Saturday Night Live

The ESPN-affiliated, Bill Simmons-run website Grantland, which specializes in sports and popular culture, claimed on Friday that Fox News Channel is a major source of what Simmons calls “unintentional comedy” (or maybe "subconscious comedy" would be more accurate). In a feature about the history and influence of Saturday Night Live’s “Weekend Update” segment, Grantland staff writer Brian…

New York magazine interviewed Saturday Night Live executive producer Lorne Michaels about his show and political humor. Michaels seemed to suggest that Republicans can take a joke, and Democrats can't. Or perhaps Republicans are used to being mocked by Manhattan liberals, and Democrats expect to be pampered. The magazine’s Lane Brown asked: "Are there any basic rules for what works and what…

After playing a clip of Saturday Night Live mocking President Obama's "embattled second term" on Monday's NBC Today, co-host Savannah Guthrie sympathetically observed: "I guess if you're at the White House you laugh so you don't cry." She then turned to Obama's former press secretary Robert Gibbs and wondered: "What do you think the President's state of mind is right now? I mean, have you ever…

Could it be, just maybe, that there's hope for Randi Rhodes yet? Rhodes finds herself high on the list of prominent left-wing radio hosts (mainly because it's a very short list), but her rants as often documented here make it difficult to take her seriously. (Audio after the jump)

On Monday, the hosts of NBC's Today eagerly played clips of Saturday Night Live bashing Republicans over the government shutdown. In the morning show's 7 a.m. ET half hour, fill-in co-host Tamron Hall played a clip of SNL host Miley Cyrus doing a parody music video blaming the GOP for the shutdown and gushed: "I think she [Cyrus] might become a member of the five-timers club. You know, the group…

Miley Cyrus hosted “Saturday Nightly Live,” which meant SNL used a musical number to bash conservatives. Cyrus sang a take-off of her song “We Can’t Stop,” turning it into a sexual mockery of the GOP called “We Did Stop (The Government.)” It seems it’s not a lefty attack on Republicans if it doesn’t bash Boehner and Bachmann. SNL portrayed House Speaker John Boehner with skin-tight, mid-drift…

With ObamaCare about to start signing up its first patients and Congress in the middle of a debate concerning its funding, the folks at NBC’s Saturday Night Live decided to begin their new season this weekend mocking the president and his signature piece of legislation. The cold open started on C-SPAN with Barack Obama played by Jay Pharoah speaking about the Affordable Care Act at Prince…

As NewsBusters previously reported, Saturday Night Live last month aired a mock movie trailer depicting Jesus Christ returning to Rome to exact revenge in the gory fashion of Quentin Tarantino and Sam Peckinpah. On Wednesday, the American Family Association announced that it had gotten Sears and JCPenney to stop advertising on the online SNL episodes featuring that trailer:

The season of Lent began Wednesday, and the folks at Saturday Night Live thought it was appropriate to usher it in with a movie trailer depicting Christ returning to Rome to exact revenge. In the gory fashion of Quentin Tarantino and Sam Peckinpah, SNL presented to viewers on the fourth day of Lent "Djesus Uncrossed" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

The media’s love affair with Hillary Clinton has gotten completely unhinged. During a pre-taped Valentine’s Day sketch aired on NBC’s Saturday Night Live this weekend, popstar Justin Bieber took a picture of his penis and emailed it to the former Secretary of State (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On a night when NBC's Saturday Night Live began with a reverential tribute to Friday's massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, the writers also had a perverse fascination with female body parts. After guest host Martin Short mentioned kissing a vagina during his opening monologue, he later played a representative from Buckingham Palace instructing an Ob/Gyn, played by Bill Hader, how to treat and…

Samuel L. Jackson dropped an F-bomb on NBC's Saturday Night Live last evening. As the recurring sketch "What's Up With That" came to a conclusion, Jackson also said "bulls--t" (video follows with commentary, vulgarity warning):

Jay Leno really went after Barack Obama Tuesday. The Tonight Show host began a series of jokes about the President during his monologue with a jab at the Commander-in-Chief dodging questions about what really happened at our consulate in Benghazi last month (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

NBC’s Saturday Night Live began its program last night with a vulgarity that although bleeped was as obvious as the nose on Jimmy Durante’s face. In the opening segment spoofing Thursday’s vice presidential debate, Kate McKinnon playing ABC’s Martha Raddatz channeled Samuel L. Jackson in the movie "Pulp Fiction" telling the contestants, “Don’t try to f—k me like I’m Jim Lehrer” (video…