First 'Saturday Night Live' 50th Anniversary Documentaries Set Premieres
The storied sketch comedy series gets ready to tell more stories
The history, the musicry, and all the hot impressions. Sunday marks six weeks until the NBC sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live holds its live 50th anniversary primetime special. Already the show is counting down the days on its socials, having spent the last week highlighting sketches from the seven most recent seasons, and compiling their monologue walkouts, musical guest intros (well, one each), and goodnights. In addition, it’s long enough known that there would be five documentaries producer about the show and its creator Lorne Michaels. Now the first two are preparing to come later this month.
The first of these is a four-part Peacock original docuseries called SNL50: Beyond Saturday Night. It will feature more than 60 contributors and alumni from across the series history, including never-before-seen footage and interviews with “unprecedented access. What it tackles is already known, with titles and synopses provided upfront. The first episode is titled “Five Minutes” and, directed by Robert Alexander, will focus on the audition process. The second is called “Written By: A Week Inside the SNL Writers Room”, a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the chaotic sketch writing process and how it makes it to air. It is directed by Marshall Curry. The third episode of the series, “More Cowbell,” focuses entirely on the famous sketch about a fictional Behind the Music episode on Blue Öyster Cult from the April 8, 2000 episode hosted by Christopher Walken. Here producer Bruce Dickinson, played by Walken, insists Gene Frenkle, played by Will Ferrell play “more cowbell” during the recording of “(Don’t Fear) the Reaper”. The episode is directed by Neil Berkeley. The finale, “Season 11: The Weird Year” is directed by Jason Zeldes and explores a pivotal year in the show’s history that “reset its direction and ensured its future”. It was Michaels’s first season back after five years gone. The cast was a 100% turnover from the previous, bringing on established names Randy Quaid, Anthony Michael Hall, Robert Downey Jr., and Joan Cusack, with Nora Dunn, Jon Lovitz and Dennis Miller also hired. If you know you know, and if you don’t, you’ll learn when the docuseries premieres on Peacock on Thursday, January 16.
Piece by Piece director Morgan Neville and Caitrin Rogers executive produce alongside showrunner Juaquin Cambron. Jonathan Formica and Allison Klein are producers “I’ve been obsessed… as long as I can remember,” Neville said in a statement. “For SNL50, I’ve been lucky to collaborate with some of my favorite independent filmmakers to tell some deeper stories… Taken together, these standalone episodes give a new perspective… and what makes it work.”
Just 11 days later, on January 27, NBC will be turning up the music thanks to The Roots drummer Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, an Academy Award winner for directing Summer of Soul (...or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised), who co-directed with executive producer and Emmy winner Oz Rodriguez. Taking up the whole primetime broadcast night will be Ladies & Gentlemen … 50 Years of SNL Music, streaming on Peacock next-day. The logline reads that Ladies & Gentlemen will “feature untold stories behind the culture-defining, groundbreaking and newsmaking musical performances, sketches and cameos of the past 50 years”. Questlove has made four appearances on SNL, most recently on the “Rap Roundtable” sketch of the December 12, 2020 episode hosted by Timothee Chalamet with musical guest Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band.
The documentary will feature interviews with musicians including Bad Bunny, DJ Breakout, Elvis Costello, Miley Cyrus, Billie Eilish and Finneas, Dave Grohl, Debbie Harry & Chris Stein, Mick Jagger, Dua Lipa, Darryl DMC McDaniels, Tom Morello, Kacey Musgraves, Olivia Rodrigo, MC Sha-Rack, Paul Simon, Chris Stapleton, Justin Timberlake, Lee Ving and Jack White. It will also have its own array of interviews with show cast and crew from across its history, including Michaels, Fred Armisen, Conan O’Brien, Eli Brueggemann, Jane Curtin, Jimmy Fallon, Al Franken, Josiah Gluck, Bill Hader, Steve Higgins, Marci Klein, Melanie Malone, Tom Malone, Mary Ellen Matthews, Eddie Murphy, Ego Nwodim, Liz Patrick, Leon Pendarvis, Lenny Pickett, Joe Piscopo, Andy Samberg, Brian Siedlecki, Akiva Schaffer, Paul Shaffer, Sarah Sherman, Howard Shore, Robert Smigel, Jorma Taccone, Kenan Thompson, Maya Rudolph, the late Hal Willner and Bowen Yang.
“Everyone knows the most famous SNL appearances, whether it’s Elvis Costello, Prince or the Beastie Boys, but they’re the tip of a huge iceberg,” Questlove said in a statement. “The process of going back through the incredible archival footage was like being in a time machine, DeLorean or other. I’m so happy I went on the trip and now get to share it with everyone.”
Ladies & Gentlemen… 50 Years of SNL Music is executive produced by Michaels, Questlove, Zarah Zohlman, Erin David, Dave Sirulnick, Jon Kamen, Meredith Bennett, Alexander H. Browne, Shawn Gee and The Roots bandmate Tariq Trotter. The special is produced by Questlove’s company Two One Five Entertainment, RadicalMedia and Michaels’s company Broadway Video. It is not yet clarified whether the “five documentaries” are the four docuseries episodes plus Ladies & Gentlemen. I anticipate finding out because it would surely be weird to stuff it all so early in the year.
Saturday Night Live will be back with new episodes on January 18 and 25 before breaking in preparation for the primetime anniversary special on February 16.
