SNL: S04E20... HOST: BUCK HENRY... DATE: MAY 26, 1979
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The Wicker Breakdown:
First, the show starts with a Mr. Bill sketch where he gets tickets to see the final episode of season four then ventures over to Rockefeller Center to join the audience, getting abused all the way, of course. He gets to his seat just in time to announce, "Live from New York..."
The opening credits then start to roll but then are almost instantly interrupted by Jane who is angry that a piece of Play-Doh was allowed to make the opening announcement before she was despite the fact that she has put in four years with the show. Belushi comes in to defend her only to steal her thunder and make a second announcement of, "Live from New York..." to officially kick off the show.
Buck Henry then hits the stage for the tenth time as some form of host considering he’s also co-hosted and pretty much hosted the Anyone Can Host special. His opening monolog is about how great he feels to break through via SNL despite being a behind the scenes entity throughout the rest of his career. He then points to a section of the stands where audience members have electrodes attached to their heads. The idea is that this technology will cause the screen to grow or shrink depending on how much interest they have in what is being said. Every time Buck starts his smart talk, the screen begins to shrink, then when he switches to simpleton humor the screen returns to the standard size. I was hoping that this effect would come into play throughout the episode, but it ended up being just an opening joke.
The next sketch was a fake ad for a getaway camp called Ray's Disco Roller Fishing Park which is a place where campers can take advantage of all three activities as you disco dance in roller skates while trying to reel in a fish.
Being that this is a Buck Henry show, we need to have a Samurai sketch. This time the two interact in Samurai Bakery as Buck places an order for his brother's wedding cake and the Samurai is up to is usual antics as he tries to help out.
Next, they play at least a full minute from a mini-series called Blind Ambition where Rip Torn played Nixon, and they take on his tendencies to tape every conversation that he had while working in the White House. We then pull back from the TV to see Aykroyd as Nixon watching the show with his family. Nixon claims that this series is based on the transcripts of his tapes and they totally missed the tone of the conversation. We then cut to a reenactment as Nixon explains how he and Buck, who plays the campaign manager, were just joking in an attempt to get a laugh making the tone of the reenactment much sillier than the context of the conversation.
Bette Midler then hits the stage to perform Married Men which was performed just last episode by Linda Ronstadt and Phoebe Snow.
Once again, Jane and Bill anchor the news. At this point, I forgot how awkward Bill was during his early days behind the desk, now he's a real pro. This week Garrett Morris gets a segment to discuss whether or not The Rolling Stones were racist based on a line in their latest album about how black women just want to have sex all night. It turns out, Garrett just wants to know where these black women are. We also get a segment with Roseanne Roseannadanna where she starts out talking about the struggles of holiday travel during the gas shortage only to end up rambling about an incident she witnessed with Jane getting sand in her bikini when the two had a run-in at the beach.
Then the show falls apart for a segment with the return of Buck Henry's creepy uncle character that I've already mentioned above, and whether or not he actually wrote this, I blame the disturbing failure on Mr. Mike.
Franken and Davis then do a routine about Franken becoming a Hare Krishna. He claims that despite having more of a flowery delivery, this change hasn't affected his comedy. Davis however disagrees and seeks revenge by chopping off Franken's Krishna man bun which gets a very violent reaction.
11. We then head over to The Olympia Cafe which is only taking to-go orders as they work around the mess of what appears to have been a fire. It's hard to tell whether or not this is supposed to be an insurance fraud sketch, but Belushi is definitely trying to take advantage of the situation adding items to the claim any time the claims adjuster makes the slightest of question/suggestion. It then turns out that the policy is void when they admit that Murray lives under the sink. Just when it seems like Belushi is about to snap, he announces that he's Greek, so his solution is to dance, and dance they do.
Bette Midler the returns to the stage to sing Martha.
This week's short film was a pretty entertaining mini-mockumentary about the cloning of human babies.
Not For Transsexuals Only is an interview show hosted by Jane where she interviews a couple that switched genitalia as if this were a transplant situation instead of reconstructive surgery.
Finally, Buck Henry hits the stage for the traditional goodnights, only to introduce Mr. Mike who does another one of his dumb impersonations of celebrities getting needles jammed into their eyes. This week it's Elvis, but that doesn't really matter because it's the same dumb joke either way.
