SNL Should Bring Back That Cast Member from 15 Years Ago to Play a Current Public Figure

OMG, you guys! I just had the most brilliant, original, hilarious, and logistically plausible idea. Saturday Night Live should bring back that cast member I liked from well over a decade ago to play a public figure that’s currently in the news every week!

 

We all remember how much we loved it when that cast member was on the show. I’m sure that person is totally available, and would love to drop everything they’re doing to fly across the country/globe from wherever their current project is filming and give up the majority of their weekends from October through May to appear in an SNL cold open. Each week, they could deliver us a forever-memorable topical sketch where they stand behind a plexiglass podium or sit behind a foam-core Resolute Desk and deliver setup/punchline two-liners about whatever Republicans or pop stars did over the past six days.

 

I mean come on, that actor — who has since left the show, moved out of New York City, had a successful run co-starring in mid-budget comedies when those were still a viable vehicle for studios, then transitioned into artsier indie film territory to accommodate their lifestyle after settling down and having children, and who, once their kids personal life felt manageable, eventually acquiesced to a streaming service’s insane salary offer to star in a prestige 10-episodes-per-season conceptual drama which gets nominated for Emmys but everyone watching the Emmys is like “oh that was a show?” — would be thrilled to get paid SAG/AFTRA scale to make a guest appearance on a live, 11:30 p.m. comedy/variety show!

 

Are there currently over a dozen current cast members who I’m sure are great and I’m sure have names? Sure. Would they relish the career-defining opportunity to play an iconic public figure on national TV? Definitely. But the will of the people who post their every fleeting thought on social media is that SNL should ignore them and bring back someone whose name we all remember because they once had the career-defining opportunity to play an iconic public figure on national TV.

 

And it’s not like there’s an entire generation of up-and-coming comedians out there working their asses off on comedy stages around the country who are desperately seeking an SNL audition, and who are ready and willing to serve as the go-to impressionist for this particular public figure for as long as we will let them. Right?

 

Anyway, why should SNL continuously change with the times when they can have a beloved, long-gone cast member enter Studio 8H to such cacophonous cheering and thunderous applause that they have to bump a featured cast member’s breakout Weekend Update segment?

 

Comedy isn’t supposed to be about subverting expectations, it’s supposed to be about delivering exactly what’s expected and comfortable, hitting the same first thought every single “Sunday Morning Sketch Writer” across the country has at the exact moment any news breaks.

 

To be completely honest, I haven’t wanted SNL since Will Ferrell left. But if they take my idea of having a semi-retired comedian waltz in wearing a blazer and slacks each Saturday night to read from cue cards, I would totally tune in (the next day on YouTube).

 

Hey, Lorne Michaels, are you listening?! Because my mom says you should!