Posted on 09/15/2008 10:53:37 AM PDT by wac3rd
The quality of "Saturday Night Live" season premieres is almost always on the shaky side, and the 34th season debut was no exception. It took off, however, like a skyrocket.
Saturday's "cold open" sketch a "Nonpartisan Message From Sarah Palin & Hillary Clinton" rose to the occasion and then kept rising, right into the stratosphere. Former writer and cast member Tina Fey, making a brief return to the show, played the Republican vice presidential candidate, with pregnant cast member Amy Poehler doing her surefire, time-tested Clinton beside her. In the parlance of the show, they "killed."
With CNN reporting Fey's return as national news Friday, the tremendous buzz was reflected in the ratings. Early overnight figures showed the "Saturday Night Live" season premiere earned a 7.4 rating and 18 percent share of viewers watching at that hour the highest for a season premiere since 2001, and the highest for any "SNL" telecast since Dec. 14, 2002, when Al Gore was host. The numbers were up 64 percent over last season's premiere, according to Nielsen data.
The sketch was written by "Update" co-anchor Seth Meyers with assists from Fey and Poehler, and every punch line got roars from the 400 audience members.
Poehler as Clinton: "I believe that diplomacy should be the cornerstone of any foreign policy."
Fey as Palin: "And I can see Russia from my house!"
Poehler: "I believe global warming
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
I must be one of the few people who didn’t find it funny in the least. It was just another NBC hit piece on Palin in the form of comedy.
Don’t hold your breath. Some things are sacrosanct.
Just got to watch it this morning and thought it was hilarious. It was much more vicious to hillary than it was to Sarah.
And Sarah’s laughing response was awesome. She said she wore a Tina Fey costume for Halloween.
You go girl!
My bet is that ratings dropped after the first 10 minutes......skit was funny, but you can be sure Omama and wife won’t be touched!
I have not heard of him for years.
Don't hold your breath, FRiend.
Tina and Amy were amusing. And Shatner who should have been used more. The rest of the show was pretty horrible. Writers on bad mushrooms again. Terrible music.
(....crickets.............)
Couldn’t have been worse than MadTV with Bobby Lee as McCain. Having ‘old’ Cindy and John facing the ‘hiphop’ Obama’s on Dancing with the Stars. The judges liked them both, so I didn’t really see the point of the skit, except John McCain is old and white and the Obamas are funky. I think that was the point? Meh.
I never watch SNL and my wife watches it even less than I do. Oddly enough we both watched the opening “message”. I found it funny and somewhat balanced in its skewering of both Palin and Clinton. But I got angry during the next skit about the home-schoolers vs. public-schoolers. It wasn’t just anti-home-schooler it was anti-God. Liberals are government worshiping, God-hating, do-gooders.
Shatner is ALWAYS funny. The inherent self-parody is irresistable. I stopped watching soon after the Shatner bit.
He’s been dead since 2004, but I guess it really all ended for him in November of ‘63.
Given the media's outright fear of being painted as racists, we both know that will NEVER happen.
NEVER.
Shameless attacks on Americans, and nothing but praise for democrats.
Both shows and the people involved are examples of how pathetic our media is.
The show after the funny Fep/Palin sketch was absolute dreck.
The worst one was the Christian home-schooled kids, portrayed as ignorant fanatics.
Ed
Agree, in general that the rest of the show was unfunny. I’m thankful for my TIVO. In my house, SNL is otherwise known as Sunday morning dead. If a sketch doesn’t get a smile in the first 15 seconds it’s done. SNL generally takes about 15 minutes for me to watch.
The home-schooled kids were portrayed in a most unbelievable fashion so I don’t think anyone bought into that at all. The public school kids were portrayed as real real dim and refugees from the Leno segment “Jaywalking”. Which is pretty close to the truth.
I cracked up when Amy Poehler (As Hillary) pulled a chunk of the podium off.....
I thought it was quite funny.
And if I'm one of the Obamessiah's priests I really bothered by the fact that he's not enough of a factor in the public mind to have him in the skit.
Yup.
Mom and Dad have a copy of "The First Family" on 33-1/3 LP. Probably worth a buck or two, now.
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