Tag: john hamm

Kristen Wiig receives a star-studded induction into ‘Saturday Night Live’s’ Five-Timer’s Club

by Therese Odell, posted in saturday night live: season 49

Saturday Night Live
Kristen Wiig & Raye
April 6, 2024

Kristen Wiig is arguably one of Saturday Night Live‘s greatest former cast members — which is why it is no surprise that she is one of only five cast members who has hosted enough times to be inducted into the Five-Timers Club. (Can you name the other four?)

But despite her greatness as a cast member and her success off the show, Wiig has not had the most successful run with hosting the show. In 2016, I said the episode “was the equivalent of putting on an old sweatshirt: comfortable, familiar and warm, but not something you’ll remember even two days from now”; in May 2020 — which was in the middle of the pandemic and one of those difficult at-home episodes — Wiig only appeared in two bits, one of which was a “weird-and-not-weird-in-a-funny-way-just-weird monologue”; and in December 2020, I found the material to be “mediocre” and gave it a B-. (I don’t have her first episode from 2013 here in the Foolish archives, unfortunately.)

So I am happy to report that for this momentous occasion, the writers gave Wiig some good material to work with and supported her with a bevy of superstars, and as a result, Wiig finally hosted the Saturday Night Live episode that her talents deserved.

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Miles Teller hosts the most wildly uneven ‘Saturday Night Live’ in recent memory

by Therese Odell, posted in saturday night live: season 48

Saturday Night Live
Miles Teller and Kendrick Lamar
October 1, 2022

As I’m sure you know, this is a season of change — literally — for Saturday Night Live. Eight cast members, Aidy Bryant, Pete Davidson, Kate McKinnon, Kyle Mooney, Alex Moffat, Melissa Villaseñor, Aristotle Athari, and Chris Redd, left this season, some under … interesting circumstances.

They have added four new cast members, Marcello Hernandez, Molly Kearney, Michael Longfellow, and Devon Walker, but as anyone who has watched this show for a while knows, it takes a minute before baby cast members find their sea legs.

And so I was ready for this premiere to be uneven. Without seasoned performers like McKinnon and Bryant around to anchor what would otherwise be mediocre sketches, some bits just aren’t going to land as well.

What I was not expecting was for this episode to give me whiplash: sharp and self-aware in one moment, delivering two of the worst sketches I have ever seen on this show in the next. Sketches so bad that at the time of this writing, no one has yet taken credit for writing them. Genuinely, you guys, this episode is one of the most baffling I’ve seen to date.

Not that I’m blaming Miles Teller. I’m not a huge fan of Teller — I find him very punchable, but I understand that this must just be a me thing since he’s a huge Hollywood star. But I have to admit, he did his very best with what he was handed. When the material was good, he was very good! When the material was terrible, he still tried his hardest.

No, the blame lies squarely on the writers and head writers here. Let’s hope they can pull it together in the coming weeks.

Continue reading “Miles Teller hosts the most wildly uneven ‘Saturday Night Live’ in recent memory” →