What Did You Miss on Saturday Night Live This Week? Mulaney, Mulvany, and Meeting the Fockers
This week, John Mulaney hosted Saturday Night Live, or was it John Mulvaney? People were scratching their heads after Daryl Hammond, when announcing the open credits and host of last night’s referred to John Mulaney as John “Mulvaney” not once but twice.
Was it a joke? Does Hammond really not know the name of the writer who worked on the show for six years. Did Hammond pull a Ron Burgundy and read a typo as is? The intro was corrected for the YouTube version of Mulaney’s monologue, but you can’t hide from the Internet. Goddammit they are relentless. Just give the people the answers they want!
Mulaney went straight stand up for his monologue with a set that covered Patrick Stewart introducing Salt n Pepa, Millennial music, his home life, getting older, and the strange phenomenon of building a gazebo during a war. It was a strong set, and a somewhat safe set, but there’s no rule that stand up comedy sets on SNL have to generate controversy (although they often do).
It was a memorable week, not only was SNL welcoming back a favorite son (Mulaney called his time as a Saturday Night Live writer the best time of his life), but also suprising the audience with a very special cold open with guest stars Ben Stiller and Robert Deniro in the roles of Michael Cohen and Robert Mueller- or were they playing Greg Focker and Jack Byrnes? Nostalgia scores big points with SNL fans and it seems like everyone was happy with the cold open that referenced milking cats and lie detectors while taking shots at President Trumps porn star scandal.
The sketches were mostly funny– more due to Mulaney’s delivery than the sketches themselves– with our favorite being a Broadway parody sketch showing what might happen if anyone ever ordered the lobster off a menu in a diner.
If you’re not planning to watch the full show, you can skip the sketch about a student who changed his mind about participating in the walkout because he had a hardon, and you can probably take a pass on the sketch about the guy who wants to have his surgically implanted horns removed (although Mulaney was hilarious, the sketch was definitely on the meh side).
If Mulaney is looking for a new character to develop into a longer form project, he may want to keep Tawney Pockets on his list. Who cares if the sketch went nowhere, it’s all about the character.
