Lorne's Exile

  Now we come to the Jean Doumanian Era's first edition of Weekend Update , hosted by actual former local news TV anchorman Charlie----oops!----Charles Rocket. One piece has Gail Matthius filling the old Laraine Newman role as Update  correspondent; in this case, Gail interviews Illinois Congressman and Independent President candidate John B. Anderson, portrayed by Joe Piscopo; the Congressman still didn't believe had not won the recent election. Here is the premiere performance of The Rocket Report as Charles tries to interview garbagemen about John Lennon and Yoko Ono's garbage. In the final portion, Gilbert Gottfried appears as an expert to says that President-elect Ronald Reagan was dead and that Vice-President-elect George H. W. Bush was holding him up.  And as was the case with announcer Don Pardo, Charles admonished Gibert that his was Charles, not Charlie. In closing Charles says "Good night and watch out!"

  Performing the first song of the Jean Doumanian Era, Kid Creole and the Coconuts is being shown doing "Mister Softee" on the Elliot Gould show.  You can find it and the rest of the November 15, 1980 telecast here .

From the Elliot Gould Show, here's a film by the director of Blue Lagoon Randal Kleiser entitled "Foot Fetish."  

Time for the first installment of the cable TV show, What's It All About?  with Denny Dillon and Gilbert Gottfried as the opinionated Pinky and Leo Waxman, respectively (coplete with thick Jewish accents).   Their special guest is guest hose Elliot Gould as himself.  

Continuing with The Elliot Gould Show, Gail Matthius, with a black bar superimposed in front of her chest, presents an American Cancer Society breast cancer self exam PSA. This was written by staff writer Patricia Marx.

It's a Billy-Gram! In this sketch (written by future cast member Terrance Sweeney), guest host Elliot Gould and Ann Risley were living together without marriage when they receive a singing telegram for the girlfriend's birthday, sent by her parents---only it wasn't a regular singing telegram, it's a Billy-Gram!  The deliverer, played in hammy style by Charles Rocket, sings the telegram denouncing the girlfriend's lifestyle.  Check out Charles' hammy facial style.

  In what was supposed to be the Jean Doumanian Era's first stab at political satire, the Elliot Gould Show's oval office sketch as a depressed (and lame duck) President Jimmy Carter (Joe Piscopo) blamed everyone, inluding Jews, for his defeat. Denny Dillon did a fine job as First Daughter Amy Carter. Meanwhile, Ann Risley's portrayal of First Lady Rosalynn Carter was pretty much on a par with Laraine Newman's in the old days, only hornier, as she told Jimmy he had to lose the election. As she told him, "It was the election or the erection." The sketch ends with Jimmy, on the intercom, calling for his brother Billy to come on out to the front lawn.  The President draws his pistol from a drawer in the desk. It was a pretty decent sketch.

  Continuing with The Elliot Gould Show, here's the Petroleum Commercial, filmed and written by Mr. Bill's creator, Walter Williams.  This is their version of the old roadside Burma Shave signs.

  In the first monologue of Saturday Night Live '80 's season, guest host Elliot Gould spoke to the audience and showed them various types of underwear, then swapped a pair of his shorts for Denny Dillon's panties.

  Here is the photo of guest host Elliot Gould as well as another  rundown of the new cast members (remember, folks, Eddie Murphy was not included in the opening telecast) of the newly-rebranded Saturday Night Live '80 : Elliot Gould, Guest Host Denny Dillon Gilbert Gottfried Gail Matthius Joe Piscopo Ann Risley Charles Rocket And, for good measure, here are musical guests Kid Creole and The Coconuts.

  It is Saturday, November 15, 1980 and Elliot Gould is guest host of the opening episode of Saturday Night Live 's sixth season, and you can view it here . This is Elliot's sixth (and to this day, most recent) episode as guest host. Kid Creole and the Coconuts are the musical guests on this night. As each episode progresses, we'll touch on individual sketches, starting with the cold opening recalling SNL 's "Glory Days". The opening shot of the opening episode of the Jean Doumanian Era  is of a sleepy Gail Matthius, who realizes the show is about to open, then wakes up next to guest host Elliot Gould, who are introduced to the new cast members and with each describing himself as a cross between two of the cast members from the original era.   Gail described herself as a cross between Gilda Radner and Jane Curtin. Next, up popped Charles Rocket, a cross between Chevy Chase and Bill Murray. Next up, it's Ann Risley, describing herself as a cross between Gil...

In mia-October of 1980, roughly before the Season Six premiere, Tony Schwartz of The New York Times  wrote this piece in which he revealed the names of the new Saturday Night Live cast members. Variety later wrote that producer Jean Doumanian leaked their names to Mr. Schwartz after a disgruntled ex-staffer had leaked the names to The New York Daily News. Nevertheless the Times revealed the names first. As a major consequence of this action, NBC had cancelled a press conference that was supposed to introduce the new cast members; NBC president and CEO Fred Silverman and the head of the Entertainment Division, Brandon Tartikoff were none too pleased with the revoltin' developments about Jean's leak to Tony Schwartz without Fred's or Brandon's knowledge.  

  Alongside the newly-hired head writer Mason Williams, here's a list of Saturday Night Live 's new writers: Barry Blaustein from 'round New York town, a former associate producer of the then-Hollywood-based Mike Douglas Show , who, in one of Jean Doumanian's best moves as producer, teamed up with Mississippi -born ex-ad man David Sheffield. John DeBellis, who succeeded in getting Joe Piscopo and audition. Brian Doyle-Murray (Bill Murray's brother), the lone holdover from the previous season's staff. A West-Coast team, David Hurwitz and Larry Arnstein, who were behind the San Francisco-based television show The Chicken Little Comedy Show . Sean Kelly, an Irish-born, Canadian-raised  veteran of The National Lampoon . Artist, writer , and actor Terrence (Terry) Sweeney. Patricia Marx, a native of Abington, Pennsylvania who was a humorist and writer. The aforementioned Richmond, Virginia-born Mitchell Kriegman, who was an actor, writer, comedian, and filmmaker ...

Following the firing of Peter Tauber, Jean Doumanian hired Abilene, Texas-born guitarist, composer, singer, writer, comedian, and poet Mason Williams .  A former writer and regular on the original Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour , Mr. Williams scored a major instrumental hit in 1968, with his own composition "Classical Gas." After her unhappy experience with Peter Tauber, Jean thought that with Mason and his experience in television comedy writing aboard, that the situation with the writing staff would become more stable. That was what she thought.  

Here's another preseason photo of the Saturday Night Live '80 full-blown cast  . Left to right, Denny Dillon, Charles Rocket, Ann Risley (sigh!), Joe Piscopo, Gail Matthius, Gilbert Gottfried.  

  During Saturday Night Live 's fifth season, to help compensate for the recent departures of Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi by making featured players out of several writers---and musician Paul Shaffer. Among the "featured players" were James Downey, Peter Aykroyd (Dan's brother), Brian Doyle-Murray (Bill's brother), Don Novello (on most cases, using the nom de plume Father Guido Sarducci), Al Franken and Tom Davis, Tom Schiller (who was a filmmaker as well), Alan Zweibel, and Harry Shearer (who at midseason was promoted to the Repertory  Company formerly known as The Not Ready For Prime Time Players). New producer Jean Doumanian ultimately hired five "featured players."  In this case, these---save for writer-filmmaker Mitchell Kriegman-----were "glorified extras." Here is your roster for Season 6's featured players (one would be fired before Christmas, another became one of SNL 's greatest-ever cast members, three others were axed by Je...

  Originally set to be Saturday Night Live 's new head writer, novelist, journalist, and stand-up comic Peter Tauber had disagreements with his boss, producer Jean Doumanian. He even wrote a memo to Jean, and when she dismissed it, he sent it to NBC programmer Brandon Tartikoff and his boss, embattled NBC president and CEO Fred Silverman. It just wasn't working out so Jean fired him shortly before the new season started. Here's a bit of Peter's memo:  '' you are very largely surrounded by sycophants, yes-men, fawning admirers, gushy-lucky-kids, flatterers and people who are dependent on you for approval and position. This would not be the end of Jean's problems with the writers.

Here is an actual promo for the November 15, 1980 sixth season premiere of NBC's Saturday Night Live  with guest host Elliot Gould; shown here are Ann Risley, Gilbert Gottfried, Charles Rocket, Elliot Gould, Joe Piscopo, Denny Dillon, and Gail Matthius.

Wow! An actual promo for the Season Six premiere of NBC's Saturday Night Live  with voiceover by the legendary Don Pardo! Shown in order of appearance: Denny Dillon, Gilbert Gottfried, Gail Matthius, Joe Piscopo, Ann Risley (sigh!), and Charles Rocket.

With worries concerning the new Saturday Night Live regime, the staff had trouble finding a guest host for the sixth-season opener, scheduled for November 15, 1980.  There seemed to be a campaign to keep prominent show business figures from working of the Jean Doumanian-produced show, some did it out of loyalty to Lorne Michaels. Several reasons were made for the late start to the upcoming season, most prominently, the use of Saturday Night 's traditional home, Studio 8H, was being used by NBC News for its' 1980 election coverage; rather than use the studio in Brooklyn, where three of the Season 2 episodes originated from four years earlier, they decided on the mid-November. With barely a week before the season premiere , they finally were able to snag Original-Era favorite Elliot Gould to open the new season with Kid Creole and The Coconuts as musical guests. Elliot had hosted the show five times previously. Here's a promotional advertisement from the November 15-21, 1980 ...