‘SNL’ originals make a strong showing in our first round
The first round of our bracket competition for the best “Saturday night Live” cast member is over. Yes, there were some brief technical difficulties early on — sorry about that — but ultimately that didn’t keep thousands of voters from clicking on their favorites.
Generally speaking, these first results are not surprising, as they skew toward the classic casts from the early years of “SnL” rather than more recent players. They fit into that oftheard narrative that the show “isn’t what it used to be,” that the first cut is the deepest.
The results also support the early identity of “SnL” as a countercultural phenomenon, a product of the break-and-remake impulses that drove so much of the 1960s. The show, which premiered on Oct. 11, 1975, was created to toy with the rules of comedy — and politics — on mainstream TV, to push beyond the outer limits, and the first guest host, George carlin, was a symbol of that.
Since the 1980s, “SnL” has become an integral part of the cultural establishment that it initially struggled against. Almost 50 years on, it is an institution that produces stars and that promotes Hollywood. Like Rolling Stone magazine, to some extent, it became the new boss and it remains so.
Some observations about the vote:
1. The original “SnL” cast won each of their face-offs except in one case: Jimmy Fallon beat Laraine Newman with 58.3 percent of the vote. I fully expected newman to win this handily, not because I dislike Fallon, but because she brought an intensity that often wins the day in “SnL” debates. Fallon was a goofball on the show, always having fun, always breaking, but lacking in the kind of edginess that defined the first cast. In some ways, now that he’s the host of “The Tonight Show,” he is one of the faces of the Hollywood machine, feeding the beast rather than trying to bust its chops or bust it wide open.
2. The other members of the first cast took their respective face-offs handily, two — Gilda Radner (95.4) and John Belushi (91.3) — winding up with 90something percent of the vote. The four other originals beat their competitors with much less extreme percentage difference: Dan Aykroyd (75.1), Jane Curtin (62.5), Chevy Chase (63.1), and Garrett Morris (55.3). Bill Murray, who joined in season two, captured 92.5 percent in his matchup.
3. One thing I’ve tried to make clear is that this contest is about the cast members’ time on “SnL,” not the work they did afterward. Some of the least effective players during their tenures on the show went on to greater glory, like Oscar winner Robert Downey Jr. and TV comedy superstar Julia Louis-Dreyfus (who weren’t included in this bracket), but that doesn’t matter as far as we’re concerned.
I suspect that after-“SnL” excellence was part of the extremely close showdown between Cecily Strong and Chris Rock, with Strong only barely beating Rock with 50.3 percent of the vote. It was the closest contest in Round 1. I love Rock, but he was at half-mast during his three seasons on the show, which has a long history of being out of touch with its black players. Strong, on the other hand, was an ace sketch performer during her 11-season run, with a bunch of great recurring characters including Gemma and The Girl You Wish You Hadn’t Started a conversation With at a party, as well as strong impressions.
4. I was surprised that Leslie Jones won against Jan Hooks, and won by a solid margin at 60.5 percent of the vote. I love Jones; she was the oldest person to join the show, and she brought lots of needed energy and edge. And I love Hooks, who always went there and beyond with her sketch characters, including brenda the Waitress and one of the Sweeney Sisters. but I assumed Hooks would win, given the breadth of her work and the strength of her era’s cast, which included her frequent collaborator phil Hartman.
5. Some of my low-key favorites were voted out, so I’d like to bid a fond farewell to Will Forte, Vanessa Bayer, Seth Meyers, Julia Sweeney, Cheri Oteri, and Taran Killam. buhbye.