Season 50 Episode 10 Martin Short

A year and change ago, culture writer Dan Koi caused a stir (online; much easier to stir there) by writing a essay for Slate provided that, to some people, Martin Short represents less a comedic legend than a high-energy comedian known as Grandpa, pushing our collective tolerance within inches of its breaking point for reasons that needed exploring. Many people then registered their understandable disagreement (if predictably disproportionate outrage). The more interesting point in one writer’s mystification about the amount of Short’s performing style, however, was the valid notion that Short, beloved as he is, had never really achieved a widely popular showcase hit until Only murder in the buildingmany decades into his career. You can read many more words about this at some dullard’s Substackbut the point is that there’s something wonderfully ephemeral about Short’s comic-legend status, a comedic purity to the ephemerality of his best work—guest spots, talk show appearances, Jiminy Glick segments—that reflects the spirit of improvisation and sketches. comedy.

And yet even within this show-bizzy sketch-comedy world, Short’s Saturday Night Live history has become dirty. Yes, he was a cast member during the famous one-off tenth season, but as he is referred to in his memoirs and in interviews, he and Billy Crystal and Christopher Guest came to the show as known quantities and had enough juice to get away with making a couple showpieces for each of the season’s 17 episodes, often ending their commitments about halfway through the episode. (I haven’t seen many of these episodes in their full 90-minute glory; after Weekend Update , would it just be Mary Gross riffing for 40 minutes?) Yes, he’s made plenty of subsequent appearances, including hosting the entire episode of shows, but he’s also right now, almost 40 years later, making his way to the five-hour club, and two of the episodes that got him there were co-hosted with other stars. It is the first time that he has gone less than a decade between hosting, and it is most delightful that he has only hosted in December. As much as Short tends to play characters who struggle into the limelight and glory in its heat, his actual performances are barely enough to leave us wanting more, and that ended up happening even tonight, in a episode that was apparently made to honor him, starting with a solid 17 minutes of Short-centric comedy.

Still, after the obligatory Five-Timers Club opening sketch and lavish sing-song monologue, which felt like the show stretched itself out, forgot its spotty track record of politically cold openers and let Short’s persona dominate, it became increasingly clear that this week’s episode would not be a bunch of wacky Martin Short characters backed by the flow SNL ensemble, or even Short, who does a ton of ensemble work alongside the younger but less extravagantly beloved cast. Rather, it would be a bunch of semi-recurring SNL bits supported by a pasel of guest stars that sometimes included Martin Short.

It makes sense: When you have almost half of the currently living Five-Timer Club members gathered at the cold open (not counting hybrid members whose performances are partly for music, there are 25 living five-timers, and 10 of them was on at the end of that sketch), in the midst of the show’s 50th season, it would no less be a little weird not to make further use of at least some of the beloved characters on hand: Tom Hanks, Alec Baldwin, Melissa McCarthy , Paul Rudd, Tina Fey, Kristen Wiig, Emma Stone, John Mulaney and Scarlett Johansson. In other words, a mix of actual alumni, honorary members, friends of the show and a handful of global superstars! What an ensemble! Plus Jimmy Fallon too! They should definitely do some comedy bits that are more substantial than in-joke walk-ons to reward the audience at home for having to sit through a bunch of live audiences screaming at their various introductions.

And look, they did! Fallon and Stone appeared backstage during Short’s monologue. Then Melissa McCarthy provided a hilarious topper to the first “normal” sketch of the night that helped set it apart from its first incarnation. A few minutes later, several five-timers appeared alongside Short in the recurring airport parade sketch, the perfect vehicle for that kind of cameo, with Hanks delivering another solid topper by reprising his role as Sully from the film Sully. Then it was back to the core cast members for a pre-tape bit and Weekend Update; Fair enough, it’s not that unusual for hosts and guests to keep them out, and there was a ScarJo cameo of sorts during the annual Update joke swap. So back to sketches, and the main guest star in the inexplicable Giant Saturday bit was… Paul Rudd? But there’s definitely a crazy character that could be played by… oh, Dana Carvey, obviously? Ok, a little weird. Then some more Hozier, some more Martin Short during a Peanuts skit, and the show ended. Huh.

By and large, this is not as unusual as it seems. The idea that the sketch is front and center for most of any given SNL is pretty much a 21st century expectation. As late as the mid-’90s, it wasn’t uncommon for hosts to dip into multiple actual skits per episode. section. Now they mostly just skip the cold open and Update, and Short was obviously right at the opening, giving him more screen time beforehand. There’s also something charming about the idea of ​​a Christmas special where Short is probably the nominal host, but there are lots of fun people hanging out and having a good time, just like when Betty White hosted back in 2010. White showed up. all the way through (probably more than Short did tonight!), but it still felt like an all-star edition of sorts, with several sketches, sometimes from years earlier, unexpectedly reprized by several returning cast members. Business as usual, whatever the show looked like in May 2010, was on hiatus, for better or for worse. It almost played more like a prime-time special than an actual one SNL.

It was more the atmosphere tonight, and yet lots of hardcore SNL fans roll their eyes at excess cameos, I’m inclined to give them a go at it, especially this season. I also have to assume that on some level this is how Short prefers to work on the show. The last time he hosted, he shared duties with Steve Martin (and, as with tonight, put his spin on several things that seemed like one-offs at the time). Working there full-time, he apparently took some pride in being able to get off work a little early after killing it early. He has a variety show vibe and that’s part of it SNL DNA too. It’s only natural, though, that when Short so fully embodies the spirit of old-time set-on-a-network-show life, he won’t always summon an equal amount of magic or work that magic on material that can be improved immediately. Sometimes he just does some comfort TV and doesn’t overstay his welcome.

What was on

For much of the parking lot argument, it was hard not to think back Quinta Brunson version, and how a funny sketch suddenly seems like so much more of a Mikey Day vehicle when it’s brought back, even years later, despite Short’s obvious facility with physical comedy. But Melissa McCarthy really brought it home in the end. I simply laughed too much at her part of the skit not to include it here. Similarly, the airport skit was more pleasantly familiar and funny than LOL-level until Hanks showed up as Sully, which got a big laugh out of me.

The for tape with Heidi Gardner and Kenan Thompson was pretty fun too, even though it basically copied the setup from this one Christmas card years ago, and with a less surprising comedic twist at three quarters. And the Peanuts sketch worked OK; I have a soft spot for real people trying to dance like the Peanuts gang, and um, it was nice to see Martin Short again!

What was off

Unlike his other English-speaking-guest-flummoxed-by-another-culture sketch La Rivisita Della Televisione with Vinny Vedecci, Giant Saturday failed to elaborate on his premise on a second round. This was the only really bad sketch of the night, which seems like it should be an overall win for a typical hit-and-miss show. But it was also one of only four traditional live sketches overall, and really, there was hardly a segment in the entire episode that didn’t feel like some kind of revival in spirit. (This was at least the third Peanuts-related skit they’ve done, and probably the least straight-up funny.) Even one of the musical segments was a cover! (Albeit a very welcome one. I didn’t know you had it in you, Hozier!) The sketches weren’t all that offensive, as they didn’t feel like they had much space amidst a lot of self-referential pageantry. Again, the TV special moods won, without much in the center.

Most Valuable Player (who may not be ready for prime time)

In the spirit of giving holidays (and also the main cast being repeatedly elbowed aside), it might be Colin Jost and Michael Che this week. I don’t know that I ever need to see CEO of Comedy Colin Jost tut-tut someone about hilarious overreactions to the United Healthcare bomber, but Che refrained from saying “it’s the 90s” (was it my Christmas present? I’ll take it!) and most importantly, the joke-swap routine, while increasingly rococo and kind of self-regarding, also takes full advantage of live TV in a way that SNL can’t always fit into its tight schedule, especially on Update. Like many of the evening’s segments, it was familiar and took up quite a bit of airtime; unlike most of the sketches, it didn’t feel like a complete rehash, just revealing the real human reactions underneath the nasty jokes.

Next time

They won’t tell us! Any guesses? They get Gerry Butler back on deck for Den of Thieves 2? Nicholas Hoult because he’s in everything? CG /the monkey off Better man? (What, you thought they’d book Robbie Williams? This is America, dammit!) In fact, it looks like the 50th anniversary special will run on February 16th, and the show itself probably won’t air a new episode the weekend before or after that. , we’ll likely get two episodes in the later side of January/very early February, which means the show will likely be off for about a month.

Stray Observations

• • I have to admit: I went from mostly fixating on why Hozier kept looking like he was about to play his guitar, and then not playing his guitar, in the first song, to feeling much warmer about him when he dived into a cover of “Fairytale.” of New York,” though giving the Kirsty MacColl part to a trio of backup singers messes with the song’s dynamics a bit. (Of course MacColl is irreplaceable, but then so is Shane MacGowan, right? And they didn’t get three Hoziers to do that part!)
• • It may be way past time for Bowen to give Evil a rest.
• • Not so sure Marcello has a good grip on his Linus, guys.
• •Part of me thinks they should have just gone all out and done some more greatest hits with the guest stars who didn’t actually do any sketches (Stone, Fey, Baldwin, Mulaney). Will there be a slew of cut-for-hour sketches in the coming days, or would this pretty much always be an episode dominated by a five-hour club name?
• • Last SNL of 2024, everyone! Season 50 is already half over! Here’s wishing you all as good and safe a new year as possible. Thank you for reading these reviews; I really love making them and I’ll be back in January for more!