Saturday Night Live: “Andy Samberg/St. Vincent”
(Episode 39.21)

In its troubled thirty-ninth season, Saturday Night Live goes out the way it started: by bringing back one of its favorite alumni and a cavalcade of his friends. This season’s premiere with Tina Fey wasn’t as strong as might’ve been expected, so I was understandably wary of Andy Samberg’s first hosting gig. Yet by mixing a ton of cameos with the up-and-coming stars of the current cast, “Andy Samberg/St. Vincent” became a strong combination of the last generation of SNL stars and the current cast.
For perhaps the only time this season, the topical cold open was actually pretty funny. As hinted at in the news, SNL decided to take on the Solange & Jay Z elevator fight, but without the real Solange (as speculated). Jay Pharoah and Sasheer Zamata as Jay Z and Solange are fine, but what really makes this skit work is the elevator footage with the audio on, which reveals that Solange was just trying to get a spider off Jay. Also, the appearance of Maya Rudolph, one of twelve cameos for the night, as Beyoncé was a welcome hilarity and sort of set up the blending of casts that would highlight the evening. It’s also crazy to think that this skit couldn’t have been done earlier this year—so good job SNL for adding some diversity to your cast. Keep it up.
Samberg’s first monologue doesn’t rely on singing or the audience interrupting, so right away that’s a plus. Apparently in his seven seasons on SNL, Samberg completed only 23 fewer impressions than Bill Hader, which is surprising since (as Samberg points out) he did 100 digital shorts and about 6 live sketches. With a little help from Seth Meyers, Samberg tries to beat Hader’s record by running through a list of impressions of everyone from ALF to Seth Meyers mocking Samberg. Of course as soon as Hader is name-dropped, you know he’s going to come out and reclaim his title, but completely unexpected is Martin Short running out to help Hader celebrate.
“Camp Wicawabe” seems like an attempt to do a younger version of “Girlfriends Talk Show,” but is far more adorable. Aidy Bryant and Kate McKinnon are two ten-year-olds who are the troublemakers at their summer camp. Pushing the boundaries of adorableness is Kyle Mooney as their six-year-old “musical director,” who plays the xylophone and has a slight speech impediment. It’s much more fun than it probably sounds on paper, and I’d be surprised if we don’t see more of these characters next season.
Oh man, I forgot how much I love seeing those sweet words “An SNL Digital Short.” It was a given that Samberg would come back with a digital short, but we were surprised with two of them. The first featured Samberg playing DJ Davvincii, who leaves his adoring crowd wondering when the bass will drop. Practically the entire cast is in the crowd and when the bass does finally drop and Lil Jon appears on a computer saying it’s time for everyone to “Get Turned Up To Death,” everyone dies from exploding heads and Davvincii’s laser eyes. The build to this crazy conclusion is almost as exciting for us as waiting for the beat to drop is for the crowd.
The second short—which surprisingly happens later in the night—brings back The Lonely Island as Samberg and Jorma sing about how they like to hug girls and then leave them hanging. Tatiana Maslany makes a quick cameo and Pharrell’s appearance makes this about the 500th song he’s appeared on in the last year. Of the two shorts, this one is probably more likely to go viral, but it doesn’t have the payoff that Davvincii has.
Last week’s Charlize Theron episode brought the weird in a big way, but Samberg brings his own brand of weirdness as evidenced in the skits that center around him. First he plays Quasimoto as a Confident Hunchback—the idea of that alone is pretty great. Watching Quasimoto hit on various girls at a bar in 1482 while wisecracking about his hunch is so strange that it works.
Similarly, we get to see Legolas from The Hobbit trying to order at Taco Bell. This is classic Samberg, as he takes a well-known character or person and throws him in a situation that is immediately hilarious. (See also “Mark Wahlberg Talks To Animals.”) This is also the sort of skit where—if you don’t laugh solely at the title—this probably won’t be the thing for you.