THE STORY – Set in 1975, the film chronicles the events leading to the premiere of NBC’s Saturday Night, later known as Saturday Night Live.
THE CAST – Gabriel LaBelle, Rachel Sennott, Cory Michael Smith, Ella Hunt, Dylan O’Brien, Emily Fairn, Matt Wood, Lamorne Morris, Kim Matula, Finn Wolfhard, Nicholas Braun, Cooper Hoffman, Andrew Barth Feldman, Kaia Gerber, Tommy Dewey, Willem Dafoe, Matthew Rhys & J. K. Simmons
THE TEAM – Jason Reitman (Director/Writer) & Gil Kenan (Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 109 Minutes
A movie about the early days of Saturday Night Live? It sounds like a disaster. That was what everyone thought when Jason Reitman (“Juno,” “Up in the Air”) first announced this project. But, much like the disorganized sketch show, produced by a 30-year-old with no production experience and staffed by and starring squabbling counterculture druggies at the film’s center, Reitman’s “Saturday Night” ends up being far more successful than anyone expected. Shrewdly choosing to avoid a sweeping biography of the early days of SNL, Reitman and co-writer Gil Keenan (“Monster House”) opt for the “Steve Jobs” style treatment of SNL—a ticking clock, real-time recreation of the 90 minutes leading up to the first episode.
Reitman acknowledges that in interviewing the participants of that first episode, seemingly every person has conflicting stories about what the first ever episode of SNL was like. What everyone agrees upon is that the experience was pure chaos. The resulting film is a synthesis that attempts to capture the essence of that experience, even if it may not be strictly accurate. The film doesn’t have much to say beyond reiterating that SNL was a chaotic mess, but it’s a miracle it ever got to air. Instead, it focuses on creating visceral thrill ride entertainment while providing some laughs along the way.
30-year-old Lorne Michaels (“The Fabelmans” star Gabriel Labelle) scrambles through NBC headquarters trying to make sense of a live production that even he is unsure exactly how to describe. His scripts aren’t finished. His actors view themselves as serious artists who think they’re too good for the material (John Belushi, played by Matt Wood, Garrett Morris, played by “New Girl’s” LaMorne Morris) or are egotists ready to steal the spotlight from Lorne with visions of becoming the next Johnny Carson (Chevy Chase, played Cory Michael Smith from “May December”), neurotics who just want to understand what’s going on (Billy Crystal, played by Nicholas Podany, Jim Henson played by Nicholas Braun), caught in a confusing semi love triangle with Lorne (Dan Aykroyd played by Dylan O’Brien and Rosie Shuster played by Rachel Sennott), or simply insane (Andy Kauffman played by Nicholas Braun). Lorne’s crew are unprofessional and unqualified, often quitting in the middle of a rehearsal or old school studio union hands who refuse to lift a finger more than they have to. Meanwhile, there is a studio exec (Willem Dafoe) itching for an excuse to cancel the show and NBC middle-men like Dick Ebersol (Cooper Hoffman) and studio censors briefing down Lorne’s neck about the show’s content and budget. Add to the mix fires, lighting equipment collapses, fights, walkouts, drug-induced psychotic breaks, the appearance of livestock, and unwelcome appearances by a spiteful Milton Berle (JK Simmons) all in the 90 minutes leading up to the show, and you have a movie that is more “All That Jazz” or “Birdman” than the tedious recreation of “best of” SNL skits or sentimental ode to “this is why SNL matters” that some feared it would be.
With a million fires to put out, the film is undoubtedly stressful. However, that stress doesn’t translate quite as effectively as it could because, unlike other “ticking clock” movies, the film’s ending is a fait accompli. We all know the show makes it to the air and becomes a mammoth hit. As a result, getting too invested in the stress and uncertainty on display is impossible because there is no world in which everything does not work out in the end.
That said, it is difficult not to be drawn in by the chaos and nervously giggle as one problem is compounded by another. This is partly due to the considerable technical craftsmanship on display. Reitman’s go-to cinematographer, Eric Steelberg, lenses proceedings with a cinema verite feel, smartly utilizing handheld in a way that captures the propulsive motion and chaos amid a sea of neon lights and clouds of cigarette smoke. Meanwhile, editors Nathan Orloff (“John Wick: Chapter 4”) and Shane Reid (“Deadpool & Wolverine”) maintain a breakneck pace that heightens the constant chaos and refuse to let the audience catch its breath, even when there is no true suspense as to the ending. Oscar-winning composer Jon Batiste (“Soul”) provides a Birdman-esque percussion score that enhances the sense of relentless movement.
Of course, “Saturday Night” doesn’t exclusively want to capture the stress of the first night. It also wants to paint a picture of who these people are, which made SNL exist. That is difficult to do while everything is constantly in motion. Reitman and Kenan utilize snappy Sorki-esque dialogue to merge jokes and exposition to flesh out crucial background information. Most of that exposition feels as natural as it could, especially when smoothed over by plenty of amusing one-liners. However, the exposition feels unnatural and clunky at times, such as when Rachel Sennott explains Lorne’s background as an abandoned child and the contours of her own relationship with him.
Similarly, not everyone is fleshed out as a character. Many of the characters are not. There simply isn’t time to do so. And it doesn’t go unnoticed that aside from Sennott, the women characters end up with the short end of the stick as far as having fleshed-out motivations or standout moments onscreen. There is, however, a recreation of a sketch involving a scantily clad Dan Aykroyd being ogled by a trio of female construction workers, including Ella Hunt as Gilda Radnor, that warrants a special shoutout.
Fortunately, despite one or two amusing recreations, much of the comedy does not default to lazily recreating existing sketches. Instead, the humor mostly comes from punchy one-liners flung about by writers and standup comics who are bored and testing out new material. Unsurprisingly, the jokes batted about tend to often default to dick jokes, which range from amusing to eye-rolling, but it’s hard to imagine that the behind-the-scenes of SNL in the 70s was anything but a constant barrage of dick jokes. I wouldn’t hold the consistently fratty humor on display against the film because I can’t imagine it wasn’t period-accurate.
Regarding period accuracy, the production and costume design are meticulous recreations of the era. The production design, which recreates not only the backstage of SNL but also the surrounding 70s New York streets and the backstage of various other NBC shows, could net Jess Gonchor (“Hail, Caesar!,” “True Grit”) her third Oscar nomination. The makeup & hair design is mostly effective. Cory Michael Smith is uncanny, both in look and performance, as Chevy Chase, as is Matthew Wood as Belushi. Dylan O’Brien captures the essence of Aykroyd but not the look. Other members of the cast, like Nicholas Braun as both Jim Henson and Andy Kauffman, feel more like the kind of impression of a real-life figure that we might see on an actual episode of SNL rather than a performance that actually captures the essence of the real-life figure.
Of course, the most important character to nail was always going to be Lorne Michaels. After all, he’s onscreen in nearly every shot of the film. Gabriel LaBelle, at 21, is a decade too young to be the 30-year-old Lorne Michaels. The receding hairline wig and layering of five-o-clock shadow on his face do their best to age him up, but his Lorne Michaels still feels young. And at 30, Lorne Michaels was, in fact, young, but LaBelle feels too young. He mostly nails the neuroticism and borderline madness of a stressed-out Michaels on the verge of losing his show. Still, at times, he struggles to sell the film’s Sorkin-esque monologues convincingly, especially when he’s shouting or sharing the scene with the also 21-year old Cooper Hoffman, who passes more believably as the 30-year-old Dick Ebersol.
Ultimately, how Reitman chooses to tell the story of the early days of SNL was probably the most effective way the story could have been told. Is it deep? Not really. But is it much better than anyone probably expected this kind of movie to be? Absolutely. “Saturday Night” is fun and, more importantly, manages to be so without lazily repurposing iconic SNL bits for comedy. Sometimes, it feels like a cop-out to say a movie is just “fun” and nothing more, but that is precisely the case here. “Saturday Night” is a funny and well-acted piece of entertainment, best enjoyed on a Saturday night.
