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1. Land Shark There's some great material here, but the show isn't quite an hour long and doesn't really establish a tone of its own. The classic bits are two vampire skits with guest stars John Travolta and James Woods. Woods is so funny, we wonder if he's wasted his career in straight roles. Also strong are Al Franken's intense Stuart Smalley bit, the Coneheads routine and Rich the Copy Guy. Others have a knee-jerk nostalgic appeal, like the original Land Shark gag, and there's nothing bad about the Twilight Zone Eye of the Beholder takeoff with Pamela Anderson. Perhaps cued by the Myers-Carvey Wayne's World best-of skits used as bookends, the show leans heavily in favor of mean-spirited humor ... not a bad thing for Halloween, I suppose. I get the feeling that some great material that had to be chopped because of legal rights problems - mainly Madeline Kahn's drop-dead funny I Feel Pretty, that she sings as the Bride of Frankenstein. The Bernstein-Sondheim estates probably had something to do with it.
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1. Christmas Eve at the White House This Christmas show is longer both in length and in amusing content. Surely due to the broader possibilities inherent in the Christmas holiday, there are more classics here. Eddie Murphy's skit has to be one of his best, and the same goes for Carvey's Church Lady (Santa = Satan) and Jon Lovitz' Hanukah Harry and Master Thespian skits. There's the expected Martha Stewart skewering, and another Matt Foley exercise for Chris Farley. Dan Ackroyd's schtick as Mainway, the evil marketer of deadly kid's toys is helped enormously by the presence of Candice Bergen, who has a wonderful time trying not to laugh. Steve Martin's A Holiday Wish monologue is equally hilarious. The best skit by far is the incredibly accurate parody of It's a Wonderful Life. It's a truly wicked satirical jab. Dana Carvey's uncanny Jimmy Stewart imitation is just too perfect to not be funny. Christmas has the requisite edgy material, such as the jarring and rather cruel-spirited Martha Stewart's Topless Christmas. On the other hand, the special has some great musical material that shows SNL at its best as an ensemble of killer comedy talent. Dysfunctional Family Christmas is a spoof of a syndicated K-Tel type music ad with vicious Xmas Carol parodies, but Winter Wonderland is a practically straight caroling number with most of the early cast members (+ a delightful Candice Bergen, again) belting out backup for Garrett Morris. It's charming to see the original cast (some of them gone now) having so much fun, and it even generates some Christmas cheer. This very satisfying show is more than the sum of its parts. The quality of these Lion's Gate shows is fine, with some of them limited by the video quality of 1970s broadcast TV. There's a refreshing absence of host intros like the ones that mar the music compilation discs. I only caught one clip with a distracting edit, in the Xmas Church Lady routine. It looked as if it was made to excise most of a musical performance - ? Savant recommends the Halloween show to SNL fans, and the Christmas show to everyone.
On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor,
Saturday Night Live Halloween rates:
On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor,
Saturday Night Live Christmas rates:
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