Live From New York: An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live (38 page)

Molly Shannon as the beleaguered Catholic schoolgirl Mary Katherine Gallagher, with Ana Gasteyer, Cheri Oteri, and host Gwyneth Paltrow. Though
Saturday Night Live
was often criticized as a “boys club,” women writers were prominent from the beginning, and the casts of the nineties included some of the most talented women in the show’s history.© Mary Ellen Matthews for
EDIE BASKIN

Monica Lewinsky as herself and Darrell Hammond as Bill Clinton. In recent years, celebrities spoofed on the show were more and more likely to make appearances — from Robert DeNiro to Janet Reno. Veteran writer James Downey thought it was a bad idea and that inviting infamous presidential fellationist Lewinsky onto the show was a “tacky” thing to do.© Mary Ellen Matthews for
EDIE BASKIN

Saturday Night Live
reborn — again. In the second half of the nineties, the show went through yet another resurgence, thanks largely to a talented and relatively drug-free cast that included (from left) Will Ferrell, Chris Kattan, and Cheri Oteri. Frequent host John Goodman joins them. Ferrell, the most versatile “utility player” since Phil Hartman, left at the end of the 2001–02 season. © Mary Ellen Matthews for
EDIE BASKIN

Friends of the producer. Michaels (right) greets host Alec Baldwin and musical guest Paul McCartney in 1993. Baldwin, one of the most popular recurring hosts, once asked Michaels if Rosemary Clooney could be his musical guest. Request denied.©
EDIE BASKIN

Opening the twenty-fifth-anniversary special. Bill Murray reunites with Paul Shaffer for their first Nick the Lounge Singer sketch in years, doing the Bruce Springsteen song “Badlands.” Murray later called it one of the highlights of his career. The sketch “killed” and got the show off to a rousing start.© Mary Ellen Matthews for
EDIE BASKIN

Onstage at the twenty-fifth-anniversary prime-time special. Writers Robert Smigel, James Downey, and Tim Herlihy — arguably three of the show’s best — with star Adam Sandler. The special earned spectacular ratings and reunited all the living cast members from a quarter-century of comedy — with the exception of Eddie Murphy, who refused to appear.© Mary Ellen Matthews for
EDIE BASKIN

Jeopardy
,
SNL
-style: Will Ferrell as Alex Trebek hosts one of the most popular and hilarious recurring sketches of recent years, with Michael J. Fox as Tom Cruise, Jimmy Fallon as former cast member Adam Sandler, and Darrell Hammond doing his wickedly ridiculous impression of Sean Connery.©
EDIE BASKIN

Last-minute rehearsal. Jimmy Fallon and Tina Fey, in background, go over jokes for a “Weekend Update” segment — always the last thing to be written. Fallon and Fey have brought “Update” back to its former prominence as the show’s satirical centerpiece.© Mary Ellen Matthews for
EDIE BASKIN

Cleaning up on Emmy night (from left): supervising producer Ken Aymong, coproducer Mike Shoemaker, Michaels, and coproducer Marci Klein. Michaels relies on these three colleagues, along with producer Steve Higgins, to handle the crises and complications of each week’s show.©
AP/WIDE WORLD PHOTOS

Michaels in his ninth-floor office, which opens onto the balcony of Studio 8H. Behind him: the all-important lineup board on which each show’s list of sketches is arranged on index cards. At right, Michaels’s ever-present basket of fresh popcorn, religiously kept filled by his staff.©
EDIE BASKIN

BARRY BLAUSTEIN:

I knew Dick treated us better than other people. Everybody’s allowed to write for anybody. And Eddie and Joe were hitting. And all the time we developed a relationship with Eddie. So I’m aware it was different. In the meetings to decide stuff, it was never, “You’ve got to put our stuff on.” A lot of times we said, “No, let’s not put that on.” From our standpoint, we’d gotten a lot of pieces on the show. It was never, “Jeez, when is a piece of ours ever getting on there?” And we also tended to write more stuff.

ANDREW SMITH:

I remember there was this wonderful Puerto Rican maid that Gilda had based the character of Emily Litella on. She was a lovely, lovely gal, and very small. She actually became a great friend, and we used to play tricks on her and chase her down the hall. But she was afraid to come into my office and clean because my office used to be Garrett Morris’s, and that’s where he used to freebase. She was afraid to come in, since that was where fire was. So for a long time my office never got cleaned, until I assured her it was totally safe to come in.

JIM BELUSHI:

Let me put it this way. Those two years of
Saturday Night Live
— ’83–’84 and ’84–’85 — were the toughest years I’ve ever spent in show business. Everything has been easy since. If you were a young physician and they threw you into Cook County Hospital or Bellevue for two years, that’s what I equate it to. I’m really glad I did it. I’m very proud to be part of the legacy of
Saturday Night Live.
The only thing I regret is I didn’t have two more years to really kind of hit that full fruition of it.

Even my brother John left after four years. I said, “John, what are you doing leaving? It’s like the hottest thing going.” He goes, “Well, you know, Jimmy, it’s like high school — freshman, sophomore, junior, senior year, and then you’ve got to move on.”