Drawing a total blank....
What a downer to come right off of Christmas only to be greeted with the news of the passing away of President Ford. Not that I was even alive when he was president, but from what I know about him, he was a good guy. And pardoning Nixon took serious balls.
But in my brain's typical "find a tangent no matter how slight" fashion, I started thinking about Saturday Night Live - the presidential portrayals to be exact. If memory serves me, Chevy Chase was the first cast member to accept the challenge, bringing Ford to the late-night small-screen in all his prat-fall glory. Dana Carvey's George Bush was legendary. Phil Hartman's Clinton was already outstanding, but then Darrell Hammond came along and took the role to new levels. Will Farrell's W? What can you say, other than "strategery"?
However, this raised a couple of questions in my mind. Aside from the obvious, "why can't they find an even half-way passable Bush since Ferrell's departure?" is this: Who played Carter? And perhaps even more importantly, who played early-Reagan (come on, the man was Commander-in-Chief for 8 years and oversaw the falling of the Iron Curtain)?
I feel I've seen a decent number of classic SNL episodes, but I cannot for the life of me ever recall seeing a Jimmy Carter skit. I know I've seen a few Hartman-as-Reagan sketches, but Hartman didn't even join the cast until 1986 (thanks Wikipedia!).
Anyway, I know that's kind of random, but it's been on my mind all day. Was there a 8-year embargo on White House lampoonery? Maybe I should dig a little deeper into Wikipedia....
But in my brain's typical "find a tangent no matter how slight" fashion, I started thinking about Saturday Night Live - the presidential portrayals to be exact. If memory serves me, Chevy Chase was the first cast member to accept the challenge, bringing Ford to the late-night small-screen in all his prat-fall glory. Dana Carvey's George Bush was legendary. Phil Hartman's Clinton was already outstanding, but then Darrell Hammond came along and took the role to new levels. Will Farrell's W? What can you say, other than "strategery"?
However, this raised a couple of questions in my mind. Aside from the obvious, "why can't they find an even half-way passable Bush since Ferrell's departure?" is this: Who played Carter? And perhaps even more importantly, who played early-Reagan (come on, the man was Commander-in-Chief for 8 years and oversaw the falling of the Iron Curtain)?
I feel I've seen a decent number of classic SNL episodes, but I cannot for the life of me ever recall seeing a Jimmy Carter skit. I know I've seen a few Hartman-as-Reagan sketches, but Hartman didn't even join the cast until 1986 (thanks Wikipedia!).
Anyway, I know that's kind of random, but it's been on my mind all day. Was there a 8-year embargo on White House lampoonery? Maybe I should dig a little deeper into Wikipedia....
posted by jonphiwil @ 8:37 PM
1 Comments:
At 10:37 AM ,
SuperBee said...
That's interesting. And totally true. I cannot remember any Carter-era jokes.
Probably because the cast during the Carter Administration, for most of it, was so TERRIBLE that they were incapable of playin him.
Same goes for early Reagan.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home