The Reel Review
Comedy TV show creator Lorne Michaels must juggle nervous network executives, a challenging cast, rebellious writers and a heavy-handed network censor in the hour and a half leading up to the inaugural episode of the show that would become Saturday Night Live. Gabriel LaBelle, Rachel Sennott and Willem Dafoe star in this behind-the-scenes historical dramedy.
Saturday Night is co-writer/director Jason Reitman’s love letter to viewers old enough to remember those first few seasons of the popular comedy show. The film illustrates the challenges – some real, some fictional – in getting the show to air while also giving long-overdue props to Michaels’ first wife Rosie Shuster, whose many comedy sketches played a huge part in the show’s early success. LaBelle (Snack Shack, The Fabelmans) and Sennott (Bottoms, Shiva Baby) do an excellent job as the husband-wife duo, with a supporting cast that includes Dafoe as NBC executive David Tebet, JK Simmons as Milton Berle and Dylan O’Brien (Caddo Lake, the Maze Runner trilogy) as Dan Aykroyd.
The frenetic, ADHD-fueled pacing of the film and the annoyingly repetitive “we’re gonna fail” theme frankly is all a bit off-putting, with the film also spending too much time on the network executives instead of providing more interesting details about the original cast, some of whom get relatively little screentime. Those unfamiliar with the show’s early years will be bored with Saturday Night, although it sticks the ending well enough to satisfy its early years fans.
REEL FACTS
• NBC changed the title Saturday Night to Saturday Night Live at the start of the show’s third season in 1977, after purchasing the rights from rival network ABC to the name following the cancellation of Howard Cosell’s variety show Saturday Night Live.
• Two Saturday Night cast members have previously guest hosted Saturday Night Live – Willem Dafoe and JK Simmons.
• Rosie Shuster was responsible for several of the show’s sketches, among them: Jim Belushi’s Killer Bees, Bill Murray and Gilda Radner’s Lisa and Todd sketch, Radner’s Emily Litella and Baba Wawa sketches, Dana Carvey’s Church Lady and Eddie Murphy’s Tyrone sketch.
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