get people who could create characters the public could “get into” as they did in the good old days.
One of the strengths of “Saturday Night Live” for more than 20 years has been its cadre of characters, everyone from the Blues Brothers to Ba Ba Wawa to Gumby to the Church Lady to Wayne and Garth to the Sweeney Sisters.
But the characters developed over the last few years have been lacking. Adam Sandler’s Opera Man, Cajun Man and Canteen Boy were soft at best. And Chris Farley’s motivational speaker Matt Foley, who lived “in a van down by the river!” was fun, but couldn’t touch John Belushi’s Samurai.
By no means are the new characters superior to those of the first few years of the show, but some of them are funny enough to look forward to watching.
– Lucien Callow and Fagen: They’re also called the Fops, and played with freak-show charm by Mark McKinney and Dave Koechner (Koechner came to the show this year from Second City, along with the underused Nancy Walls). The two are weirdos with powdered wigs and white makeup, red lipstick and Restoration-era garb. They boast about watching TV shows naked, and constantly fawn over favored celebrities. Delicious.
– Mary Katherine Gallagher: Played by Molly Shannon as a clumsy, hyperactive teenager who is forever falling into chairs, people, tables and whatever gets in her way. Wearing thick glasses and a too-short plaid dress, Mary Katherine loves sticking her hands under her armpits,then smelling her fingers. It’s a wonder Shannon hasn’t broken her neck.
– “The Joe Pesci Show”: Jim Breuer plays the star as if he is in fact the homicidal hood from “GoodFellas.” (“I’ve got my mike here, I’ve got my chair here, I’ve got my desk here, I’ve got my gun here!”) Pesci has berated such guests as “Casino” co-star Sharon Stone and “My Cousin Vinny” co-star Marisa Tomei, and has taken a baseball bat to “Home Alone” co-star Macaulay Culkin.
Also providing muscle are:
– Norm MacDonald’s edgy “Weekend Update” reports (and his Bob Dole impression, which is an older, crankier Norm MacDonald but nonetheless insane).
– David Spade’s “Spade in America,” which is the standup doing rants from behind a desk (There was some speculation that Spade was leaving the show before the end of the season–he had been on leave and was back during the Hartman-hosted episode a few weeks ago).
– Darrell Hammond’s dead-on impersonations of Ted Koppel, Bill Clinton and Jesse Jackson–without black face.
But not all the new characters this season are delicious:
– The Spartan cheerleaders: How this bizarre sketch caught the fancy of the public remains one of the mysteries of this television season. Cheri Oteri and Will Ferrell do a terrible job playing cheeky teenagers who impersonate members of the cheerleading squad.
– “Leg Up!” Oteri again, this time with Shannon as Hollywood dance legends Debbie Reynolds and Ann Miller hosting a show “for dancers, about dancers, with two dancers who love to dance.” Shannon is all right, but Oteri isn’t, as the two “dancers” try to beat each other for the honor of being the major hambone.
– Rita: An angry, old woman from South Philadelphia who spits out epitaphs at almost anyone who comes in front of her porch. Again, it’s Oteri in this role, who surprisingly felt little heat when she let a profanity slip by accident during one of the live shows.
In fact, let’s just say that Oteri and Ferrell are the worst cast members of “Saturday Night Live” in years (yes, even worse than the one-note Melanie Hutshell, who drove her Jan Brady impersonation into the ground).
Program note: “SNL’s” McKinney should be happy with this. Former presidential hopeful Steve Forbes, one of McKinney’s characters, is hosting Saturday’s show. Can anyone see an evil Forbes twins sketch happening?
