PRIME TIME

PRIME TIME

DON’T MAKE ME LAUGH

Richard C. Walls

I’ve read barely a kind word from the critics for the new Saturday Night Live, and many a nasty one, which strikes me as kind of odd; you’d think that during reactionary times, satire, even uneven satire, would be something to be encouraged. But then one shouldn’t be too hard on TV critics—if their early reports fairly seethed with hatred for the new SNL, I can think of at least four good reasons. 1) TV critics are, by and large, a lightweight bunch and if this really is a reactionary period then you can bet that they’re bobbing along on the flow with all the insight that cows bring to the slaughterhouse. 2) Thenthere’s the fact that most of the critiques were reactions to the first show (the Madonna one) which, from my present perspective of half a dozen shows into the season, was by far the worst of the lot. 3) The syndication of the half hour Best of SNL series has left everyone in the world with a selective memory concerning how good the original show was. 4) Cast your net wide enough and sooner or later you’ll offend everyone, even people who should know better. One writer, opining in a famous progressive journal, was apparently so offended by new regular Terry Sweeny’s gay characters, which admittedly may rely too much on stereotypical behavioral tics for easy laughs, that he generalized his outrage into an attack on the show’s writers for being too craven in their attempts to elicit the irreverent chuckle. Imagine, the new SNL too irreverent. I mean, don’t make me laugh.

But if the show isn’t exactly dangerous, it is upholding the tradition of healthy subversion pretty well and even though Robert Downey (he’s the normal-looking one) and Nora Dunn remain miss-

ing in action, other cast members are beginning to make an impression. Randy Quaid is a standout, a legit actor perhaps best known for his role in The Last Detail. Quaid has a neat running bit in which he does an impressionistic impression of Reagan —like Chevy Chase doing Gerald Ford, Quaid eschews exactitude to get at the essence of the man, here by playing him as an amiable dummy, perhaps too gentle a spoof for some, but not too far off the mark. The aforementioned Sweeny’s companion piece is another continuing highlight: Nancy Reagan as an aggressive drag queen. Since this is the exact opposite of Nancy’s public persona, the laughs depend on the viewer’s hostility toward the first lady’s too-perfect little ladyness; if you think she’s a good role model, the humor may seem a little obscure. Two performers who seem better than the material they’ve been given so far are Jon Lovitz, a deadpan, nasal-voiced, latter day William Powell who does “droll” very well (so far, better than the writers) and Denitra Vance, the first black woman regular cast member whose two most memorable bits so far were a truly awful impression of Cicely Tyson— Tyson may be respectable, but she really isn’t a tight-assed dragon lady type—and a more on-target one of Leslie Uggams giving a dramatic reading of a letter from a loony bin inmate on the 1965 Roy Orbison Christmas show (high concept, no?). Moving down the scale, Anthony Michael Hall gets the show’s award for unpreparedness—during one sketch he continually stopped the action to find his place on the cue cards; the kid just seems someplace else, maybe contemplating his next John Hughes movie. Honorary cast member Damon Wayans does a good jivey black guy, but for all we know he may really be a jivey black guy; it remains to be seen if he has any range. Finally there’s Dennis Miller, current curator of the Weekend Update desk and the real thorn in the side of anyone who wants to like the show; the guy does a really bad Bill Murray, calculated to make the viewer squirm.

But actually, it was during one of Miller’s Weekend Updates that it all came together for me as to why the show was worth staying with and was to be given every chance possible to catch on. Miller had done a couple of soso one liners that the studio audience had given the proper medium response to when up came this gag: United Way was having a “punch Mary Lou Retton in the mouth” lottery (howls of approval and delight from the audience); at a dollar a ticket, they figured to raise $75,000,000 (more howls). And there you have it—jokes like that either give you a feelgood glow or they don’t. Me, I was positively basking.