It was inevitable that with Andy Samberg returning to SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE as host, tonight’s season finale would have the feel of an SNL class reunion.  The cameo guests were indeed plentiful:  Bill Hader, Kristen Wiig, Fred Armisen, Seth Meyers, Martin Short, and Maya Rudolph all showed up, and that’s not even to mention […]

  It was 12:45AM before Charlize Theron really had a highlight to call her own on tonight’s SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, another instance of the show bringing on a bright talent and then not having them do very much.  Although Theron had her issues with the cue cards, as many movie stars on SNL do, she’s […]

  When inspiration hit this week’s SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, it came from an unexpected direction.  African-American staff writer Leslie Jones, who isn’t an official cast member, pretty much blew the doors off Weekend Update with a sustained piece of political incorrectness that was all the more startling in the context of the timidity that is […]

  It seemed that with experienced SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE host Seth Rogen returning to the show for his third visit tonight, SNL had a fair chance of continuing its mini-streak of worthwhile episodes after the Louis C.K. and Anna Kendrick outings, but no such luck.  Although the night didn’t live up to Rogen’s monologue promise […]

  SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE went musical in a big way for its host, Anna Kendrick, and that mostly wasn’t a bad thing.  Kendrick is a genuine musical-comedy performer, with not just the novelty hit “Cups” from Pitch Perfect to her credit but a lead in the upcoming film of Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods on […]

  Louis CK’s last visit to host SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE in 2012 was one of the show’s best recent episodes, and now that his signature Louie is resuming (finally!) on FX in May, he came back tonight for a return engagement.  Expectations were high, and there were definitely some inspired moments, although the night ended […]

  Odd and inconsistent may have been the watchwords for tonight’s SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE with host Lena Dunham, but even intermittent inspiration was a big improvement after last week’s grimly unfunny outing with Jim Parsons. Dunham has one of the most distinctive voices in current TV comedy, and her SNL gig worked best when it […]

  SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE was pushed off the air for a solid month by the Winter Olympics, and then by 15 more minutes in the east tonight by an NHL game in primetime–not the kind of thing that pleases Generalissimo Lorne Michaels.  After all that, the show wasn’t remotely worth the wait. The Big Bang […]