Sunday, October 26, 2008

SNL - Jon Hamm/Coldplay - 10/25

The most obscure SNL host in recent memory turned out to be a pretty good one . . .

My favorite skit was probably the Vincent Price thing. Anyone who’s seen Sunset Boulevard will admit how great Kristen Wiig was as Gloria Swanson. Jon Hamm was a pretty great James Mason, too. Bill Hader is always a great Vincent Price – I may start using “Cheesy greasy” on a regular basis. Jon Hamm was also good playing up his Mad Men persona here and here. The Jon Hamm’s John Ham had a terrific visual with sliced ham coming off a toilet roll dispenser. He was also hilarious here:

The opening which parodied recent crazy comments by Joe Biden and John Murtha was OK but a little too long. The Obama variety show was just OK, mostly notable for the return of Ms. Paul Thomas Anderson. Seth Myers seems better off at the Weekend Update desk without Amy Poehler, who was in labor. The Will Forte sex offender skit was uncomfortable but definitely worked, but Forte’s Robocall was a little much. On the Baby Mama DVD commentary, Tina Fey says it’s easy to forget how handsome Forte is because he’s “f@cking nuts”. I couldn’t agree more.

Coldplay is better heard than seen. Chris Martin needs to not hop around so much and all of their clothes are out of some kind of winter gay pride parade. At least they played “Yellow”. Hopefully, they’ll ditch the tympani for the next album. The only thing worse than the tympani is Andy Samberg as a Rastafarian. But, for my money, the best show so far this season. B+

1 comment:

Lawyer said...

Wiig was perfect as Swanson and Hader's frustrated deadpans are always funny to me. Agreed on the length of the opening sketch and the obama variety show, although the Wright/Ayers segment was inspired.

I thought RoboCall was the best bit of the season. Samberg's rastafarian sucked except when he started singing really low when he walked by actual rastafarians who looked at him with skepticism.

Uniforms worked for the Beatles, not Coldplay. Overthinking your outfits is sort of counter to good music in my book.