Review by C.J. Bunce
Saturday Night Live is American as apple pie. Books, magazine articles, and entertainment news have documented what has made the unique show survive 50 years. Former cast members Dana Carvey and David Spade are still so transfixed with the show they have an ongoing podcast interviewing seemingly anyone and everyone who even walked into the studio. Good and bad accounts are everywhere about the magical first season with cast members John Belushi, Chevy Chase, Dan Aykroyd, Gilda Radner, Laraine Newman, and Garrett Morris, boss Lorne Michaels, and a writers room that would include a future U.S. senator, plus sketches from one of the most beloved celebrity creators of all time: Jim Henson. What really happened? We may never know, but director Jason Reitman’s 2024 sleeper drama/biopic Saturday Night couldn’t have delivered better on such a unique undertaking. The movie is now streaming on Netflix.
Is it really a comedy when you’re just laying everything on the table?
The movie re-creates the 90 minutes of final studio preparation before the first sketch aired and Chevy Chase uttered to America for the first time, “Live from New York, it’s Saturday night.” The trailers for the movie were lackluster, so it’s no wonder if you missed it in theaters. Nobody altogether looks like the actors they are playing. And you’d be right to be skeptical–this crew would define comedy for years, each with a following and to some the idea of trying to portray them is practically sacrosanct. I’m in that group. I’m probably the youngest age group that watched the first episodes live as a kid (kids didn’t get the adult jokes, but thought the singing bees were funny, and nothing was funnier than Gilda Radner’s over-the-top character accents).
But quickly you see that somehow each cast member is able to embody each of the actors, pulling out something obviously real and relatable. Sometimes it’s the speaking meter, like the rapid fire wit of Dylan O’Brien as Aykroyd or the slow deadpan of Cory Michael Smith’s take on Chase. Sometimes it’s the trademark, like Matt Wood’s impression of Belushi’s raised eyebrow and his use of quiet to create humor–something we’d see in years of sketches and movies. It’s harder for the women–whose careers didn’t jettison in the same way as the three white guys. So for Radner we see that genuine nature come through via Ella Hunt’s smiles and bust prep work, Newman we see in a well-known sketch replicated by Emily Fairn, and Jane Curtin we see working a backstage monologue in a conversation with Garrett Morris where Kim Matulin simply nails the buzz and mock anger in her voice. And the best of the cast characters is Lamorne Morris as Garrett Morris (no relation). Garrett Morris’s style in sketches stood out not just because he was the only non-white in the cast, but because of his long acting career and his ability to project. Lamorne gets it exactly right.
But they aren’t even the stars of the movie. That’s Gabrielle LaBelle as long-time showrunner Lorne Michaels, here as a very different version of the established, cocky fellow everyone talks about today. Along with Rachel Sennott as writer Rosie Shuster, the duo share a blossoming romance in passing over the 90 minutes of chaos. Other noticeable characters include Nicholas Braun in a dual role as both Andy Kaufman and Jim Henson–great work on both–J.K. Simmons as Mr. Television Milton Berle (he’s perfect), Taylor Gray as writer and one-day Senator Al Franken, Nicholas Podany as Billy Crystal, Brian Welch as Don Pardo, Robert Wuhl as Dave Wilson, Paul Rust as Paul Shaffer, Willem Dafoe as cranky talent scout David Tebet, and Matthew Rhys as George Carlin. Plus Finn Wolfhard is there for good measure as an NBC page trying to lure people from the street to come in and watch the show.
It’s practically a rockumentary, as good as any entries in the genre, and last year’s best run at playing historical figures on the screen. It’s an incredible ensemble cast that shows reverence for some pretty hefty sacred cows, especially Kaufman, Henson, and Berle. As Milton Berle, J.K. Simmons reminds us all that of all the cast members he is the one with the Oscar. But every character backstage gets a chance to shine. LaBelle’s expressions and performance is Oscar-worthy. More than being an actual comedy, Saturday Night is more jaw-dropping and eye-popping stuff–to see how tightly written and smart the Reitman and Gil Kenan script so perfectly gets everything so true to the spirit of the performers, the era, the legend and legacy of the show, from the lack of a final set list to last-minute studio censors. It’s that rare movie that will knock your socks off if you pay attention. Like the triage of M.A.S.H., the crazy studio prepping for a big, live show of many personality types is a wild thing to contain in a single movie. It’s goofy that it’s low budget approach didn’t garner Oscar consideration. It should have. Timothée Chalamet nominated for playing Bob Dylan? The talented Gabrielle LaBelle ignored by the Academy makes no sense at all–he leads the cast like a picture perfect live-action Charlie Brown putting on the Christmas pageant.
Just like the line from one of our favorite John Ford movies, when we’re only looking back on the ninety minutes before the broadcast of the first live episode of irreverent comedy, something very trivial, maybe the truth doesn’t matter–“when the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” Yet Aykroyd has said the film is an accurate depiction of that night. This is an audacious snapshot of a culturally significant space in time. It’s not like the stuff of daily news when the government suddenly is making up news to fit a new narrative–you can decide which is more important in the long run. When it gets to the last line of the movie it’s the perfect, worthy climax for all the reality behind it.
Don’t miss it. Saturday Night is streaming now on Netflix.
