SNL Transcripts: Saturday Night Live in the ’90s: Pop Culture Nation: 05/06/07

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 Saturday Night Live Transcripts


  Special: Saturday Night Live in the ’90s: Pop Culture Nation



























Weekend Update with Norm MacDonald: 10/07/95

Norm MacDonald: Thanks! I’m Norm MacDonald, and now the fake news. Well, it is finally official: murder is legal in the state of California.

Tina Fey: Norm was, probably, the last dangerous cast member. In the good way. In, like, you didn’t know — he might say whatever he wanted.

John Goodman: It was the perfect tone for “Update”, for me, because Norman couldn’t give a damn about anything.
Weekend Update with Norm MacDonald: 12/03/94

Norm MacDonald: Kenny G has a Christmas album out this year. [waves] Hey, happy birthday, Jesus! Hope you like crap!

Don Ohlmeyer: Norm did, I thought, a terrific job for a couple of years. And then, that season… it just was flat.

Jim Downey: We wanted to be like a punk segment, sort of like — like — in the 70’s, where it was very bare-bones and — and — and not — and no cuteness.
Weekend Update with Norm MacDonald: 09/27/97

Norm MacDonald: Well, according to published reports, Michael Jackson’s wife is now pregnant with the pop star’s second child. Asked why he decided to become a father again so soon, Jackson explained that his seven-month-old son is starting to lose his looks. [ some boos ]

Norm MacDonald: [ chuckling ] So, it wasn’t a studio crowd-pleasing… effect. It was never aimed at the studio audience, you know? It was always aimed directly at me. I just wrote what I knew was funny.
Pearl Jam performs “Not For You”: 04/16/94

Pearl Jam: [ singing ]“This is not for you
This is not for you
This is not for you
Oh, never was for you… noooooooo!!!”

Weekend Update with Norm MacDonald: 03/15/97

Norm MacDonald: [ finally realizes he’s looking into the wrong camera, looks into the live camera ] You know, it would probably be better if I was over on this camera…

Rick Ludwin: There was a period when Norm was not as well-prepared as he probably should have been… and… “Update” wasn’t ready to be seen at the run-through —
Weekend Update with Norm MacDonald: 03/15/97

Norm MacDonald: [cheers and applause, the view shifts, a grinning Norm turns to the live camera] Okay. Well, now that I’m over on this camera, it’d probably be better if you put the cards over here! [greater cheers and applause]

Rick Ludwin: — which we viewed as a problem.

Lorne Michaels: But… you know, I’ve been there a long time, so I can tell you that there’s some consistency to the disorganization.

Ken Aymong: Don didn’t want Norm doing “Update” any more. [ he shrugs his shoulders ] You know, I wanted it to stop raining. You know? I mean, I didn’t take it as any more than that.

Don Ohlmeyer: You know, having come from a producing and directing background, you know, I always used to hate… network executives who would tell you how to fix a show.

Lorne Michaels: Don had come out of producing, so there was a lot more “I’d do it this way.”

Rick Ludwin: Lorne was always professional, and he would always listen politely, but he would ultimately ignore all the suggestions, which would… make some of the people on the West Coast, uh — angry.
Pearl Jam performs “Not For You”: 04/16/94

Don Ohlmeyer: And I said to Lorne, you know, “We’ve gotta fix this,” and he says, “Well, you know, they’re doing the best they can do.” I said, “Well, if that’s the best they can do, then we’ve gotta get somebody else in there.” And Lorne fought me on it. It was the only thing — in the time that I was there — that we really had knock-down, drag-out arguments about, and he felt that there needed to be a change, but he wanted to wait until the end of the season.


Jim Downey: They pretended to believe that it was going to be an enormously popular decision, for which the public would thank them, and, in fact, the human emnity of the TV critics was really something to see. Time Magazine had a thing about it, and even printed up a little postcard to send to NBC to — to dump on them.

Michael Shoemaker: When it happened, that Norm wasn’t taken off of “Update”, um, I don’t think that any of us expected that that could happen, because, before or since, it’s never been that kind of network. Complete interference. And it came at such a crazy time.

Jim Downey: Mike Shoemaker calls me on the phone and says, “Two things — uh, you and Norm are fired, and, uh, Chris Farley’s dead.”

Michael Shoemaker: It was the Christmas break… Farley had just died… and, I think, Lorne was at the funeral… and… it just all kind of happened.
Garbage performs “When I Grow Up”: 03/20/99

Garbage: [ singing ]“Trying hard to fit among you
Floating out to wonderland
Unprotected
God I’m pregnant
Damn the consequences.

When I grow up
I’ll be stable
When I grow up
I’ll turn the tables.”

Lorne Michaels: I said, at the time, that it was the child that John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd didn’t have. But he — he — you know, when he was a boy, he actually taped his eyebrow up, to try and, uh, look like John Belushi.

Tom Davis: For those of us who lived through the Belushi thing — we just saw it coming. And it was just like looking at a puppy next to a highway.

Al Franken: It’s not like he didn’t try, it’s not like he didn’t try. He must have done… twelve rehabs, or something like that.
Permission to Host: 10/25/97

Chris Farley: But that was then — this is now! This time, I’m not just talking the talk! I’m gonna be walking the walk on this one!

Tim Meadows: [ pats Chris’ back ] And he’s got a GREAT sponsor, who’s here to keep an eye on him.

Chris Farley: Yeah!

[ Chevy Chase enters Lorne’s office ]

Chevy Chase: Hey, Lorne!

Chris Farley: Yes!

[ the audience cheers ]

Lorne Michaels: You’re — you’re Farley’s sponsor? You just got out of Betty Ford!

Chevy Chase: [ chuckles ] Well, that’s neither here nor there, Lorne! The important thing is that Chris has been doing great! [ rubs Chris’ head ] He’s been completely sober for — what? — two weeks.

Chris Farley: Six!

Chevy Chase: Six! Whatever. But what counts is: Chris is not just talking the talk… he’s walking the walk.

Mark McKinney: He had big American fame — BIG american fame. I don’t know, I think that’s pressure. It sounds great, you know, for everyone who dreams of fame, if that’s what you want. But I remember just looking at him, and going, “Uh, that must be tough to handle.”

Alec Baldwin: I think it was John Goodman who once said to me that it’s very hard for the Falstaffian Man to weather that kind of response they get from the public. I mean, Chris told me the same thing. Chris said everywhere he went, he would walk into bars and restaurants for years — just his entire life — and he never paid for a drink. Everywhere got their arm around him, they wrapped ihm in a headlock, they were hugging him and saying, “You! You! Your drink’s on me!” It was like the party just unpacked right in front of you.


Tim Meadows: The last month or so before he passed — I don’t think about that stuff as much. You know? I think about the guy who used to drop his pants when I was coming offstage back at Second City, uh — just to make me laugh! [ he laughs ]

Ken Aymong: It was pretty rough stuff. And then, you know, Phil Hartman, I mean, that’s — that’s beyond words.

Norm MacDonald: They were, like, the happiest guys about performing. They both have their greatest joy in just making people laugh than any performer I’ve ever seen.
Coming up next… Norm Vs. The Network

SNL Transcripts

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Author: Don Roy King

Don Roy King has directed fourteen seasons of Saturday Night Live. That work has earned him ten Emmys and fourteen nominations. Additionally, he has been nominated for fifteen DGA Awards and won in 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020.

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