Buckwheat Lives – The show opens with Alfalfa (Gross)
reading a “Blondie” comic strip in the paper. As he turns to the sports page,
he notices someone who looks an awful lot like his old pal Buckwheat in a crowd
scene. Then, we are shown the “footage” of his shooting for the umpteenth time
as Alfalfa concludes that “Buckwheat is alive!” and the caption reads “To Be
Continued…” For an opening, this just seemed like filler. There was very little
in terms of jokes, but it was a good way to hook those who tuned in to see
Eddie. C+
Monologue – Murphy comes out on stage and strikes a few
triumphant statue poses. He then states after the success of “48 Hrs” and
“Trading Places”, he felt like he was too good for SNL and the show was
starting to get bad again. He basically took on the mentality that he would
never have to degrade him by appearing on the show again…until he made “Best
Defense.” That movie turned out to be so bad, it took off some of his clout as
an “actor” in Hollywood but he only did it because they paid him out the ass.
He called up NBC and they let him host the Christmas show. Luckily for Eddie,
the script for “Beverly Hills Cop” came in which he filmed before Christmas…but
unfortunately, it was too late for Eddie to back out now. Eddie did a great job
of poking fun at his early career here. I also liked it when he tried to
prepare us for those two or three sketches that may just flat out suck. Also,
it was a little strange hearing Eddie say that he had a great week and saying
the “new people” were great when, they weren’t exactly “new” to comedy…just
“new” to SNL…and apparently, Eddie didn’t quite recognize that. Someone posted
a Playboy interview with Crystal from around 1988 when he mentioned that this
was “an uncomfortable week” and “one of the two times he really got mad that
year.” Apparently, Eddie was rather disrespectful and would either skip
rehearsals or show up late and was very unapologetic about it. Crystal also
said Murphy acted like a “heavyweight champion” and treated him, Guest and
Short like they were “young schmucks” when they were really established
comedians who had been famous longer than him. Some say the real reason Murphy
didn’t show up to the 15th anniversary special was because Crystal was going to
be there. He did backhandedly praise Murphy in the interview however saying he
is a fine actor and character performer, but not a good comedian because he is
was too vulgar and didn’t seem to respect his audience. This is something
interesting to think about, but otherwise this was a fine monologue.
White Like Me – Eddie segues to this from the monologue
saying before they get into the laughs tonight, he wants to show the audience
“something he takes very seriously.” In this parody of John Howard Griffin’s
“Black Like Me”, Murphy decides to go undercover as a white person so he can
fully experience racial prejudice in America. He finds that when white people
are alone together, they encourage each other to give things away for free and
live it up. Jim Downey can be seen as a newsstand owner encouraging him to
“take” a newspaper without paying him. After his experience, Eddie invites a
few of his black friends to share his “white“make up. What else can I say? In
terms of SNL’s filmed pieces, this was an undisputed all time classic!
Everything about this was executed perfectly. I loved how Eddie’s preparation
for the role consisted of merely watching Dynasty (“their butts are real tight
when they walk…they keep their butts real tight) and reading Hallmark cards. I
also thought the juxtaposition of his incredibly realistic and convincing white
make up with his unnaturally stiff walk was brilliant. The fact that his alias
was just “Mr. White” and the whole scene at the bank (“What a silly negro!”)
were great as well. Some of you may have noticed that this sketch bears a
striking resemblance to a similar “White Like Me” sketch done nine years before
with Richard Pryor. I think we can give them a pass for that since both sketches
were executed quite differently (one was Pryor’s mere retelling of his
experience in a live sketch and one was an in depth real time look at what
Murphy went through first hand.) Also, both were performed by two legendary
black comedians in their prime and resonated very well with the audience. As
far as I remember, these two sketches didn’t borrow heavily from each other.
They were both very funny and still hold up somewhat today. The source material
was at least a decade old as well. A+
The End of Buckwheat – In this continuation of the cold
open, we find out that Buckwheat is in fact alive and has been living in
seclusion for the past year and a half. He is wearing a fake yellow beard and
going by the name Jim Bailey. He has been practicing speech therapy with the
help of a record (narrated by Shearer) and so far the only phrase he can say
coherently is “I’m sorry, I’m not allowed any visitors. I’ve been quite ill”
which he says to a rotary club member (Kroeger) and tries to tell Alfalfa who
doesn’t buy any of it. Buckwheat reveals that the gun that shot him was full of
blanks and he faked his own death to protect himself as he was getting death
threats which are revealed to be from Alfalfa. He wanted to get his ultimate
revenge after Buckwheat put a frog in Alfalfa’s pants when he was singing in
Mrs. Crabtree’s class. Alfalfa pulls out a gun and forces Buckwheat to put a
frog in his pants and sing before he shoots him. His tombstone reveals that he
died at 66. This was an okay sketch by itself, but it was kind of a sloppily
written and a horrible way to add closure to the “Buckwheat Buys the Farm”
saga. This left more questions than it did answers. Was John David Stutts also
Buckwheat in disguise and was his death faked as well? C-
Mister Robinsons’ Neighborhood IX – In what would turn out
to be the last ever installment of this urban kiddie show parody, it is
revealed that Robinson is posing as a Salvation Army Santa to scam people out
of their money and sneak in and out of the building where he was evicted from.
He also lets us in on how he plans to take the heads off of regular baby dolls
and replace them with heads of lettuce marketing them as “Cabbage Patch Kids”.
There wasn’t much to this either, but the Cabbage Patch gag was pretty funny.
You could tell that by the 83-84 season the Mr. Robinson sketches were getting
rpetty tired anyway and this really showed little signs of improvement, but
Eddie performed the hell out of it and it was kept pretty short. C+
Newsmakers – Ben Chapman (Crystal) hosts this news magazine
talk show where his guests are Rebecca Sturgeon (Dreyfus) and Paula Franklin
(Gross). They are two representatives of the communist party. Whenever they
talk over each other, they would do this elaborate “jinx” dance with each other.
This happened about four times during the course of the interview. This sketch
was pretty pointless and it had little in terms of jokes. It felt like it went
on too long and I didn’t really care for it. Julia and Mary performed t well,
though so I have to give them credit. This was the first bad sketch that Eddie
was referring to. C-
Black History Minute – Dr. Shabazz K. Morton (Murphy)
explains how the recipe for peanut butter was stolen from Dr. George Washington
Carver by Frederick “Jif” Armstrong and Edward “Skippy” Williamson. This is
notable for being the only sketch where Eddie Murphy broke character after
flubbing a few of his lines. He even started the sketch by shouting “I don’t
see what’s so damn funny”. I wonder if that was in the script or adlibbed.
Anyway, this sketch turned out to be a great testament to Eddie’s strength in
playing off the audience and performing in general. I think this sketch
would’ve gone unremembered if it weren’t for great one liners like “so, I
messed up…shut up!” or “keep on smilin’”. B-
Saturday Night News – With this episode, Christopher Guest
is permanently instated as the Update anchor for the rest of the season…and the
desk is a much sadder place for it. He starts off by milking the audience for
“more” and “less” applause before making a brief joke about Eddie Murphy
starring in a CBS TV movie about the life of Frank Sinatra titled “Old Blue
Eyes is Black”. Paul Harvey (Hall) tries to deliver a commentary on three
famous brothers who didn’t even want to enter politics and adds many not so
subtle advertisements in there. Guest calls him out on it saying “get on with
your story about the Kennedys” and Harvey is upset that Guest took the suspense
out of his story. This wasn’t really as good as the previous Paul Harvey commentary,
but at least they are having Hall try something entirely different with his
impression. Guest reports that a certain percentage of students can’t find the
US on a world map and points it out to them on one in case any of them are
watching. The audience was practically silent there. BBC Correspondent Angela
Bradleigh (Stephenson) delivers an entirely unintelligible commentary on
Reagan’s budget cuts. Her accent is so thick you can’t understand her. This is
a bit similar to Chris Kattan’s character “Suel Forrester” but much funnier
because she doesn’t play it too big and her bits are shorter. Murphy delivers a
commentary on the popular Christmas dolls this year. The new crop of dolls all
appear to be based on celebrities and movie characters and compares them to
classic toys from his childhood such as Mr. Potato Head and G.I. Joe. All of
this was great. The Mr. .T./Brooke Shields bit was great and all his comments
on the Michael Jackson doll were hilarious. This was a surprisingly good Update
for this season and the commentaries made up for Guest’s lack of enthusiasm. B+
Broadway Gumby Rose – Crystal and Short reprise their roles
as Lew Goldman and Irving R. Cohen for this sketch set in Lishman’s Deli. Alan
Zweibel can be seen behind the counter and Larry David can be seen at a table
as a patron. They are talking with their friend Morty Schmegman about the old
stage production of “Waistcoat Willie” when Gumby enters and catches up with
his old friends. They begin arguing about the contents of the fabled Morey
Amsterdam and Adolph K. Musselman sandwiches when a waiter (Hall) wants Gumby
to pay up for the time in 1958 when he ran out without paying. Gumby makes Mort
foot the bill for him. Crystal breaks character briefly but quickly recovers.
This was a rather dry sketch, but it was performed well and a good setting to
bring back Murphy’s portrayal of Gumby. I did like the back and forth mucus
jokes between Crystal and Muprhy, Short’s singing and Hall’s “green jew” line.
B+
Lifestyles of the Relatives of the Rich and Famous II – This
was obviously the second taped piece of the night. In this installment, we meet
Jerry Lewis’s niece Denise who works as a nurse for a living in the Empire
State Building. Obviously, it was just Short doing his impression in drag
talking about his faux distant relationship with Jerry. Shearer had the same
minimized role as a nodding, distant Robin Leach (except wearing a Santa Hat
this time). By now, you might start to think this was just a vehicle for
Short’s impressions. Next week’s show will follow Yule Brenner’s travel agent
aunt, Kitty (Crystal) and James Brown’s traffic directing cousin Leonard
(Murphy). I liked this better than the first sketch because it was kept shorter
and didn’t focus just on Short acting broad. Crystal and Murphy were the
funniest parts. B-
Milestones – Host Alfred Jenkins (Guest) interviews Nobel
Prize winner Bishop Desomond Tutu (Murphy) and Heisman winner Doug Flutie
(Hall). Most of the show focuses on Flutie’s award winning Hail Mary play which
they repeat a clip of to distract Flutie as Tutu has dropped and broken the arm
off of the Heisman statue. They try to fix it in a panic before he notices.
This was a good sketch, but not one of my personal favorites. Murphy was
hilarious here. My favorite bits were Flutie’s frustration and the reveal of
the melted after the failed attempt to spot weld the arm on. B-
Climbing The Stairs – Short reprises his role as Lawrence
Orbach from the “Synchronized Swimming” film with Shearer. This time, the
setting is World War II where Orbach is 18 years old. He and his fellow
soldiers are taking cover in an injured woman’s (Stephenson) house. Private
Butterworth (Kroeger) is hit and the woman tells Private Frankie (Hall) that
there is a phone upstairs. Sergeant Gurney (Crystal) orders Orbach to climb the
stairs and call the phone…but he can’t climb stairs because he was raised in a
flat, Midwestern ranch where there were no stairs. Kroeger must draw him a
diagram to get him through this. He manages to make it after some struggling,
but he shows that he doesn’t know how to use a phone either. Even thought it
was executed well, I really didn’t like this sketch. First of all, it barely
made sense to me that they put Short’s character so far back in time after only
one appearance. Secondly, the whole sketch just seemed like an excuse for Short
to do a bunch of broad physical comedy without any real jokes. He did it well
though, but it shouldn’t have been the entire joke of the sketch. This all just
seemed wildly out of place in a show hosted by Eddie Murphy. D+
Well, for something heavily lauded as the best show of the
season, it had its fair share of weak spots upon watching for the second time.
It did start off pretty strong however and then just trailed off a bit after
Update. Thankfully, Eddie was able to liven up some of the weaker material
making the show all the more enjoyable as a whole. Next episode is Kathleen
Turner/John Waite.
