laughter is the best medicine

17 Feb 2015

Did you see all the stars out Sunday night?

As some of you may know by now, I love to laugh. It’s the best medicine. I try to be funny when I can. This past Sunday night Saturday Night Live put on a 40th anniversary telecast. It was a blast!

Minute after minute, skit after skit, it was a star-studded smash. It was an A list of stars that just kept popping up, many times not recognizable until they spoke. They brought back a flood of great memories from SNL. And the parade of stars just went on and on and you didn’t want the show to end.

An A List fish bowl of talent and laughs

To me Saturday Night Live has always been funny and creative. Maybe not every skit but the wealth of creativity has shined through over the years. SNL has been funny, super comedic creativity, edgy, talented, and many times a kind of raw humor you can only find (or get away with) on Saturday Night Live.

Bradley Cooper and Betty White reminisce at the end of a skit. It went viral I understand.

For 40 years now SNL has come on late at night at the end of the week. Almost everyone can identify with someone or some skit over the past 4 generations. Four generations of stars, skits and funny iconic catch phrases (see Wayne’s World below). Most everyone has their favorite hosts or cast members or skits. And the entertainment world was out in full gala to honor this iconic show Sunday night.Spielberg, Swift, and Palin.Where else could this photo possibly have happened?

Maybe even their logos bring back flashbacks of memories or nostalgia…

1975-1976

1980-1981

1990-1991

1998-2000 ..into the new millennium..

2009-2012

The anniversary special went on until the wee hours of the night, at least on my side of the country. But I was able to find 5 of my favorite skits from the evening. I know most bloggers don’t like to take a look at videos on a post but these are worth it. If you don’t have time now to view all five, bookmark it and come back when you have time if you missed the special. Then vote on which skit was your favorite.

Here is an Opening Monologue with Steve Martin that illustrates some of the stars and how they just kept on popping up. It was a hit parade of stars that Steve Martin puts down, one by one…

Tom Hanks, Melissa McCarthy, Peyton Manning, Billy Crystal, Princess Twerk, Chris Rock, Alex Baldwin

Another star Studded skit was SNL’s now famous celerity Jeopardy. Will Ferrell does his famous role as host Alex Trebek and welcomed a hilarious Sean Connery, Burt Reynolds, Justin Beiber, Tony Bennett,and Jim Carey doing a pretty good impersonation of Matthew McConaughey.

Connery struggled mightily with his reading, eye sight and sobriety misreading game categories of “Who Reads” (Whore Ads) and “Let It Snow” (Le Tits Now). Bill Cosby also made and embarrassing cameo appearance pitching his favorite cocktail that Tebek begs was shot “six months ago” during a Daily Double. Categories include “Letters that start with the Letter G” and “State Your Name”

This is the kind of humor you can only find on SNL and I literally had tears coming from my eyes in a LMAO manner several times…

A classic skit that had to appear, but SNL anniversary special took it one step further, was Weekend Update with three lady veteran all-stars from three different generations of viewers, Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, and Jane Curtin. Emma Stone stepped up to do a spot-on impression of an old Gilda Radner‘s Roseanne Roseannadanna skit, Melissa McCarthy literally crashed into the “Weekend Update” desk as Chris Farley and Edward Norton emulated Stefon in a role for him I never would have saw coming.

Jane Curtain explains, there was a time when she was the only blonde newscaster on TV doing the fake news. That she spawned a whole network now doing fake news… Fox news..

As you watched on through the show inevitably you kept on wondering were they going to reprise your favorite skits or characters during the special from over the years, King Tut, Mr. Bill, and so on. Those that stayed to the very end got a treat when Wayne’s World appeared with the now famous Mike Myers and Dana Carvey, who perfectly reprised their characters like it was only last week.

This was some brilliant comedic creative humor I thought. If you remember the skit or the movie it was a big Schwing! They did a special SNL-themed Top 10 list, They delivered some of the night’s most memorable jokes, including an extended jab at Kayne West after telling the crowd Beck deserved his Grammy saying, “I think Beck was one of the best, even better than Beyoncé.”

Finally a great sketch showing off some of the talent found in SNL was a Martin Short, as himself, and Maya Rudolph, as Beyoncé, monologue.

Maya Rudolph nails it when comes to Beyonce impressions, personal wind machine and all! The skit picked up as her wind machine kept blowing the smaller Martin Short off the stage. It all started with Beyoncé singing the phrase “40 Years of SNL” to the tune of “Drunk in Love,” Maya‘s fluid dance moves were impressive…

Which of these were your favorite skit?

These at least were some of my favorite skits from the SNL 40th presentation. Certainly there were dozens and dozens to chose from. What was yours?

The classic Jerry Seinfeld closing as he takes embarrassing questions from a tough celebrity crowd? Like who he thinks was the worst celebrity host? He calls on Sarah Palin who he thinks is Tina Fey…