December 5, 1981 – Tim Curry / Meat Loaf (S7E7) [THROWBACK REVIEW]

Cold Opening – Texxon

• This was back during the show’s first ten years, where we would regularly have disclaimers at times instead of traditional cold opens.
• Short & absolutely sweet, and the Karen Silkwood line is a killer, as well as mentioning the “creep” at SNL who writes the jokes about them.

Rating: ****

Opening Montage

• Let me just say that I absolutely LOVE this montage, one of my top 3 personal montages in SNL history (alongside 88-90 & 18-20), and the black & white style, as well as the host & musical guest bumpers are absolutely great & add to the overall vibe.

Monologue

• Already, Tim is coming off very likable and comfortable on stage, which shouldn’t come as a surprise due to his fabled career on stage before & after this hosting stint.
• Great to see an Eddie walk-on as a janitor.
• This was around the time where they would put Eddie in the monologue alongside the host, capitalizing from his immense popularity with viewers around the time (which would grow even more with the next there seasons).
• Fun interplay between Tim & Eddie, especially the memorable part with Tim applying white shoe polish on Eddie’s face, to complete his new image in not appearing as a black man in public. Needless to say, this is very similar to a certain legendary Andy Breckman-written short in Eddie’s hosting stint from season 10.
• Funny look from towards the camera with all that white polish around his face.

Rating: ****

Mick!

• A very fun & ambitious idea for a musical sketch, and Tim Curry is an ideal choice to play Mick Jagger.
• A fantastic Mick Jagger impression from Tim, and I could see some facial resemblance as well.
• Fun cameo from Frank Reynolds, who’s absolutely fitting into the sketch & adding to the fun vibes.
• Eddie is stealing this whole sketch with his duet as Buckwheat with Tim’s Mick Jagger, which is getting a great audience reaction.
• Boy, Tony Rosato looks hilarious as Rip Taylor, which I guess is also fitting here considering how he frequently was in telethons & TV specials around that time period.
• The sketch is getting too long for my likes, but the performances, especially from Tim Curry, are absolutely making up for that.
• As always, a great vocal impression from Joe, this time doing his spot-on Frank Sinatra impression, who feels welcomed in this musical sketch.
• An overall very strong & fun sketch. And even when I had a problem with the length, the energy, performances, and pacing more than made up for that. Tim was outstanding here.

Rating: ****1/2

Illegitimate Son

• A famous sketch where Eddie pretends to be President Reagan’s illegitimate son.
• I’m loving the silliness of this sketch, and Eddie is selling this premise with total ease, his natural charisma & likability is making the sketch run by smoothly.
• Funny message from Eddie towards Reagan, and the hilarious photoshopped image of Reagan’s “secret” family is a great touch.
• Overall, just as great as I recall it being. Easily amongst Eddie’s best sketches.

Rating: ****

The Trouble With Fred

• Once again, short & sweet. Even though I could see some not liking the punchline with Fred’s “trouble” being that he is dead. Yet, it worked fine for me.

Rating: ***

Frank & Papa

• I believe this is Tony’s Italian father character, which first appeared in the season 6 finale. I do appreciate the attempt from Tony at what is clearly a slice-of-life piece drawn from his own background. Even though I’ve heard that he often would rely on Italian characters throughout his short-lived tenure. From what I’ve seen from him in this season, he’s been a pretty reliable, solid, and a consummate professional as a performer, making it even more baffling that Ebersol would fire him.
• Very strong, fast-paced, and sharp back-and-forth line deliveries between Tony & Tim.
• Funny sudden entrance from Robin as the Italian mom coming in to start arguing with Tony & Tim.
• An overall good sketch, but was hurt by its unnecessary length. Tony & Tim shined here at least, as well as Robin’s sketch-stealing walk-on which gave this sketch a nice boost.

Rating: ***

SNL Newsbreak

• UGH.
• Another ugh at that painfully unfunny “falling letters” gag which would be repeated ad nauseam in this season; quite possibly, alongside the Charles Rocket Update, the ultimate Nadir for the news segment in SNL history.
• I love Mary, and what she brought to SNL, as her tenure is criminally underrated, but she’s terrible as an Update, excuse me, Newsbreak anchor. And the romance subplot with BDM is NOT working.
• Ah, here comes Tim to save me from this dull segment.
• Tim is cracking me up already as Prince Charles and is bringing some much-needed energy to this segment, kinda like how Will Forte & Fred Armisen would save me from the dire Fey/Poehler Update editions (another terrible era for the news desk) with their terrific commentaries.
• Christine seems well cast as Princess Di, even when she’s barely contributing anything to this commentary. Yet again, that’s nothing new, considering how women were treated during this SNL era.
• The return of Joe’s regular sports commentary segment, which is thankfully adding to the nice energy level that this episode’s has been in.
• Bryant Gumbel cameo, and some fairly fun interactions between him & Joe.
• The great vibes from tonight’s episode continue, as we now get an Eddie Murphy commentary.
• As usual, some great ad-libs from Eddie towards the studio audience, and I always love it when Eddie interacts with them during his commentaries.
• Thank God for the three commentaries that actually saved this Newsbreak for me, as without them, the dire & dull feel of these would’ve been exposed even moreso than usual.

Rating: *** (mostly for the solid commentaries)

Tim And Meat’s One-Stop Rocky Horror Shop

• A famous sketch from this season.
• Great to see Meat Loaf in his obligatory sketch appearance, especially after that great musical performance from him earlier.
• Really fun & infectious energy here. Meat Loaf is especially shining & is a very solid pair alongside Tim. Then again, as they were in the classic Rocky Horror Picture Show.
• When Meat Loaf is showing off the newspaper, you could tell Tim is trying hard not to break character. It feels so rare to see a pro like Tim Curry struggling to keep a straight face.
• Some fun walk-ons throughout the sketch, especially with Tim Kazurinsky wearing the Frank-N-Furter outfit which basically steals the sketch for me.

Rating: ****

The Zucchini Song

• Ah, a beloved classic.
• Yet another very fun & silly sketch concept tonight, with Tim singing his innuendo-filled song about a certain man’s famous zucchini (I do recall the Bernadette Peters episode, from the same season, also having some silly concepts, including the famous Johnny Keep Your Gun Clean musical number).
• I’m loving the old-school, burlesque/vaudeville feel here, which Tim is obviously more than a natural for.
• So many laughs to be had from this song, and Tim is giving yet another outstanding performance tonight. His expressions as well are slaying me, perhaps even more than the cleverly-written song itself.
• Very nice audience participation bit, and I absolutely love the part where Tim is pointing at the lyrics on the board (gorgeous set design, by the way). This moment has always stuck with me from this episode.
• An overall true SNL classic, I was laughing & having a blast in every second throughout this masterpiece.

Rating: *****

If Reagan Had Survived The Assassination

• Joe is generally a great impressionist, but his Dan Rather is kinda “off” for me, and is nowhere near as memorable as the Darrell Hammond version.
• An interesting alternate timeline to this sketch with it discussing Reagan’s policies as if he died from his assassination attempt.
• Some of the points here seem to be more of an attack against Reagan’s policies, which I get, even though there are still some good jabs & point critique to be found here.

Rating: ***

Segments Ranked From Best to Worst

The Zucchini Song

Mick!

Tim And Meat’s One-Stop Rocky Horror Shop

Texxon

Illegitimate Son

Monologue

Frank & Papa

If Reagan Had Survived The Assassination

The Trouble with Fred

SNL Newsbreak

Final Thoughts:-

• A classic episode, and easily the finest of this up-and-down season, and one of the strongest from both the Ebersol era & 80s SNL. So many things to rave about here, and a large part of the episode was rated in the impressive 4-5 stars range from me. Tim Curry, was, as expected, an absolutely phenomenal host tonight who brought a great deal of energy & gave many fantastic performances, especially in “Mick!” and “The Zucchini Song”. Adding also to the episode’s quality is our musical guest Meat Loaf, whose musical performances (especially the first one), were great & helped as well with the fun vibes tonight.
• There were several alterations added to my copy of the episode, such as “In The News”, and “Reach Out”, the latter is a great dark film from the James Coburn episode later in the season that I opted not to review, as I decided to stick to the episode’s original running order.

Up Next:-

• Dabney Coleman / The Cars.