Live From New York: An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live (86 page)

MARCI KLEIN,
Coproducer:

Sometimes, right before they say “Live,” like right before the show starts, when the music is playing, but before the host comes out, I get — it’s so pathetic — I start getting misty-eyed and all emotional, because I just can’t believe I’m doing this job. I can’t believe how much I like this show.

And Lorne gets the same way. That’s the moment when I see him get the most excited. I’ll look over at him, and his eyes will be popped open, and he’ll get on his toes to look out, and he’ll be mouthing the intros, and he’s just so excited.

MOLLY SHANNON,
Cast Member:

I did a Mary Katherine Gallagher sketch with Mike Myers and Steven Tyler from Aerosmith, and there was like a brick wall, really balsa wood painted to look like brick, and the stunt people cut the wood so you could break through it fairly easily. But they didn’t have enough time to stack the balsa-wood fake bricks and the sketch was starting and I went like, “Oh no, that’s the wall I’m supposed to break through, and it’s not ready, what am I going to do?” And it was like, “Nine, eight, seven, six… .” Oh God, oh shit, the whole sketch — and then Lorne just appeared behind the other side and looked at me like, “Don’t let this goof you up. Just do it. Go ahead.” And I was just like, “Wow,” it helped me a lot that he was there. Stuff like that sort of fuels your performance. And that little private moment between Lorne and me, that’s just something that he did do that helped me.

CAROL LEIFER,
Writer:

I always felt like if Lorne was stony toward you it was pretty impenetrable. I saw him not too long ago and went over to say hello. And it was like the quintessential Lorne moment — “Oh hello, Carol, how are you, what’s going on,” talking, bullshitting, then a band started playing, with blaring horns. It was real loud music. And Lorne just turned to me and said, “Conversation over.” And now that’s become a catchphrase among my friends and me — “Conversation over.” That’s quintessential Lorne.

DICK EBERSOL,
NBC Executive:

Maybe it’s because of his marriage to Alice or having a family, but the Lorne of today has done I think a very, very good job of learning at this stage of his life to delegate. He has, for the first time in the history of the show, the semblance of a real life. And that was never true for Lorne — or me — over the first two decades of the show. I can see it now, though. He doesn’t have to live at the show all the time anymore.

ANDY BRECKMAN:

Lorne has to be on his game just twice a week: after read-through and between dress and air. And that’s it. That’s when the show is formed. And every other moment of the week he can be Lorne — he can be, you know, the celebrity Lorne Michaels.

CHRIS PARNELL,
Cast Member:

I don’t see Lorne running things except like in a removed way. The only time I really see him in action telling people what to do is when we have the meeting in his office between dress and air and he’s giving notes. Other than that, there’s not much interaction with him. We see him on Monday for the pitch meeting, Wednesday for the table read and then usually not again until Saturday. He’s around, but there’s not that need to interact with him.

I’ve always really liked Lorne and respected him. I wasn’t liking him too much when he was firing me. But he has a sort of fatherly nature about him, and I certainly respect what he’s done. Lorne has lived in a different world than most of us on the show, so that creates a certain difference or separation.

DARRELL HAMMOND,
Cast Member:

I don’t understand anything about what happens between dress and show. It’s weird. I don’t know how Lorne does it. In the beginning I thought I did get it. But as time went on, I kept seeing Lorne make these decisions. He would make all sorts of changes and I wouldn’t understand why he did what he did. I mean, anyone can second-guess anyone else. But then we would go out there for the live show and the changes would work. He can’t always be right, no one can, but I realized at that time that he invented this and it’s not a sketch show and it’s not a comedy show and it’s not a variety show or a musical show. It’s
Saturday Night Live
. It’s his and he knows how to do it and I don’t.

AL FRANKEN,
Writer:

Lorne called the shots. But Lorne is also taking into account a lot of things. He used to try to make sure that everyone was in the show. That was easier to do when the cast was smaller. Sometimes he would put something in just because someone needed something in, psychologically. Sometimes two pieces may bump in a certain kind of way, that other people don’t see, the same style of a piece, and they shouldn’t run back-to-back. There are just so many factors — you can’t get from this set to the other set, there is no configuration in the show where this thing can go in, this sketch can go in but then we have to lose that sketch.

Almost every week, that was the case. Somebody felt bad, and some people take it like, “I am insulted,” or “I am just going to take it.” Those were people who usually got a lot of stuff, and other people were angry and hurt and depressed, actually. A person could actually get so disheartened and depressed that it affected their ability to create. Certain people actually spiraled out of control or spiraled down to a point where they were having a difficult time emotionally during the year, and it very much hurt their productivity. And it just was a vicious cycle.

GARRY SHANDLING,
Host:

Lorne’s presence was mostly felt on tape day, what I call tape day, which is the day it’s done live. On Saturday he would come and he would do the dress rehearsal, the first show in front of an audience, and that’s when I went up into his office and just watched him very intuitively reorder the sketches on a big board and cut very intuitively without any doubts. He was really one with that show and the process of selection of what finally aired. He was like a surgeon — very quick, very smart. I certainly don’t remember anyone arguing with him.

ANNE BEATTS:

I always felt a little concerned that Lorne never so much as made a pass at me. I thought he was really cute. I remember thinking that he was really cute and interesting.

ROSIE SHUSTER,
Writer:

The first summer we were separated — I was fourteen, and that was the last separation we had for many, many, many years — he announced that when I came back from Los Angeles he wanted to “pet.” So I spent the entire summer straining, pulling, doing my best to grow a set of tits.

ELLEN DEGENERES,
Host:

To be honest, I thought that Lorne would be a tyrant. He seems to have a reputation of being this really mean kind of scary presence. And he was so nice. Just the reception you get — the first day, when you’re brought into his office and he welcomes you and the cast comes in and sits in his office. It’s such a warm way to welcome the host and makes you feel good about being there. I don’t know what it’s like to work with him on a daily basis, but the experience I had with him was great, and he seemed respectful of me. I could feel that he liked me; he made that clear. I really liked him. I really thought I’d be scared of him, and he was so nice and warm. He was great.

And I think he’s good-looking. He’s a looker. He’s a handsome man and he’s a good dresser. I like the way he dresses. You know — he’s a cutie. I think he knows that. He can’t not know that he’s cute. There’s that picture in his office of him younger, and he was really cute then, but I love the way he looks now.

ELLIOTT GOULD,
Host:

Gilda once said to me at a party after I had hosted, “Look what you’ve done for Lorne.” Perhaps she meant my accomplishments prior to Lorne’s success — my coming on the show and working with some degree of consistency on the show and exercising my humility and my sensibility and giving the show everything that I had. Lorne has always been decent to me. And therefore I’m centered with Lorne.

TRACY MORGAN,
Cast Member:

It’s like Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi. Whenever Luke was in trouble, Obi-Wan would come out of nowhere. That’s who Lorne Michaels is, he’s Obi-Wan. That’s what I call him. Everybody has their little nicknames for him. Chris Farley used to call him the Chief. Some people just call him boss. And some people call him Daddy. I call him Obi-Wan.

BOB ODENKIRK:

I mean, the whole thing was weird to me. The whole thing. To me, what was fun about comedy and should have been exciting about
Saturday Night Live
was the whole generational thing, you know, a crazy bunch of people sittin’ around making each other laugh with casual chaos and a kind of democracy of chaos. And to go into a place where this one distant and cold guy is in charge and trying to run it the way he ran it decades ago is just weird to me.

WILL FERRELL,
Cast Member:

Lorne can never tell you that flat-out you’re hired, with a hip hip hooray. The way he told me was, “So, we’ll bring you out to New York,” and I thought, “Oh, another audition.” Then he said, “Have you ever lived in New York?” And that’s when it hit me: Oh, I got the job. Then I felt self-conscious because I was so relaxed and I wasn’t jumping up and down, and so I was like, “Oh, okay.” And then I said to Lorne, “Well, I’m going to shake your hand.” And he was like, “Do whatever you need to do.” And then I walked out.

MARGARET OBERMAN,
Writer:

I think Lorne Michaels is a very lucky man, that’s what I think. He was at the right place at the right time and he recognized some very talented people, and it was the right moment and all those things that maybe come once in a lifetime. I’m not going to say he’s not that talented. But he’s a producer, and the true talent is what is on the stage.

DANNY DEVITO,
Host:

What makes Lorne so good as a producer? I think it may be the popcorn. There’s a lot of popcorn in his office. He always has big, big bowls of fresh popcorn, and I think that helps. It’s really what sets him apart from other producers. And another thing is, he doesn’t really care if it drops on the floor. It’s like total focus on the board. You could just eat like a slob in that office and he really doesn’t give a shit. With him it’s really all about the show.

ROBERT WRIGHT,
NBC Chairman and CEO:

He’s never been a sitcom producer, so he doesn’t have that. He’s never been a variety-show producer either; he’s not a George Schlatter. He’s not one of the early sitcom producers, like Sheldon Leonard, where he did nineteen in a row. So he doesn’t have that kind of a history. He’s really unique. The length of the show and the fact that he stays with it; he’s the Sumner Redstone of live comedy programming, with one show. He has to work very hard to do that. I know he does. And he’s fortunate that he has young children, because he’s forced to pay attention to lots of different worlds.

My sense is he would rather not do as much of the politics, but he knows it works, and he knows that the people do a great, great job with it. I think he’s political, but I don’t think he feels he’s a political satirist as much as he is funny. I think his great strength is, he’s looking for funny. And if politics is a way to do that, fine. If it’s some piece of legislation or some event, a war or whatever, he’s there. He’s a marvelous asset.

STEVE MARTIN:

He puts people together well. He will suggest something that performers are either too shy or too afraid to suggest. He will encourage partnerships, he’ll make the phone call to the person that everybody else’d be afraid to call. And he also has this kind of soft wit and patience. Patience with things and people. He loves the youth that flies around those offices. He gets a lot from it. It keeps him hip, I guess. It keeps him puzzled and it keeps him challenged, because the new thing is sometimes very hard for older people to tolerate and accept, even though we were all once a part of it. He’ll let something go that he might not fully understand.

SARAH JESSICA PARKER,
Host:

Lorne is not necessarily a demonstrative person, but you know you’re in good hands. You know it’s not a lack of interest on his part; he’s overseeing something and doesn’t need to be there hands-on all the time. I think he trusts the host that he hires. Look, he’s hired you, he must feel fairly confident in your ability to fulfill your obligations, and he feels he doesn’t need to baby-sit.

RUDOLPH GIULIANI,
Host:

Lorne’s a good friend. He’s somebody I really respect and admire because of the consistency and the way in which he’s carried this out through now maybe two different generations of people and four or five generations of artists. So at this point you have to say, despite the fact that he’s had some tremendously talented people, this whole thing is really him.

Honestly, you’d have to be very fortunate to find somebody like him. The show could only survive without him if they could find somebody like him — if he could find somebody like him and train him, the way a great coach can find somebody to replace him. But usually you can’t do that.

GWYNETH PALTROW: