Hello all,
So it’s the 2nd episode of Saturday Night Live since the WGA Strike of ‘08, and it’s going to be hard to top last week’s show, hosted by Tina Fey.
Ellen Page, a fellow Nova Scotian, is the host tonight and you can tell that she is not completely comfortable with all the attention she is getting ever since her Academy Award nomination for Juno.
Ellen Page came out to do her monologue and she lasted all of 20 seconds before she gets the assist from her ‘writer’ for Juno. This skit was a little funny, but it came off as a feeble attempt to cover for Ellen Page’s inexperience in this role. You can see the nerves come to the surface during and after her monologue as she doesn’t quite know what to do with her hands, and she sways around after the segment is over.
Now, I watched Juno several weeks ago, and I thought it was insightful and hilarious. However, did I feel she was a standout actress ? Not really. I’m not saying she was great, but it wasn’t the standout performance that everyone else apparently feels it is.
But back to Saturday Night Live, the opening sequence was yet another Clinton/Obama debate sketch. This was one was not quite as good as last week’s, but still mildly amusing. The sketch was followed by a segment involved Hillary Clinton herself, which came off more as a desperate attempt to gain some buzz around herself in the hopes of gaining some ground on Obama.
Ellen Page’s portrayal of Hannah Montana’s Miley Cyrus was pretty interesting, as they are about the same height. The impersonation of Miley Cyrus was very close to what I’ve seen when Miley has done other interviews.
The band, Wilco was the musical guest. I’m not a huge fan of music, so this is the first time I have even heard of them. The first song the played was kind of soothing, though the lead singer looked like he had caught the red-eye flight the night before and hadn’t gotten any shut-eye in days.
The digital short was basically a rehash of a YouTube video combined with the montage to bad dreams segment of the Oscar’s. It wasn’t funny then and it was even worse when fleshed out tonight.
The Baby Gap sketch was surprisingly funny. Ellen Page playing an inner-city street trash girl was hilarious. She played off of Kenan Thompson quite well, who was also very convincing as a overweight black woman.
Weekend Update is horrible as usual. Here is the format: blah blah blah… wait for prompted laughter… insert punchline while staring at camera… wait for more prompted laughter, switch to next horrible news story.
Rudy Giuliani was this week’s Weekend Update guest. He was actually funnier than the comedians and summed up this entire episode on SNL, comparing it to his failed campaign for the Presidency of the United States.
Rudy Giuliani, “It started strong, but really didn’t have an ending”
So, as much as I like Ellen Page, her first episode (I know there will be more) of SNL was a bit lackluster. She has definately come a long way since her episodes on the Trailer Park Boys. The sketches tonight were mediocre at best. There were stand out performances, especially by Kenan Thompson (Baby Gap sketch) and Bill Hader (Peter Pan sketch). Though this episode was not as good as last weeks episode, SNL has really stepped it up since their hiatus for the WGA Strike. I just wonder how long this level of quality will hold up as the last few years have really shown how low this show can go.
Ryan ‘Piece’ Levy
