SNL in the '90s plus The Best of '06-'07

Brian Villalobos,  May 08, 2007

Hoo-boy.

If you’re a Saturday Night Live fan in the merest measure and you didn’t watch this weekend … man. Gotta say it, pal: You missed out.

Or, then again, maybe you didn’t.

The thing about being an "SNL fan" is that that label isn’t very specific. The show’s been running for three decades and change; canvas "fan" self-identifiers and you’ll find folks that’ll swear by one cast and denounce all others. (’Cept the ’80s.)

There are those of us SNL faithful who have pledged support with the unflagging devotion of, say, those guys who paint their breakfast nooks blue and silver and name their kids after quarterbacks and pass formations and buy their wives Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader uniforms for their anniversaries. (Except, you know, lazier. I have yet to attempt to entice my wife to dress like Roseanne Rosanadana.)

There are others who haven’t watched in years, aren’t even sure it still comes on. Others watch occasionally, and then only until "Weekend Update" is over. There are those who refuse to watch "Update," insist that it hasn’t really been "Update" since Tina Fey/Fallon/Colin Quinn/Norm MacDonald/Kevin Nealon/Dennis Miller/Jane Curtin/Chevy stepped down, back when SNL was SNL. So, you see, there’s no pleasing everyone. But darn it, if anything was gonna do it, it would’ve been this double whammy: Saturday’s normal slot showcased a "Best of 2006-2007" special, and Sunday offered a two-hour documentary, granting a look back at the show during one of its most wildly inventive periods, the ’90s.

The ’06-’07 show, I thought at first, was a little oddly timed, as we’re not quite half through ’07, but I’m guessing it (1) granted the cast a mid-season recharge and (2) was a not-so-subtle way of saying, "Hey, we’ve got some good folks with us now, too" — on which point I tend to agree with them. Top to bottom, the current cast really is about as solid as one can ask for. Highlights (of the highlight show) included the starbound Kristen Wiig’s exquisitely uncomfortable carpool with Alec Baldwin; Wiig as Nancy Pelosi; a room of deceptively perceptive airport-security trainees led by Dane Cook and Jason Sudeikis; and a consistently funny medley of Amy Poehler/Seth Meyers "Update" clips. Disappointment: surprisingly little of the brilliant Fred Armisen.

The real peach, though, was the retrospective: Compiling interviews from such notables as Mike Myers, Dana Carvey, Will Ferrell, Lorne Michaels, Ana Gasteyer, Jimmy Fallon, Tina Fey, Chris Rock, and David Spade, SNL in the ’90s: Pop Culture Nation grants pleasingly candid insight into a productive but tumultuous time at Studio 8-H that saw the rise (and, in some cases, fall) of some of comedy’s brightest talents. Commentary is interwoven with clips of brilliant and familiar sketches, as well as apropos musical performances: Beck plays "Sexx Laws" during a look at the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal; Pearl Jam’s angry "Not For You" underscores discussion of Norm MacDonald’s infamous parting-of-ways with the show. Perhaps most telling, though, is the ending tune, Oasis’s "Don’t Go Away" — at once a call to lapsed or wavering SNL faithful to stick around and an assertion that the show, once sublime, will get there again.

At any rate, SNL in the ’90s is tremendously fascinating and entertaining — well worth your time no matter what your interest level. It re-airs Wednesday, May 23 (8/7c, NBC), just in time to get you geared up for the next new episode -- hosted, appropriately, by Molly Shannon.

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Brian Villalobos lives in Austin, Texas (practically), writes on film and TV, and totally cried at Stuart Little.
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