The age of cable television is essentially over. Youtube, Netflix, Hulu and Apple TV feature more content than we could ever consume, and many of the most beloved shows of our time — such as “Suits,” “Bridgerton” and “Squid Game” — are released on these on-demand streaming platforms. Media entertainment, it seems, is a never-ending source of instant gratification.
However, there seems to be one notable exception to the rule. Enter “Saturday Night Live,” originally called “NBC’s Saturday Night.” Forty-nine years after its premiere in 1975, the show still manages to entertain everyone from children of the 1960s to current college undergraduates — despite its antiquated form of transmission, live television broadcasting. How has SNL remained so relevant across so many generations, even though its creation predates the internet by almost a decade? The story begins with Jason Reitman’s new film, “Saturday Night.”
“Saturday Night” premiered at Telluride at Dartmouth on Sept. 21 at the Black Family Visual Arts Center. The film captures SNL creator and producer Lorne Michaels’s anxiety and uncertainty surrounding Saturday Night Live’s first-ever broadcast on NBC on Oct. 11, 1975.
In a word, Reitman’s “Saturday Night” is chaotic — just as the writer-director intended. I expected to be shown the important events leading up to the first live airing of SNL and to leave with a sense of closure. But Reitman refuses to give viewers this satisfaction. Instead, the film only covers the final 90 minutes before SNL’s first live broadcast and focuses on the experiences of cast members, crew and assistants who played integral roles in the show’s success.
If a director is daring enough to stray from one focus to another as they tell the origin story of one of the most beloved television shows of all time — and to do it all in under two hours — it needs to work. Now that I have seen the film, I am thoroughly convinced of Reitman’s creative vision. The unconventional structure of the film was absolutely necessary. The frequent cutaways to new characters allow viewers to witness the range of the behind-the-scenes pieces that made the live show run smoothly. This frenetic spirit imbues the film with humor and liveliness. It serves as a cut through Michaels’s anxiety as he faces pressure from NBC to engineer what the film refers to as a “revolution” of live TV.
Among the many subplots are a comedian’s request for 28 gallons of fake blood and a llama, comic John Belushi’s contemplations on whether to sign a contract as an official cast member and a crew member’s unassisted journey laying dozens of bricks to build the set. There are scenes, too, that capture the broader issues that the cast members faced, such as the pervasive use of drugs and alcohol, the lack of diverse representation in media and the rampant misogyny and abuse of female cast members.
In one disturbing scene, Milton Berle — comedian and SNL guest host — exposes his genitals to a female cast member in an attempt to assert sexual, emotional and physical dominance over her. In another scene, first-season cast member Chevy Chase enters a room full of NBC producers and says, “Ladies and gentlemen … Or, let’s be honest — just gentlemen,” eliciting a roar of laughter from the crowd.
Reitman intersperses these subplots into the film like a mosaic. The connecting thread and main point of conflict is Michaels’s race against time to prepare the crew, cast and a finalized script before the live broadcast. The film highlights the quick costume and set changes, pressure for the cast members to perform perfectly during a single take and the real-time lighting and camera adjustments necessitated by live television.
These considerations may seem obsolete to many modern viewers. Today, most shows are filmed far in advance in accordance with a script that has been finalized and edited hundreds, if not thousands, of times. Every costume and set can be perfected down to the very last detail, and the editing required to create the perfect cut can be longer than the time it takes to shoot the original scene. It is still important to understand the historical significance of live television broadcasts as well as to develop a newfound appreciation for media that is still broadcast live, such as news and sports channels.
Throughout “Saturday Night,” one question remains unanswered until the end: What is Lorne Michaels’s hodge-podge of a show even about? When asked this question by an NBC producer near the end of the film, Michaels claims that the show is about “what it feels like to be in New York City on a Saturday Night” — going out on the town, “getting lucky” and having a great time with friends. I think this answer was unoriginal and uninspired — even bordering on cringeworthy. As a present day viewer of SNL, I have never considered SNL to be about “what it was like to be in New York City on a Saturday night.” I’m sure many other viewers in the 2000s and 2010s would have also shared this confusion with Michaels’s statement.
Instead, the show has increasingly strived to be socially, politically and culturally critical through its comedy. It has adapted to modern media standards by critiquing the very environment in which it is forced to compete: a never-ending stream of information on social media platforms, coupled with the insurgence of short-form content like TikToks and Instagram Reels. In one skit, Billie Eilish stars in a skit called “TikTok Trash.” Another skit is called “Barbie Instagram.” In the age of digital information, we run to on-demand entertainment when we want to laugh at the internet or hear clever jokes about news stories that would otherwise cause us dread.
SNL’s original mission has changed dramatically since its inception. But SNL’s constant evolution has not only allowed it to survive, but also to preserve its original form of transmission as a live television show. As long as SNL is able to wittily make light of the issues that would otherwise incite fear, it will satisfy our desire to feel temporarily at ease in a world that would otherwise seem out of our control.
Rating: ★★★★
