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A Solid Show From This Super Famous Stranger

Of course, I’m aware of the name Anne Hathaway, and could easily point her out in a lineup, but I’m unfamiliar with her work because I’ve only seen her in films where she had smaller roles like in Interstellar or comedic projects like Documentary Now. I’m willing to bet that I would be a much bigger fan if I were just a tad bit younger because I always heard that she was funny. That, and her movies like The Devil Wears Prada seem like they would be things that I’d ironically watch or like as a guilty pleasure if they just came out a little earlier.

In this case, I think my unfamiliarity worked to the benefit of our host because if I actually were a bigger fan, I’d have the same reaction that I did to last night’s show hosted by Anna Faris where I wanted to see more the star of the night. Once again, I felt that there were too many political sketches that ran too long and didn’t stand the test of time, with Anne Hathaway stuck in the background as a prop, if she was even used at all. On top of that, there were several non-political sketches that also didn’t feature our host at all.

With Anna Faris, I was pissed as a fan who wanted to see more, but with Anne Hathaway, I was disappointed but nowhere near as outraged over the lack of airtime. This allowed me to enjoy the non-host moments and not be as much of a judge of how things played out versus what I expected in my head allowing me to better appreciate the host’s moments as well. Then again, I did have the expectation that this episode would be at least this good because I have seen at least one of Hathaway’s future visits to the show which confirmed the rumors I always heard about her was a funny one.

Now, I’m not only looking forward to rewatching this future visit that I just wrote of, but I’m also looking forward to rekindling my interest in film to finally work up the enthusiasm to go back and revisit our host’s non-SNL work. With that said, I think I’m ready to wrap this one up, and in order to do so, it’s now time to shift gears as I give you…

The Wicker Breakdown:

This week's show started with parody coverage of The Vice Presidential Debate that had special quest Queen Latifa moderate as Gwen Ifill, who plugged her own book, that was all about race and politics, throughout the entire debate whenever trying to hide that she was biased toward Obama. The rest of the sketch made fun of the first debate between Tina Fey as Sarah Palin and Jason Sudeikis as Joe Biden where this man focus was Biden’s straightforward way of speaking and the fact that Palin was so dumb. Of course, with this being the opening sketch, the all led to the announcement of, “Live from New York…”
Anne Hathaway then officially opened the show with a monolog about her recent tabloid scandal where her boyfriend was arrested for fraud turning him into an ex, but then went on to reassure us that she was okay because she recently met a new exciting man online. The more she talked the clearer it became that she was talking about the Nigerian prince from the classic email scam.
The Lawrence Welk Show had Fred Armisen as our titular host who was oblivious to the musical styling of the sister music group as he attempted to introduce us to their new sound. We then met Anne Hathaway, Amy Poehler, Casey Wilson, and Kristen Wiig’s tiny-handed character who sang us one of their songs.
This was followed by parody coverage of a Bailout Press Conference that had Kristen Wiig as, Speaker Of The House, Nancy Pelosi to share that she held Jason Sudeikis, as George W. Bush, accountable for the seven-hundred-billion-dollar which has affected the “hard-working slackers” all across America.
Guest House had the male members of the cast struggle to get noticed by our host along with the female cast member while at the Guest House club. Even though they struggled, there was no lack of effort as the sketch was made up of each guy showing their approach to making a move. Fred Was the first to go, and he floundered miserably. Bobby Moynihan was next, and he turned out to be such a good dancer compared to his appearance that he awkwardly managed to win over Anne Hathaway after the two showed off all their moves.
We then got another SNL Digital Short called Andy Samberg Vs. Kristen Wiig where the two found themselves in an Extreme Activities Competition. Andy won at arm-wrestling. Wiig the tied thing up with her walking with style. They tied as hat wearing. Andy won at wearing shoes on hands but then was beat by Wiig who turned out to be better and keeping chairs pinned to the ground. Andy was better at acting nature, but Wiig looked better in stripes. Will Forte the snuck in and won one for being the best at hating the ref meaning that he was the best at hating himself. Andy became a better Jane when he transformed into Anne Hathaway and was also a better human ATM putting him two ahead of Wiig who earned back one point by being better at “doing this.” Will Forte then got another point for becoming a referee in a desperate bid for human interaction which somehow made him the ultimate winner in the end.
The Killers then took to the stage to perform Human.
Once again, Amy Poehler and Seth Meyers gave us the news. This week, Will Forte sang us a song that outlined which politicians voted yay or nay for the Wall Street bailout plan.
We then got a parody of Mary Poppins where Bobby Moynihan as Michael and Casey Wilson as Jane questioned the definition of Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious which led Anne Hathaway as Mary to explain that it’s a sexually transmitted disease which affects the liver in her cheerful Ms. Poppins’ tone. She then went on to share that she suffered from the disease before going into horrific detail about how the disease actually works.
Sioux City News 3 took us to a small market new channel for a segment where they showed a bunch of YouTube blooper videos featuring crazy news flubs from their news team. Most of these bloopers were the anchors saying something terrible while unaware that their mics were on or accidents out of their hand.
Mark Wahlberg Talks To Animals was a sketch where, as the title suggests, the segment with Andy Samberg as Mark Wahlberg talking to animals, mainly about dumb things like what it’s like to be whatever animal he was talking to and if they liked his movies.
I'm Not Gay showed us Jason Sudeikis and Anne Hathaway as two roommates that were parting ways which led Sudeikis to feel the need to open up and admit to his five-year former housemate that he wasn’t actually gay and that it was all just his ploy to trick her into hooking up. Not only did we learn that Sudeikis wasn’t gay, but neither was his long-term boyfriend.
The Killers then returned to the stage to perform Spaceman.
This was followed by a fake ad for a new compilation album called The Less Provocative Songs Of Katy Perry where Casey Wilson portrayed Katy to sing unsexualized covers of some of her biggest hits.
Finally, Anne Hathaway closed the show by thanking the audience and saying her goodnights.

There’s nothing that I love more than when I go into a show with no expectations to then end up more entertained than during shows that I go into thinking that I’ll actually like much more. That was the case tonight thanks to these sketches that contained my three favorite moments of the evening. First, I loved this week’s SNL Digital Short: Andy Samberg Vs. Kristen Wiig because I loved all of the mundanely strange challenges they came up with. Next, I really liked the Guest House sketch because it blew me away that Bobby Moynihan was a confident/talented dancer. Finally, I was a fan of The Lawrence Welk Show because I’m always excited to see Kristen Wiig as her tiny-handed character.