Live From New York: An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live
Read Live From New York: An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live Online
Authors: Tom Shales,James Andrew Miller
Tags: #Performing Arts, #History & Criticism, #Saturday Night Live (Television Program), #Television, #General, #Comedy
Copyright © 2002 by Thomas W. Shales and Jimmy the Writer, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.
Little, Brown and Company
Hachette Book Group USA
237 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10017
Visit our Web site at
www.HachetteBookGroupUSA.com
.
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to realpersons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
First eBook Edition: November 2008
ISBN: 978-0-316-04582-7
Contents
Preface to the Paperback Edition
3: The Stars Come Out: 1980–1985
Applause for
TOM SHALES
and
JAMES ANDREW MILLER
’s
LIVE
FROM
NEW YORK
An
Entertainment Weekly
“Best of 2002” selection
Chosen by the
Chicago Tribune
as one of the “Best Books” of the year
A “Hot Read” in
Rolling Stone
“
Live from New York
feels like the party to which we’ve waited to be invited for years, the one where everyone is free to dish and tell all.”
— Gene Seymour,
Chicago Sun-Times
“
Live from New York
captures page after page of witty and wonderful recollections… .An engaging oral history and a gold mine for serious
SNL
fans, the book is also compelling reading for those with a casual curiosity about the show, its battles with censors, the backstage addictions, the drunken hosts, and the perpetual cycle of creative boom, bust, and boom.”
— Eric Boehlert,
Salon.com
“A guilty pleasure of the highest order… . Funnier, sadder, seedier, more moving, more alive than
Saturday Night Live
itself… .
Live from New York
shines.”
— Lev Grossman,
Time
“The juiciest treasure trove of backstage gossip, sex, and drugs since
The Andy Warhol Diaries
… . Scandals, infighting, and plenty of showbiz dirt make this a guilty-pleasure page-turner from start to finish.”
—
Publishers Weekly
“An exhaustive oral history of twenty-seven years of backstage squabbles, freaked-out hosts, meddling network suits, score-settling malcontents, and nostalgic revisionists, not to mention the drugs, feuds, and affairs… . Although authorized, the book is censored less than the show itself.”
— Phil Kloer,
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
“The straight dope is intoxicating, illuminating, befuddling, and — appropriately — wildly funny and ultimately addictive… .
Live from New York
is a big book, but the rich voices make it compelling. It’s over way too soon.”
— James Norton,
Flak
“Tom Shales and James Andrew Miller have crafted an irresistible read. By gathering quotes from all the principals and using only the occasional italicized paragraph for subject mortar, the authors defy a reader not to turn a page and see what’s next….You have to give big credit to the authors for figuring out the people involved were eloquent and forthright enough to be able to tell the tale themselves… . There is something memorable on nearly every page.”
— John Smyntek,
Cincinnati Enquirer
“A word-of-mouth masterpiece.”
— Ed Bark,
Dallas Morning News
“Reads like a backstage confidential….
Live from New York
isn’t just straight from the horse’s mouth. Here, the stable spills while the many perspectives are adeptly shaped by Shales and Miller. This may be entertainment history but it reads like ‘live from Studio 8H.’”
— Sherryl Connelly,
New York Daily News
“The most definitive record yet of NBC’s
Saturday Night Live
, the TV comedy program that redefined our popular culture.”
— Monica Collins,
Boston Herald
“Dozens of now-famous comedians have been part of the
SNL
crew over the years; this ‘oral history’ reveals them in stories, behind-the-scenes gossip, feuds, and secrets. The book will delight fans of the show.”
— Nan Goldberg,
Newark Sunday Star-Ledger
“Pure, unadulterated, delicious dish on the show that revolutionized TV comedy and American pop culture.”
—
Hartford Courant
“As documentation of TV history, this is a treasure. For
SNL
fans and observers of pop culture, it’s a candid, gossipy, and fun read.”
— Michael Long,
Weekly Standard
“Illuminating….A great read….A chatty, catty, mostly fascinating talkfest…. For those who love their entertainment tomes full of juicy gossip and backstage dirt, there is perhaps no greater pleasure this fall than
Live from New York
.”
— Omar L. Gallaga,
Austin American-Statesman
“The juicy anecdotes and downright insults… make the book so addictive.”
— Mark Bazer,
New York Post
“A book that moves briskly and consistently entertains…. The story is, inevitably, one of alternating triumph and heartbreak. This is one reason the oral-history format works — one writer’s triumph might be another cast member’s heartbreak, and we get to hear both. Besides, most of these people are articulately funny by trade.”
— Rob Walker,
Newsday
“If you’ve ever been a fan of
Saturday Night Live
, or if you have a taste for showbiz gossip,
Live from New York
makes for engaging reading.”
— Andy Smith,
Providence Journal
“Shales and Miller interviewed people who have worked on the show, and allowed them to speak for themselves. They describe a frenetic, competitive, ego-filled atmosphere in which young actors and writers danced wildly on the cutting edge of comedy….If you’re an
SNL
fan, it’s hard to put down.”
— Anne Stephenson,
Arizona Republic
“An irresistible read for anyone interested in the history of television or just the perversity of human nature. Quotes from the twenty-seven-year-old show’s principals provide surprises on every page.”
—
Detroit Free Press
“Refreshing… vibrant… entrancing and instructive….To reduce this superbly executed oral history to a list of potential
National Enquirer
headlines is to do it, and reading itself, a disservice…. Through interviews with almost all of the principals and a knack for making their quotes play off of one another, Tom Shales and James Andrew Miller paint a detailed landscape portrait of what has become an American cultural icon, one that will guide any attentive reader to a fuller understanding of comedy, TV, and the culture itself.”
— Steve Johnson,
Chicago Tribune
“For longtime fans of
Saturday Night Live
who have always wanted a window into the show’s unique atmosphere, it’s hard to imagine a better guide.”
— Eric Deggans,
St. Petersburg Times
“A behind-the-laughs history of
Saturday Night Live. Live from New York
is an oral history compiled — with occasional pert interstitial chronology added — by Tom Shales and James Andrew Miller. They have crafted a constantly entertaining and instructive document; among its many virtues,
Live from New York
is a better manual on how a business really works than all those cheeseball who-moved-my-Camembert books smushed together. That’s because Shales and Miller haven’t just interviewed the stars; nor have they merely come up with the most thorough examinations to date of the haunting, untimely deaths of John Belushi, Gilda Radner, Chris Farley, and Phil Hartman — no small feat, to be sure. Rather, Shales and Miller dig deeper, seeking out generations of
SNL
writers and producers, NBC TV executives, and guest hosts. Most important, they’ve quizzed the show’s creator, Lorne Michaels, and thoroughly debriefed nearly everyone involved about the pull — at once Zen-like and paternal — that this tidy, deadpan Canadian has exerted on so many people…. Whoever Daddy Michaels really is, what he did was create one of the most interesting examples of survival and invention in the history of the medium, and
Live from New York
does that achievement full justice.”
— Ken Tucker,
Entertainment Weekly
ALSO BY TOM SHALES
On the Air
Legends: Remembering America’s Greatest Stars
ALSO BY JAMES ANDREW MILLER
Running in Place: Inside the Senate
With undying love to my children,
Zachary, Sophie, and Chloe
— J.A.M.
To John Carmody — distinguished colleague,
irreplaceable friend
— T.S.
QUIS SUPERABIT?
Who Shall Excel Them?
Opening frames,
The Charge of the Light Brigade
,
Warner Bros., 1936
From the beginning
Saturday Night Live
has been a showcase for cutting-edge music as well as cutting-edge comedy. To keep this book at manageable length, the authors concentrated on the comedy. All the music and great musicians may one day get a book of their own. Godspeed.
If some of the tales told herein have the ring of familiarity, so be it. Much about
Saturday Night Live
, especially its early years, has passed into legend. While not every story can be called previously unpublished, many are being told for the first time in the words and voices of the actual participants. Certain key figures in the show’s history who did not speak on the record to other chroniclers did speak to us, and to them we are especially indebted.
Edie Baskin, Mary Ellen Matthews, and Norman Ng, along with Amber Noland, Aisha Aeyers, and Hillary Ripps, made it possible to include a splendid collection of photographs. Bob Peck of Reelin’ in the Years made an important contribution to the paperback edition.
We also wish to express our heartfelt thanks to Brooke Posch, Jennifer Guinier, and Lyle Jackson in Lorne Michaels’s office. No matter how crazed their days, they always made time to be of help. We adore them.
Sean Smith, John Maynard, Harriet Schnitzer, Peter Rose, and Jenna Singer labored tirelessly on transcripts and interview logistics. Liz Nagle and Peggy Leith Anderson, at Little, Brown, graciously helped navigate the production labyrinth. Heather Fain and Marlena Bittner, publicists without peer, woke the town and told the people with vigor and flair.
Our brilliant editor, Geoff Shandler, was an enthusiastic and invaluable voice.
Sloan Harris, our agent and hero, fought the good fights and never gave up — on the book or us. It was a privilege and pleasure to work with him.
Finally, the beautiful Jackie Miller gave her grateful husband unconditional love, and his friend and colleague unconditional support.
—
JAMES ANDREW MILLER, TOM SHALES
Preface to the Paperback Edition
Live from New York
is the book Lorne Michaels asked us to write and then refused to read. He may not have read it even yet — or he may just be claiming not to have read it. The man most responsible for the creation, shape, and longevity of
Saturday Night Live
wanted a complete history in book form that took the show from the beginning up to the present — but then, when it was published, he said he feared the contents would be too “personal” and affect him emotionally, and so he put off reading it himself.
Except for being interviewed like everybody else, if at greater length, Michaels had no input whatever into the content of the book. And never asked for any.
Though Michaels is the most important person in the life of the program, television is nothing if not a collaborative process, perhaps to an even greater degree than motion pictures.
Saturday Night Live
represents the work of an almost innumerable collection of contributors — so many over the twenty-eight years of the show’s existence that making our book an oral history, rather than an encyclopedic narrative, was a sometimes frustrating challenge. We couldn’t talk to everybody, dammit.
The goal was to get a cross section of writers, actors, writer-actors, performance people and idea people, major forces and supporting players, household names and behind-the-scenes unknowns, theoretically creating as textured and detailed a mosaic of the program and the process as possible.
Talent, need it be said, doesn’t make a person nice, and may in fact have the opposite effect. We dealt with plenty of ego-driven contrariness over the years of preparing the book, but to our relief, maybe even surprise, there were very few substantive complaints about the book from those quoted in it; thus few changes were necessitated for this edition.
Director John Landis was amused at the notion he would ever use the adjective “trippy,” and in fact insisted he’d never said it in his life, even though that’s what it sounds like on the tape. Out of respect and gratitude to him, his “trippy” has been ripped.
Of all the reactions that the book elicited, the ones we feel guiltiest about are those that saw it as an attack on Chevy Chase. When the hardcover edition was published, some reviewers seized on the reminiscences of people who felt wronged by Chevy over the years, even though there are many positive words and stories about him throughout the book. “And They All Hated Chevy” read the headline over one representative review.
They didn’t “all” hate Chevy, and his importance to the show in its formative stages and earliest outings is immense. His cool, knowing flippancy was something new on television, and viewers took to him even though he did anything but mewl for approval on the air. It’s quite possible that without his telegenic smarts,
Saturday Night Live
might not have won the attention and the plaudits it received in its first months on the air, might not even have survived to become the fabled institution it is today.
We have another big fat regret. Despite countless requests submitted through a wide variety of contacts, we couldn’t induce Eddie Murphy to be interviewed for the book. We tried again several more times for this edition, but he still wouldn’t budge. Apparently his bittersweet memories of working on the show are more bitter than sweet. But, Eddie!
Everybody’s
memories are mixed! We don’t take it personally, though, because despite pleading from Michaels and others, Murphy also refused to take part in SNL’s fifteenth reunion and twenty-fifth-anniversary prime-time special. You’ll find the reason why within the pages of this paperback edition, which contains material from a number of interviews not included in the hardcover.
Though the reviews of the hardcover edition, we are grateful to say, were overwhelmingly positive, some critics thought we were too reverential toward the program. The purpose, however, was always to celebrate
Saturday Night Live
, not to deconstruct or debunk it. Because it is, at the end of the day — which is when it airs, and at the end of the week too — truly a TV show like none other, in the extent of its influence and the canny flexibility that keeps it alive. Not just alive but fresh and, every now and then, once again the most talked-about show on the air — once again the craziest kid on the block.
That said, we are grateful to every last one of its veterans, the bright new breed as well as the savvy battle-scarred, whether expansive or relatively tight-lipped. We love them for their brilliance as well as for their tolerance of us as we crept around the wings, the green-room, Lorne’s offices, performers’ dressing rooms, and beneath the bleachers, all under the guise of doing research. But then it’s a kick just to hang around at
Saturday Night Live
, even as outsiders, and we enjoyed the luxury of having an excellent excuse to be there.
We wish only the best to the next team of cultural anthropologists and gossips who try to excavate the intricate origins and trace the phenomenal progress of
Saturday Night Live.
For us, the journey was at times a hilarious pleasure and at other times a maddening ordeal — but always, more than anything else, an honor.
—
Tom Shales
and
James Andrew Miller