Mr. Six on SNL, in 2022

My expectation is that no guest host is going to be a "good" actor in the show. There's no time to have any real craft to your performance unless it's a well-developed idea you had prior to the week. Table reads are I think on Tuesday for something that may not even make it into the show. Though someone's earlier point definitely supports recurring characters for that reason.

But all guest hosts have the same prep time, yet some perform far better than others. De Niro has always been one of the weakest in the skits. He's just wooden, which to me may be indicative of just how much he works on his movie roles. Someone like Timberlake, on the other hand, is somewhat of a natural, and kills it nearly every time.

RCMAC said:

Having said that- the show is known for flying by the seat of the writers’ pants and cancelling skits and adding new ones at the dead last minute. There’s a good possibility that the lines you memorized will be cut. This skit looks like it was in from the start, just on costumes and makeup alone.

There are occasions when the performers are told as they're waiting in the wings to head on stage for a skit that some lines in the skit have been changed after dress, and they'll have to rely on the cue cards. Not saying that happened here - Lizzo was pretty awful throughout the show in my opinion - but in many cases learning lines for this show ranges from impractical to impossible.

David Spade and Dana Carvey host the Fly on the Wall podcast where they frequently interview fellow SNL alum, and while it's a meh podcast (Carvey is not a good host), there's a lot of great behind the scenes stuff on there.

That's interesting, because it comes up frequently on the Smartless podcast (Will Arnett, Jason Bateman and Sean Hayes) as well. They've all hosted, and Will used to be married to Amy Poehler, so he's very familiar with how things go there. Any of their guests who've been on the show inevitably talk about it, and how it's just so different than anything else they ever do.

Carvey was rarely funny to me. Bit of a rant here (weird coming from a guy who rarely watches SNL), but that's about half of what turns me off about the show: the cast. The writing (the other half) has always been hit or miss (mostly miss if you're talking about the show from beginning to end), but there are far more actors whom I don't find very funny than those I do. That said, the writing has a lot to do with that, because there are some I could barely stand whose careers I really enjoyed post-SNL. Carvey was not one of them...and I kind of liked Wayne's World for a minute.

That kind of leads into another point: the recurring characters. Church Lady was kind of funny the first couple times, but as with a lot of things that become an instant hit, they're driven into the ground and beaten to death before long. Granted, not to everyone, as evidenced by the cheers every time a recurring character appears for even the 700th time, but definitely to me. Wayne's World was a funny concept and actually made an ok movie for its time (not worthy of a sequel), and Carvey's character was a decent sidekick, but for me, Myers pretty much carried that flick. I've always found Carvey's humor pretty contrived and forced, during and after his stint on SNL.

Nothing will ever touch the classic Greek restaurant sketch, for me.

You lika da juice, eh? I get you more juice..

Justin Timberlake and The Rock are solid gold when they host. The music guest is almost always terrible and a lot of times looks like a Vegas strip show.

Vater said:

I've always found Carvey's humor pretty contrived and forced, during and after his stint on SNL.

Did you ever watch his stand-up? I mean, regardless of anyone's Wayne's World opinions, this still holds up today:

But yea, contrived and forced ;)

What a hack!

Sucks.

No, seriously. I just don’t find the man all that funny. And watching a few minutes of that special just reconfirmed it...and possibly even weakened your argument (I was actually expecting to at least chuckle at something, anything). Contrived, forced, his delivery makes me cringe…I dunno…sorry my opinion about an entertainer is not the same as yours?

I agree that the musical guest is almost always terrible anymore... honestly there are so many of them that perform that I haven't even heard of, but that just may be because I don't listen to modern pop music.

^ Apology accepted. ;)

Also, I guess I'm old because this is still (fast forward to the 2:05 mark) one of my favorite SNL musical guest appearances. From...you know...those glory 90 years.

Halsey has been an amazing musical guest. Taylor Swift is usually solid too, and I don't even like her. Also, the Foos, Sarah Bareilles.

I don't know if you saw the Benedict Cumbersnatch episode the week before last, but it was really good, pretty much end to end. Arcade Fire was good, too. Just watched it on Hulu.