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Posts tagged as good neighbor

Recaps

'SNL' Review: A New Hope with Chris Pratt

by | September 29th, 2014

The seasons have certainly changed at Saturday Night Live. The show's 40th season began with an episode that hardly resembled a season premiere, with little pomp or circumstance over SNL's impressive four-decade lifespan, and in its place a straightforward night of comedy that reflected a show well adjusted to its new lineup. Nerves did occasionally get the better of the performers — especially first-time host Chris Pratt, who coasted on his signature goofy charm, flashing that Andy Dwyer "oops" face a few times – but overall the episode charged forward with a leaner (and more colorful) cast, and a greater confidence in its sense of humor.

We aren't out of the woods just yet, though. SNL's live sketches suffer [...]

SNL

Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett Reminisce About Their Favorite 'SNL' Moment from Their Debut Season

by | June 13th, 2014

Here's a new video SNL put out, in which freshman cast members Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett discuss their favorite moments from their inaugural season: all of which are just them hugging each other and goofing around during the end credits goodbye.

Festivals

SXSW Announces Comedy Lineup: Bill Cosby, Good Neighbor, and More

by | February 20th, 2014

Austin-based giant arts festival South by Southwest (SXSW) just announced the comedy portion of its 2014 lineup. Here's a rundown of what the festival will feature:

  • An evening with Bill Cosby, presented by Funny Or Die
  • Above Average, Lorne Michaels's company Broadway Video's YouTube channel, holding a showcase of past and present SNL performers that features performances by Fred Armisen, Good Neighbor (Kyle Mooney, Beck Bennett, Nick Rutherford, and Dave McCary), standup from Sasheer Zamata, Chris Gethard, and host Tim Robinson
  • A live installment of The Chris Gethard Show
  • James Adomian's character show Conspiracy Theory Live with Jesse Ventura
  • Showcases from local standup juggernauts The Meltdown with [...]
SNL

Checking in with 'SNL' Halfway Through Season 39

by | January 6th, 2014

We've reached the midpoint of SNL's 39th season — one that has optimistically been called a "transitional year," but one more commonly known as "the year the shit hit the fan with that whole black woman issue." Despite the fact that the bulk of the SNL coverage in fall 2013 has zeroed in on the show's diversity controversy, SNL has given us plenty of other things to talk about, from new cast members and emerging stars on the show, to surprise cameos and celebrity hosts who defied our expectations — in good and bad ways.

Unfortunately, few of those topics have gotten much ink in fall 2013 (outside of sites [...]

SNL

What to Look Forward to in 'SNL' Season 39

by | September 26th, 2013

Season 39 of SNL kicks off this Saturday night with Tina Fey, Arcade Fire, and a mouthful of new names for Don Pardo to read off in the opening credits. After several seasons of little turnover, the cast is experiencing a major upheaval, with six — six! — new cast members to replace the departed Bill Hader, Jason Sudeikis, and Fred Armisen. This is the largest staff hire in 18 years, tying the 1995-1996 season's addition of Jim Breuer, Will Ferrell, Darrell Hammond, David Koechner, Cheri Oteri, and Nancy Walls. After the show's dismal 1994-1995 season, which saw near cancellation and the firing/resignation of 12 cast members, those six were [...]

SNL

What to Expect From 'SNL' Season 40

by | September 24th, 2014

SNL returns for its 40th season this Saturday, with host Chris Pratt, musical guest Ariana Grande, and pretty much the same cast — minus a handful of people we rarely saw in sketches anyway. Following a lackluster season, Lorne Michaels is now sticking with the tools he's got, replacing five departing cast members with only one newcomer — standup Pete Davidson — and promoting writer Michael Che to co-host Weekend Update. Meanwhile, Colin Jost will remain at the desk after taking on the job last February. It's a conservative approach, compared to last year's throw-everything-against-the-wall casting strategy, which resulted in a cast so overpopulated that some remained literal faces in the crowd at the season's [...]

SEASON IN REVIEW

The 24 Best Sketches of 'SNL' Season 39

by | May 20th, 2014

With SNL's 39th season coming to a close, we're taking a look at the past season with a series of posts examining the highs, lows, and other memorable moments from the past eight months. Here we recall some of our favorite sketches from the season — both live sketches and videos.

Season 39 of SNL certainly hasn't been the most popular among viewers, with its first half bogged down with criticism over the lack of diversity in the cast, and its second half attacked (often unfairly) for uneven writing under new head writer Colin Jost. Even though the show hired Sasheer Zamata (along with two black female writers), and the script [...]

Videolists

Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett's 'SNL' Sketch 'Inside SoCal' Started as a Web Series

by | January 27th, 2014

In August, Saturday Night Live hired actors Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett and director Dave McCary from the sketch group Good Neighbor, and in this weekend's Jonah Hill-hosted episode of SNL, they brought some characters from their web videos to the show. The last sketch of the night — a slot that's been reserved for Good Neighbor videos for most of the season — was called "Inside SoCal," and Mooney and Bennett have been doing their characters, Todd and Casey, for three years now. Mooney, who grew up in San Diego and is adept at precisely making fun of the dialogue and mannerisms of Southern California guys, wrote the original [...]

Reviews

'SNL' Review: Kerry Washington Is Ready

by | November 4th, 2013

I never thought we would see the day when SNL considered itself newsworthy enough to parody. But it happened — not in the form of a quick joke during the monologue or Weekend Update, or a walk-on by Lorne Michaels, as has happened before — but with a whole cold open sketch, wherein host Kerry Washington was compelled to play numerous black female characters (Michelle Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Beyonce) because SNL literally had no one else who could do them. The meta-sketch also included a half-apologetic text scroll from the producers promising to fix the situation, unless they "fall in love with another white guy first," and a cameo by [...]

Videolists

The Best of Good Neighbor, the Sketch Group 'SNL' Just Hired

by | August 26th, 2013

On Friday, we reported that SNL is hiring three members of the Los Angeles-based sketch group Good Neighbor for the 2013-14 season. Good Neighbor consists of writer/performers Kyle Mooney, Beck Bennett, and Nick Rutherford, who all met as students at USC, and Dave McCary, a childhood friend of Mooney's who's the group's director and editor. Mooney and Bennett have been hired by SNL as featured players and McCary as a video director, making this the second time the show has added multiple members of an existing video sketch group after The Lonely Island in 2005.

Founded in 2007, Good Neighbor quickly amassed millions of YouTube hits with their sketch videos [...]

SNL

Good Neighbor's Nick Rutherford Joins the 'SNL' Writing Staff

by | September 9th, 2014

The one member of Good Neighbor to be left out of last year's SNL hirings has now rejoined his friends on the NBC sketch show. The Comic's Comic reports that Nick Rutherford has officially joined the writing staff for SNL and has already begun working on content for the 40th season alongside his fellow Good Neighbor members Beck Bennett, Kyle Mooney, and director Dave McCary. Here's what Rutherford had to say last year on The Poundcast podcast when asked about the possibility of him being brought on the show later:

"I mean, that's all that's ever talked about is like, 'Oh, we gotta get you out here. [...]

SNL

Is 'Saturday Night Live' Becoming 'Saturday Night Pretaped'?

by | May 9th, 2014

Last year, in his third time hosting SNL, Zach Galifianakis gave us a wonderful sketch called "Darrell's House." The sketch came in two parts. The first part was an odd piece that aired live early in the episode, with Galifianakis playing a public access TV show host who barked at an off-screen director to make various specific edits in post: remove a fight with his wife, insert a shot of a laughing crowd at the Apollo, etc. But it was the second part that was the true marvel. At the end of the night, SNL aired a recut version of the sketch with exactly all of the edits Galifianakis [...]

Comedy Film School

The Evolution of 'SNL's Pretaped Sketches and Digital Shorts

by | January 23rd, 2014

Andy Samberg and the Lonely Island were not the first to produce pre-recorded material for Saturday Night Live. The show has a long tradition of commercial parodies, short films by directors like Albert Brooks and Tom Schiller, and animated work like Robert Smigel’s TV Funhouse sketches. They weren’t even the first to use the “SNL Digital Short” tag. What they did do, was usher SNL into the age of digital online content in a time when it needed to tap into that relevance more than ever. And because they were able to tap into the early rising of the online video tide, as well as produce work prodigiously [...]

SNL

Good Neighbor Member Nick Rutherford Speaks Out About Not Being Hired by 'SNL'

by | September 27th, 2013

Last month, Saturday Night Live hired everyone from the LA-based sketch group Good Neighbor onto the show except for member Nick Rutherford. Good Neighbor's Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett were hired as featured players, while Dave McCary was brought on as a director, with all of them set to debut on tomorrow night's season premiere. Rutherford, an actor/writer/standup, spoke about the situation publicly for the first time on the latest episode of DJ Douggpound's podcast, The Poundcast.

Rutherford tells his side of the story, explaining that he and Beck Bennett auditioned for Lorne Michaels individually at a showcase in LA this summer. Kyle Mooney had been flown [...]

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