The last time the show was in such bad shape was in the early '80s right after the original Not-Ready-For-Primetime Players left in 1980. The show was completely awful for a year or two, until Eddie Murphy showed up. And then it was just awful anytime Eddie wasn't in a skit. :)

However, it rebounded with new casts - first for a single year when Billy Crystal, Harry Shearer, Jim Belushi and Christopher Guest were in the cast and then, after sucking for one season, it rebounded again for a roughly ten-year-run from late-1986 until mid-1995 with Jon Lovitz, Dennis Miller, Dana Carvey, Mike Myers, Chris Farley, Chris Rock, Adam Sandler, Phil Hartman and David Spade in the cast at some part over this time.

While the cast over the last 10 years hasn't been as good, it did have Will Ferrell for a number of years. But it's been a downhill spiral since he left in 2002, so maybe the show needs another comedian of that caliber to rebound again.

Thanks. I was getting ready to have dinner, but the mere mention of "Bear City" just made me nauseous.

I also give him credit for the way he handles the racist sign language jokes on WU. It's one of the only funny bits on WU any more.

It saddens me that they have so many "staff writers" and "featured players" and half of the skits still suck. Lets not forget that they have a "dress rehearsal" before the actual taping to cut out the bad skits.

Amy Poehler is the only breakout person I can see in the cast and thats a long shot. Sad time for SNL, but at least its jimmy fallon free now.

Although I do dislike the F.A.N., he is not the worst cast member. It's Horatio Sanz by a mile.

With Fey out for now, and perhaps permanently if her sitcom is a hit, the writing staff should be completely flushed away. Get some writers who actually know how to end a skit.

Isn't it possible that many people -DO- find those things entertaining? Hey, to each their own. I'm not forcing you to like anyone.

:lol::up:

Whoa, have they EVER been able to do that? That has been a problem since the Not Ready for Prime Time Players days.

There should be a Bear City sketch in which the citizens eat the Versace character, a straggler (as much as I like Rudolph).

Armisen and Rudolph are being held back by certain forces -- I'm positive of it. They are far more talented than the show has allowed.

From the tone of your post you seemed genuinely shocked that she has a lot of non-fans. There's no ulterior motive, I just don't find her funny or all that interesting to watch. The material they choose to have her do probably bears some of the blame. The sketches she has the lead in are rarely funny. Maybe if she got on a variety show and off a comedy show she'd find her audience. Anyway, I certainly am not blaming her for SNL's lack of funny the last few years, to me she's just part of the problem.

In Jay Mohrs book he talks about a conversation he had with the head writer who said that the show has two phazes it goes through

It has seasons that are focused on the writers and seasons that are focused on comedians...the writer focused sasons almost always suck, and the show needs an infusion of a few really stellar comeians to save it. The problem I see here is that there not throwing new comedians in the mix, so the writers will run this crapfest for another year

PLUS, the show no loonger has a CRAZY FUNNY GUY, you know, Farley, Farrel, Murphy, etc...the guy who by sheer presence of his insanity can make any skit funny.

THAT statement is on the money. :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Think back how many times a crap sketch was funny just because one of those guys just did something, anything, that wasn't on the script that made the sketch memorable. An example is the Deion Sanders show when Farley's pants fell down as he runs into the alien ship. It was much funnier because it was Farley. That sketch was as dumb as they come, but it became an instant classic show moment. Or the sketch with Farrel wearing the American flag thong in the office meeting. Or Belushi or Bill Murray doing anything.

Mohr's book was cool because he appeared in alot of those sketches with Farley, and he says farley would play the sketch dead strainght in dress rehersal, so there was this looming fear surrounding the cast as to what crazy shit Farley would do. ALL of it was planned.

I'm sorry if you got some weird vibe from my post. I was just agreeing with the person who first brought up the "distubing lack of love" for Maya. Like I said to each their own.

peace

They should get more cast members from Nick's original cast of "All That". Much funnier than the current state of SNL.

I'll just say he's as talented and funny as anyone else on the show.

good lord. I haven't agreed with a single thing you've ever posted....but this takes the cake -ohbfrank-

I'm a huge fan of Amy Poehler and like all of the female cast members to a certain degree. It's the male cast members that i can't stand. They pretty much all need to be replaced.

The best era was around 98-00 when their were a lot of females in the cast. This was a time of memorable characters and politics-light. Can anyone mention a memorable character in these recents years?

Best seasons were the ones with these people (and some of their characters):

Cheri Oteri - the crazy cheerleaders (with Will Ferrell) and the Divas Live bits as Mariah

Molly Shannon - Superstar, especially the one where she destroys the bathroom when Gweneth Paltrow was a guest

Ana Gasteyer - the old singer (with Will Ferrell) and the radio host (with Molly Shannon), very funny when Alec Baldwin was a guest and he said something about his famous Shwetty Meatballs and she thought she was drunk from non-alcoholic eggnog

Collin Quinn - back when he did Weekend Update

Chris Kattan - Mango, the Night At The Rocksbury clubbers (with Will Ferrell), his Divas Live bit, and his inpersonation of the Queen of England when W. Update ran "news" of her falling and breaking her bones

Will Ferrell - what can I say? Pure genious. As a cheerleader with Oteri "Sex can wait! Masturbate!"

Tracy Morgan - his Aretha Franklin inpersonation in the Divas Live bit

Tim Meadows - I forget the character's name but was a sex god apparently.


On a side note, the current cast's gem is not Tina Fey but Maya Rudolph. She is a class act. Her singing in Gays In Space was hilarious as well as her Donatella Versace, and her Charlotte from Sex And The City was funny, especially with that believable performance from Christina Aguilera as Samantha. I showed people the skit from that episode and they couldn't be it was her.

There's this huge website filled with everything there is to know about SNL over the years. It's http://snl.jt.org/ It tells you the guests, the cast, what seasons they were in, what characters and inpersonations they did as well as those the guests did. I still remember the one with Molly Shannon as Monica Lewinsky and John Goodman as Linda Tripp recording their conversation while she took a shit and ate a huge bucket of KFC. Funny stuff.