SNL: Now with more bad sketches!

I want to see Greg The Alien on Around The Horn.

 

Used to be, if you were an up-and-coming comedy writer, SNL was the place to be if you couldn't get a spot on Johnny Carson's writing staff.

Now all the top-shelf writing talent goes to The Daily Show and Colbert, then Conan and Letterman, then The Simpsons and Family Guy, and finally, SNL.

 

I want one of these:

http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=8929

 

I don't think the show is as bad as some here apparently do. I rather like it. I find it consistently amusing, not necessarily laugh out loud funny.
It's definitely hit and miss, but that's the way a lot of comedy is.
I've definitely seen worse "comedy" in the theater and paid for it to boot.

 

I've watched some of the late night shows in the last couple of weeks, and I was surprised how hit and miss they were. Most of the monologues were pretty tired and hardly clever.
When Stewart has his fastball there is no one better, but without the news events to play off of, he's just an innings eater.

 

Replying to this and Steak Stabler, I imagine that writing for SNL is similar to working for ESPN. It sounds really good if you're not in the industry, but the actual perks aren't that great. I think in Jay Mohr's book (might be someone else's though), writers at SNL get $500 a week. It seems like a decent amount, but it comes out to around $30k a year, and you have an utterly insane schedule during the week. You essentially have to create 45 to 60 minutes of comedy every week, within a budget, and you have to hope that the daily shows don't inadvertently steal one of your ideas.

Meanwhile, contrast that with The Daily Show. They're four shows a week, about 23 minutes per show. Stewart does an interview for 7 or 8 minutes, which I imagine doesn't require as much writing. So then you have to write material for maybe 15, and because you are a daily news show, you have plenty of headlines to work with.

 

I've always had the impression that SNL is kind of like being an assistant coach at Notre Dame - you're doing it for the resume, perhaps land a production deal. Of course the trap at SNL is that if you create something there - you become partners with Lorne Michaels in doing anything with it.