The Saturday Night Live 40th Anniversary Special

Live from New York, it's Saturday night! Well, actually it was Sunday night when the greatest night of my life commenced with an absolutely flawless special. But who cares what day it was? All that matters is that everyone was there. Seriously. And we could see them all walk into the GE Building during the live, one-hour red carpet special for the anniversary hosted by Matt Lauer, Al Roker, Savannah Guthrie, and Carson Daly. And that was nice and all, but then my heart fluttered like I had heard the pounding of native drums somewhere in the distance as a camera panned into SNL's Studio 8H and soared over the audience to examine Jimmy Fallon, center-stage, with his back to the audience, an audience made up of only those close to the show. Excitingly dramatic music began to play before his song was interrupted by Justin Timberlake. The two then proceeded to spend five minutes rapping every catchphrase from the history of the show, complete with Jimmy replicating John Belushi's exuberant dancing as the beginning chords of "Soul Man" echoed throughout the studio and appearances from Rachel Dratch as Debbie Downer and Molly Shannon as Mary Katherine Gallagher. (Highlight: Timberlake dropping his gift box, Jimmy bending over to pick it up, and the two singing the theme song to Robert Smigel's recurring cartoon, "The Ambiguously Gay Duo.")



Then, once Darrell Hammond rattled off the name of every celebrity who was participating in the evening's festivities, who else but Steve Martin stepped out the new "SNL40" door to deliver the special's monologue. Perhaps no host is more associated with SNL than Martin so it was nice to see him deliver a few jokes before being inevitably bombarded by celebrities like Tom Hanks, Alec Baldwin, and Paul McCartney, who performed a short yet rousing duet with Paul Simon.

What followed was a gloriously comprehensive montage of all the classic moments in the history of the show and as it faded, we were all pleasantly greeted by original cast member Dan Aykroyd's smiling face as he reprised his classic Bass-O-Matic sketch from the seventies with Laraine Newman. And if that wasn't enough to convince you that the night was magical, the theme music from Jeopardy once the show returned from commercials had to do the trick. The return of Celebrity Jeopardy. How pleasant it was to have a rotating parade of celebrity impressions from forty years of SNL, but doubly so that Will Ferrell's Alex Trebek had to once again deal with the abrasive and aloof antics of Hammond's Sean Connery and Norm Macdonald's Burt Reynolds Turd Ferguson, respectively. (Just guess how Connery twisted the names of the categories, "Who Reads" and "Let It Snow.")



And wasn't it an interesting surprise to see the two newest cast members of Saturday Night Live, Pete Davidson and Leslie Jones, on stage right after the live sketch. They introduced another montage (as would Robert De Niro would do to honor New York City after them, Jack Nicholson did for political sketches, Tina Fey for Weekend Update, Peyton Manning and Derek Jeter for sports, and Louis CK for digital shorts) of cast auditions. Some of the auditions were never before seen, but none of them had the same effect on me that Gilda Radner's did. It was almost torture to end such a nostalgic segment with Gildna, too.

SNL is known for its unique blend of comedy and music in its unchanging (yet always different) format and it made for a perfect choice for the special's first musical performance. Paul McCartney singing "Maybe I'm Amazed." It wasn't as flawless as McCartney's songs usually are, but it was still something all who witnessed it were (yes) amazed by, naturally. He's a Beatle! And while he was a delight for viewers the world over, the same cannot be said for The Californians sketch. I've always loved The Californians, but it didn't seem to go over too well with fans as they claimed it went on too long. I thought it was a perfect way to get a lot of those in attendance involved in the show and it resulted in Betty White making out with Bradley Cooper. (Plus, I could listen to Fred Armisen slur, "What are you doing here?" in a Californian accent forever.) The sketch also went full meta at the end as David Spade and Cecily Strong took on the classic roles of flight attendants to wish the actors "Buh bye" from the set.



It was about this time in the show when Weekend Update would typically take place. Sure enough, we were treated to a desk manned by Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, and Jane Curtin, three veterans of Update. A few topical SNL jokes were delivered and it was just so amazing to see Curtin deliver jokes in that format for the first time since 1979. The occasion was made doubly engaging when Emma Stone slid out to the desk dressed as Gilda's classic character, Roseanne Roseannadanna. Melissa McCarthy then did her best impression of Matt Foley, motivational speaker, and Bill Hader and Edward Norton tried out competing Stefons to which Seth Meyers, Stefon's husband, said, "We have children now!" And how else could Update end than with Tina being captured by the Land Shark? Afterward, we saw multiple generations of Update anchors (Meyers, Macdonald, Kevin Nealon, and Colin Quinn) introduce the man who started it all, Chevy Chase who unchained Garrett Morris for a classic Update shouting bit.

The audience's attention was taken back to center-stage as Martin Short and a Beyonce that looked an awful lot like Maya Rudolph sang two short tribute songs to SNL, a performance that opened the door for a deluge of classic musical sketches from the show's history that was truly the best example of a coveted blend of generational comedy. Armisen and Kristen Wiig returned as Garth and Kat, Ferrell and Ana Gasteyer sang as Marty and Bobbi Culp, and Joe Piscopo hit the show with his Frank Sinatra impression, one made even more impressive by the fact that Piscopo has finally aged into it. Dana Carvey continued the bit by choppin' broccoli, Adam Sandler made a surprise appearance as Opera Man, and Kenan Thompson and Jason Sudeikis asked, "What's up with that?" We were then transported back to the 1970s as Steve Martin somehow sang "King Tut" again, Bill Murray performed the Jaws love song as Nick the Lounge Singer, and Aykroyd reprised "those brothers in blue" with Jim Belushi (the best alternative to John).



But when Chris Rock brought everyone back from commercial break, the truly historic moment was underway. Eddie Murphy was about to return to SNL for the first time in over thirty years. Rock's introduction was phenomenal and while Eddie's speech was condensed and frustrating, I believe it was just far too emotional of a night for him to bring back Gumby or Buckwheat or anything like that. The moment was too big, but you could see in his eyes that he loved every second. And is the image of Eddie back in Studio 8H not enough? It was for me.

After Eddie, an impeccable comedy question-and-answer period hosted by Jerry Seinfeld incorporated humorous remarks from John Goodman (a five-timer), Tim Meadows (a solid utility player), and Sarah Palin (the most famously lampooned politician). Best of all though was former SNL writer, Larry David's abruptly dry exchange with Seinfeld. As good as it was to see everyone who ever had anything to do with SNL together, it was still good to see Larry and Jerry, though they are obviously most associated with Seinfeld. Another duo that was nice to see reunited was Pete Twinkle (Sudeikis) and Greg Stink (Will Forte) who delivered the raunchiest joke of the night as fake sports analysts for ESPN Classic.

A warm tribute featuring Fey, Baldwin, and Fallon to Tracy Morgan who, due to his car accident in June of 2014, couldn't attend the reunion was bookended by Miley Cyrus singing "Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover" and Kanye West singing a medley of some of his old and new tunes. A prerecorded musical segment followed Kanye's ordeal and of course it was "An SNL (40) Digital Short." Andy Samberg returned with his Lonely Island brothers, Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone, to sing a song dedicated to cast members breaking character during sketches with Sandler and Bill Hader. It was surprisingly heartwarming to see "Fallon and Sanz" breaking again and again amidst classic clips of Phil Hartman, Spade, and Ferrell.



As the show started to wind down towards the end, we were blessed with a classic "ten-to-one" sketch that started that way and was set to help end the sketch part of the night that way, too. A little bit of cable access from Aurora was brought to us as we partied on with Wayne (Mike Myers) and Garth (Carvey), a welcome return to arguably the most popular sketch to ever come out of SNL. The latest episode of Wayne's World counted down the top ten things about SNL with a standing ovation coming at number one: the crew. Schwing!



Of course, there is only one show that could warrant an "In Memoriam" segment of its own and, naturally, that show is the one I've spent the past paragraphs speaking to you about: SNL. Cast and crew that had passed on from 1975 to the present-day were honored as the slideshow began with the haunting image of an old John Belushi video where he played an old version of himself walking through a cemetery. He titled it, "The Not Ready for Primetime Cemetery," and laughed at the thought that he'd be the first one to die. An indescribable video. The blistering emotions felt at seeing Hartman and Farley and Belushi and Radner again were softened by an image of Jon Lovitz at the end, hearkening back to a joke from Martin's monologue. It let laughs into the studio again and allowed for Paul Simon to come out on stage and absolutely crush his performance of the very fitting song, "Still Crazy After All These Years."

Finally, everyone who performed in the show and any cast member remaining at the event joined one another on the stage for the greatest goodnight the show has ever given. And it was Steve Martin who pulled Lorne Michaels, the man behind the whole thing, up on stage allowing Lorne to say hello to a few people who thanked him and eventually look out at the audience, hold back tears, and remain singularly prominent among a frenzy of history behind him. Generations transcended as Dana Carvey wrapped an arm around Chris Rock. Billy Crystal approached Mike Myers, who was filming it all with an iPhone. Molly Shannon hugged Jim Carrey, Edward Norton engaged Jerry Seinfeld, Justin Timberlake kissed Maya Rudolph, Jimmy Fallon said hello to (no relation) ex-cast member, Siobahn Fallon. Chevy Chase stood right beside Eddie Murphy. And Lorne looked out from the same stage where John Belushi said he wanted to feed Michael O'Donoghue's fingertips to the wolverines all those years ago. All those crazy, forty years.