'Wasn't That Special' Season Seven Bonus Material
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As the Wasn’t That Special co-hosts watch each season of Saturday Night Live, they compare notes on each episode, chatting back and forth about both popular and long-forgotten sketches. Some of the topics they discuss make it to the final podcast; others are left on the cutting-room floor.
But for those of you who join at the Executive Producer level, you will have access to Christian and Scot’s behind-the-scenes notes, as well as bonus materials the co-hosts used to prepare for the episode.
Below is the Season Seven bonus notes section, with the clips coming next week.
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Episode One: No Host/Rod Stewart
Christian: I liked this one a lot more than you did. Maybe it's just PTSD from S6.
Scot: No cold open, right to credits - No Live From New York - Don Pardo removed at Michael O'Donoghue's request (would not be gone long). Marilyn Miller is back! So is Rosie Schuster. Terry Southern is on-staff.
Little Richard Simmons Show - goes into crowd to get them involved, sings "Good Golly/Tuuti Fruuti" songs
Christian: Immediately, a different tone than S6 - just wind Eddie up and let him go. Crowd loves it.
Scot: Murphy front and center
Nuns at the Beach - Gross keeps a picture of Robert Redford under her pillow, thinks it's God. Got her degree from a correspondence nun school. God tells Duke to give Gross her pudding.
Christian: The bad sketches are so much better this year. Duke is actually good - the SCTV training is obvious.
Scot: The premise is the sketch.
Prose and Cons - Best authors come from prisons - taped segment - Eddie poem about killing landlord
Christian: This is perfection. I believe there actually was a movement to make inmates into poets, and this mocks how stupid that is - like Tom Wolfe's "Radical Chic." And "Kill My Landlord" actually became a catchprase in the early 80s.
Michael Davis juggles a machete, an axe, a cleaver - enormous amount of lead-up to juggling
Scot: Crowd is laughing just a little too much/too loud all night. Wouldn't shock me if Ebersol seeded the audience a bit.
Christian: The axe story is an old one told by historical collectors about Abraham Lincoln's axe - it sold for millions of dollars, even though since Lincoln's time the head had been replaced three times and the handle twice.
SNL NewsBreak w/ BDMurray & Mary Gross - C. Everett Koop will take office no matter what "term begins at nomination, not confirmation" - cutaway to Piscopo as Snyder speaking Spanish - Raheem Abdul Muhammad on movies; why no blacks in movies?
Scot: First take: Boy, Mary Gross seems wildly miscast here - Eddie's commentary is fine, I wasn't blown away & he broke twice - not an encouraging start.
Christian: Pretty good! The jokes have now improved to "average" and Eddie was good. His breaking is endearing.
Kazurinsky & Duke in bed - creepy one-night stand - Kaz is weird and annoying, Duke's dad dies - Kaz wants to help.
Scot: Has a really hard time finding its legs, bouncing all over in feel and tone.
Christian: I think being with a one-night stand when something traumatic happens is a good premise, and it's cringey enough to keep me watching. Not great, but perfectly average.
AND THERE'S A PART TWO - at the funeral for Dad - Gross and Rosato are here, Rosato wants Dad's shirt & shoes - Rod shows up.
Christian: WHY DO I LIKE THIS SO MUCH? I legit LOL'ed at the horror of it all. And didn't realize this was a part two.
Scot: Rosato throws off a Belushi-esque vibe - Boy, I just don't think this is playing like they wanted it to.
Episode Two: Susan Saint James
Scot: Still very rough here, but avoids the worst excesses of S6.
McDonald & Wife - joke is all words have "Mc" on front - solving crimes in bed
Scot: Worst sketch of the Ebersol era thus far.
Buh-Weet Sings
Scot: It's just a commercial, not a sketch, which probably prevents it from getting to a grade of 5.
Christian: It's a 5. An all-timer, on the top five list of sketches of Eddie's career.
Bizarro World - Clearly an O'Donoghue thing - Falwell wants more sex & violence, ugliest girl contests, be cruel to animals week
Scot: I think it's all a big set up to get to the Reagan part, which is quite good.
Christian: A noble failure. Also, a bit prescient - appointing someone to the Department of Education that wants to get rid of it? Republicans have been running on this for 40 years. Did Betsy DeVos ever take that position?
Honeymoon - Rosato finds out St. James is a virgin - he freaks out about the situation
Scot: Rosato is going to drive me nuts, isn't he? -this has to be Miller's sketch.
Andy Warhol on Make-Up
Christian: Yeah, this one was a little confusing.
Scot: These are going to be terrible every time out.
Alan Alda sensitivity training book - "Nowadays women put out for wimps. Alan Alda can help make you one"
Scot: How many bar scenes do we have tonight? - The pacing is completely off in this one.
Christian: I like the randomness, but...just one joke.
Episode Three: George Kennedy
Christian: Just because Kennedy was game doesn't mean he was necessarily good.
Mr. Robinson's Neighborhood - wife walked out, so glad the bitch is gone - Landlord stops by w/ eviction notice - land of make believe to visit the President
Christian: Eddie gets political.
Kennedy sings "53 at Studio 54"
Scot: OK, I like this one. Kennedy is game.
Christian: Oh man, no (also, I am against Kennedy being 3 years older than me).
Velvet Jones debut - school of technology - "I Wanna Be a Ho" “Be somebody. Be a ho!”
Scot: Eddie is putting out killer, legendary moments every week this year.
Christian: Eddie got complaints from the NAACP on this one. (But not Buckwheat for some reason.)
Hired Hand - Rosato has many scars, Ms. Duke has some interest, apparently - sexual tension - lots of raping and pillaging discussed
Scot: They try a lot of stuff in this one. Some hi/low comedy, some musical stingers, a semblance of a plot, a twist at the end, problems with props (water). In the end, though, it just doesn't come together as it should.
Christian: Completely anchorless - I really like Duke though.