TIFF Review: A Wild History of TV Comedy in ‘Saturday Night’

Almost fifty years after its first broadcast, Saturday Night Live remains a cultural institution, inviting audiences to experience ninety minutes of comedy sketches and musical performances every weekend. It’s changed considerably over the decades since its premiere, but some segments, like Weekend Update, have consistently remained. It should surprise no one that the start of this long-running program wasn’t nearly as smooth as many of the finished products today look, as dramatized in Saturday Night, Jason Reitman’s frantic account of the hours just before the first broadcast.

On October 11th, 1975, Lorne Michaels (Gabriel LaBelle) is under a lot of pressure. It’s 10pm and he’s almost ready to go live with the first episode of Saturday Night. One of his stars, John Belushi (Matt Wood), hasn’t signed his contract and isn’t being terribly cooperative. His head writer Michael O’Donoghue (Tommy Dewey) is trying to sneak a handful of racy references past the stern censor (Catherine Curtin). Host George Carlin (Matthew Rhys) isn’t happy with anything. And there’s a chance, apparently, that they won’t even be able to go live, if executive David Tebet (William Dafoe) decides that it’s better just to air a rerun of Johnny Carson.

This film comes from director Jason Reitman, whose past films include Thank You For Smoking, Juno, and Up in the Air. This feels very different from all of those, evoking the look of the era and adhering to a style similar to the one popularized by Aaron Sorkin on another NBC mainstay, The West Wing. There’s so much happening without being centrally monitored, despite Michaels’ best efforts, and it seems like actually getting to air without something going wrong, like the many pre-show hijinks that do happen, would be a miracle.

Much is made of the fact that the show’s original cast was in their early twenties and represented the first generation to live through the development of television. This film assembles talent from an entirely new generation that was born long after these initial players had moved on to other projects. It’s fun to see more recently successful performers such as Cooper Hoffman, Rachel Sennott, Ella Hunt, Cory Michael Smith, Lamorne Morris, Dylan O’Brien, Andrew Barth Feldman, Nicholas Braun, and Kaia Gerber in the cast, as well as veteran actors like J.K. Simmons as the equivalent representative of the earlier generation, “Mr. Television” himself, Milton Berle, who delivers a brutal takedown of an overconfident Chevy Chase (Smith).

There are so many players in this ensemble that it’s easy to get lost keeping track of them, and the film provides few visual aids to illustrate who they are. That’s one reason that this film may prove all that much more enjoyable to those who grew up in this era and can instantly recognize clear homages to famous personalities. Those entirely unfamiliar with all the people portrayed – an unlikely event – should still find it sufficiently entertaining due to the nonstop antics; they just won’t have the added benefit of particular references that those in the know will surely appreciate.

There’s only so much this film can cover in a runtime about twenty minutes longer than a broadcast of the show it portrays, and it makes the most of every moment. This is an immersive portrait of chaos that somehow comes together to create something coherent, a tour of busy happenings linked together by their location and Michaels’ best efforts to correct them. It feels at times like a fever dream in the best way, adorned with great costumes and set pieces. Jon Batiste’s score often overwhelms and drowns out the dialogue, further enhancing the craziness. Reitman is an experienced director who brings a distinct vision to this passion project that brings another era back to life in fully entertaining fashion.

Movie Rating: 8/10

Awards Buzz: It’s hard to know who to single out from the cast aside from LaBelle, who may be on voters’ minds thanks to his launching pad in The Fabelmans. But a SAG bid for its ensemble seems distinctly possible, as do nominations for its screenplay, score, production design, editing, and maybe even Reitman and Best Picture.