SNL After Party (S48 E15 - Air Date 3/11/23)
Host: Jenna Ortega
Musical Guest: The 1975
Who could have known that we’d all be wistfully looking back at the time the show was hosted by a tight end? Yet, here we are.
Jenna Ortega, best known for her excellent work as Wednesday Addams in the CW meets Harry Potter Netlix series, Wednesday, seemed to be trapped in a show that didn’t seem to know how to use her to comic effect (with some exceptions noted below).
Cold Open – Oscar Pre-Show
The show opened with a typical red carpet show hosted by Mario Lopez (Marcello Hernandez) and, maybe Maria Menounos (Heidi Gardner). The sketch was an excuse for the cast to do a series of quick impressions (Chloe Fineman with a great capture of Jamie Lee Curtis, Mikey Day and Molly Kearney - hey they got in the show this week! – as the incomprehensible leads of The Banshees of Inisherin) and even an amusing non-impression of Mike Tyson by Kenan Thompson. Sarah Sherman got to pop in as a Jewish acting coach as well.
The rapid-fire nature of the sketch allowed for some funny impressions that did not overstay their welcome. It was a solid enough opener for the week.
Monologue
Jenna Ortega’s monologue did not build on the cold open. There was some fun interplay with Wednesday co-star Fred Armisen and a moderately amusing bit turning one of Ortega’s childhood commercials into a horror movie. But, overall, the monologue was a bit of a dud this week. But, hey, at 20 years old I wasn’t hosting SNL (Or dating, but that’s a whole other sad tale), so I don’t want to be hypercritical. Ortega just didn’t have much to work with for her monologue.
School vs. School
You know if there’s a game show, it will probably work. And if Kenan is hosting, it almost certainly will. That’s what we had this week as Kenan hosted a Knowledge Bowl style matchup between schools. Oddly, his character didn’t have a funny name. That struck me as odd for some reason. Anywho, the gimmick here is that one school was a X-Men style academy playing with their headmaster, Professor Xander. Ortega and Kearney were mutant students from the school.
This sketch was funny, with Mikey Day over the top shouting as Xander, while Ortega’s mutant character kept trying to use her super powers. Kearney added to the fun by using her super strength to smash a podium. Ortega showed off her acting chops here, and this was one of the show’s brighter spots.
Please Don’t Destroy – Road Trip
Here’s the thing. This was not one of the better Please Don’t Destroy pieces. But that is not a condemnation, as it was still very funny. Here, the lads go on a road trip with Ortega and sing, until they are fighting, puking, and ultimately committing an apparently fatal hit and run. As always, these guys know how to keep raising the stakes in artful and funny ways. This one wasn’t firing on all the cylinders that a lot of their work has, but it was still well done.
Parent Trap
Ortega is filming another Parent Trap remake, and Fred Armisen pops in as the person to read the lines for the other twin, which will be shot with Ortega the following day. I hope that makes sense. The joke here is that Armisen is a filterless middle-aged man with ideas of how to change the dialogue for the teen character he is reading for. It’s amusing enough, but the whole piece doesn’t really gel. As is so often the case, this sketch had to just abruptly end.
MTV Ridiculousness
This was an MTV show that features “funniest home video” clips as a panel is supposed to crack wise. Mikey Day is the too old to be doing this host, and Kenan and Chloe are the goofy sidekicks. Ortega is a Tik Tok sensation who is a guest for the show. The gist here is that while Kenan and Chloe are making innocuous dumb comments, Ortega just tells increasingly morbid stories, culminating in a tale of a cat that gave birth to a litter of kittens joined as a single cat-ball. Ultimately, they had literally no idea of what to do with this thing, so they just ended it.
Varsity Valley
Ortega and Hernandez are a couple breaking up in a pre-taped teen drama. The thing is, they are doing so in front of a Waffle House in which all manner of chaos is underway. The two nail the whole teen angsty show thing, and the events inside the restaurant are genuinely funny. Mikey Day steals the scene as a shirtless patron who is unconcerned by a taser.
Weekend Update
I was defending Weekend Update to a friend at lunch Saturday. He alleged that Colin and Che have started using cracking up at their own material as a crutch. I conceded this happens a lot, but that it is part of the charm of the segment. This week, I was kind of seeing his point. A lot of the jokes were getting groans from the audience that seemed to throw Che off his game a little. But that didn’t stop the hosts from cracking up at the material. But, look, I think this iteration of Update feels like a safe place to test the limits of topical comedy, so I’m still good with it.
For the second week in a row, the fair state of Tennessee was the target of mockery from the Update desk. This week, Tennessee Lt. Governor Randy McNally appeared to “explain” his comments on a young man’s Instagram page. Molly Kearney did some fun character work here and scored some laughs. It feels like the show was making up for some lost time with Kearney this week, and I am glad they are getting a chance to shine.
The other desk set was James Austin Johnson, who did a few brief impressions that probably wouldn’t justify an entire sketch. He also threw in his Trump, which should have annoyed me for being such a blatant way to shoehorn that in. But, the guy is just too good at it, so I enjoyed it in spite of my cynical self
The Exorcism
Well, I guess if you are going to do an The Exorcist sketch in 2023, you might as well doing when Ortega is hosting. In this sketch, Ortega is the possessed girl (of course) and a young priest is going to exorcise her as soon as his older partner shows up. Cue the upstairs neighbor (Eg Nwodim) coming down to take matters into her own hands by not putting up with any demon’s nonsense. Eventually she calls her husband (Kenan) down to serve as a vessel for the expelled demon, setting up a non-ending featuring a Kenan dummy’s head spinning around. Still and all, it was probably better than the actual sequel to The Exorcist.
Law Firm Jingle
I don’t even know what to say about this one. Andrew Dismukes and James Austin Johnson are lounge jazz (I guess) singers pitching a jingle to a law firm. This one was brutal and painful and far too long. I think a marathon of actual attorney ads would have been better.
The Goodbye Wave
Best Sketch: There were no real great standouts this week. If forced to pick – and I think I am – I’d go with School vs. School.
Worst Sketch: The jury wasn’t out long for this one. Law Firm Jingle gets the distinction.
Random Notes:
This show was not the disaster that the notes on the individual sketches might make it seem like. It just was kind of … there.
Even the musical act, the 1975, was just okay. I didn’t hate them. I didn’t love them. Although one of their songs was performed on a set that was made to look like a living room, which made me feel uncomfortably like they might just be showing up and people’s houses to perform uninvited. I don’t need that.
Jenna Ortega is a compelling actress who is very good at what she does. But maybe working with Tim Burton is no guarantee that a performer has skills that would transfer well to hosting a comedy show. But, maybe next time out she’d have better luck and maybe some stronger material.
Grade: C