El Burro Volador

Whew!  Periodically the pressure builds up and I have to address the tumultuous events going on in my personal life, after which I can go back to nattering about inconsequential matters.  Today is a nattering day…

It is no real secret to those who’ve known me for any length of time that an important influence in my childhood was Nickelodeon’s rerunning of various old television shows, particularly old episodes of Saturday Night Live (the “not ready for primetime” era).  I devoured all of these I could get, and they helped me develop an adult sensibility about comedy and a liberal worldview well-laced with irony.  Which may not have been good things to acquire when your age was still in single digits, incidentally.  If I had needed any help alienating myself from my peers, my trenchant observations about the Carter administration would certainly have finished things off.

Still, this would’ve just been an odd detail from my childhood had Comedy Central not syndicated the episodes from the show’s second golden age, the era of Hartman, Myers, Carvey, Farley, Sandler et al.  I was again immersed in the irreverent sketch comedy, and getting to watch several episodes a week allowed me to get it at a higher dosage than watching just the latest new episode each Saturday.

I have spent a lot of my life with SNL, and for better or worse I know that it has been an influence on my own thought, speech, and writing.

I spent some more time with SNL recently, this time in the form of a pair of dvds.  The first was The Best of Christopher Walken, who has hosted SNL on numerous occasions, and done some great work.  I must confess to being somewhat disappointed in this one, actually.  Sure, it has the legendary “cowbell” sketch, and one of my favorite recurring characters, “the Continental”, but that is really about it.  If you are a big fan of SNL’s brand of humor, and you haven’t seen these sketches, it is definitely worth a look, otherwise give it a pass.

The second was Saturday Night Live: The First Five Years.  This is a documentary about the shows origins and that amazing first cast of Akroyd, Belushi, Chase, Curtin, Morris, Newman, and Radner (and Murray starting with season two).  It provides some very cool insight into the show’s beginnings, but is still just a bare overview – I found myself willing/wanting to spend another couple hours on the subject when it was over.  In addition, there was very, very little actual sketch material on the disc, so potential viewers looking to catch their old favorites are out of luck (though I understand the first few seasons are available in their entirety in expensive box-set form).  Ultimately, it is for already devoted fans who are looking for a bit more info, not people looking to get a feel for what the show itself is about.