The Dave Thomas Comedy Show

The Dave Thomas Comedy Show
CBS
June 11, 1990
Variety
VHS
C+

Dave and his guests Chevy Chase and Martin Short are mildly amusing.  The best, if most dated, sequence is the "Dad Rap."  Fran Ryan plays Fran the waitress, while Teresa Ganzel plays various characters.  John Roarke is Reagan, as he often was, starting on Fridays in 1980.  This was the fourth of five episodes of DTCS, a summer replacement series.

Saturday Night Live: 15th Anniversary

Saturday Night Live: 15th Anniversary [fragments]
NBC
September 24, 1989
Variety
VHS
C+

Jumping the gun by over a year (but not as badly as Sisbert with their "500th anniversary"), this is a self-back-patting salute that I was so enthralled by that I taped two of the Timothy Dalton Jane Eyre episodes over part of it.  I've got the first couple minutes and then the last half hour or so.  None of it, even Robin Williams teasing the celeb-filled audience, is particularly funny.  Also, I'm not thrilled that I have to tag, blech, Bruce Willis.  But Paul Simon sings "Still Crazy After All These Years," and that's always good.  This is the 2000th show of mine I've reviewed, and no, we will not hit 3000.

Siskel & Ebert 500th Anniversary Special

Siskel & Ebert 500th Anniversary Special

Rough beginnings

Syndicated

June 3, 1989

Movie Review

VHS

B-

While it's undeniably interesting to take a look at fourteen years of Sisbert's teamwork (it's their 500th episode, obviously not 500 years), I'm not sure how well this all holds together, especially in front of a live audience.  My favorite part is probably the segment on their experiences growing up at the movies, particularly now that I've read Ebert's biography.  And there's a different sort of poignancy to Roger asking Gene in all earnestness "if we really hate each other or really like each other."  Gene teasingly promises to answer next special, but we know, especially now, that they loved each other like brothers.

Of particular note in retrospect are their comments on not having any influence on the issues of changing the ratings system and letterboxing.  They thought in the '80s that they had lost, but NC-17 came along in 1990, and the shift from VHS to DVD (and later Blu-Ray) helped make letterboxing more acceptable.  Danny Thomas and Bob Hope appear in one of the many parodies sprinkled throughout the show, while the other three men I've tagged are from late night talk show appearances.

Saturday Night Live: Episode 19 [excerpts]

Saturday Night Live: Episode 19 [excerpts]
NBC
May 8, 1976
Variety
VHS
B

SNL was originally one of those shows that the high school and college students watched when I was a little kid, and it wasn't till 1980 (at age 12) that I started to catch up with it, watching the mostly rotten first post-Lorne-Michaels season as it aired, as well as the earlier episodes in edited down form.  When I revisited it as an adult, including the original "classic" years, I felt like it was over-rated, but still with good moments.  This episode has not only the "slumber party" sketch written by Marilyn Suzanne Miller (who voices the offscreen Mother), with guest host Madeline Kahn and the female regulars doing a nice job of playing preteens trying to figure out sex (Gilda is not surprisingly the most believable as a little girl), but also Chevy playing the "you" of "You're So Vain," in apricot scarf and accompanying Carly Simon on the cowbell.  There was originally a lot of other stuff of course (it was an hour and a half after all), but this is what I recorded off Nickelodeon in the late '80s.