Sorry, but "Laugh-in" is 500 times better than SNL

[Deja Q]

Original SNL cast not excepted, their show is just a slow-paced rip-off by comparison (that's not to say it's not funny at all...). Need I mention the current SNL episodes, which are so bad that even current MadTV is light years better than them?

Of course, I'm a weirdo with issues. Normal people will still find SNL preferable, methinks.

[Syrinx]

1. I like the original SNL better

Belushi, Aykroyd, Radner, Murray. Those were the days...

[roguevalley]

2. I remember the first night it was on. I thought I would bust a gut.

its hard to tell anyone who wasn't there how much of an impact stuff like this had. How was the world before the beatles? I think it put
SNL in the shade.

[Deja Q]

4. A new version, if it were this fast paced and slick,

would probably fail unless it was very funny.

Somehow controversy was all the rage in the late 60s/early 70s.

Today people prefer just the opposite. Oh, some of us would love it but the bulk of society is just too dependent on the cozy predictable mindrot. I'm amazed "MadTV" even gets laughs and they pulled a couple hilarious doozies on Duhbya* last season, and this was the FOX network! So it is possible for a new "laugh-in" or something similar to work... I dunno.

Of course, add in how hollywuss wants to remake everything instead of being daring or original, if we did get a new version of "Laugh-in" they'd be recycling Nixon and Vietnam jokes instead...

[JohnnyAmerica]

10. Funniest show I ever saw

I sat there laughing so hard and thinking they would never get away with some of the stuff they did.
Anybody remember Richard Nixon and "Sock it to me?"
Laugh-in made the Smothers Bros. show possible.
Pat Paulsen for President!

[Art_from_Ark]

13. My mom wouldn't let me watch "Laugh-In"

after I started saying "Sock it to me" all the time

As for SNL, I watched some of the early episodes in high school and felt that the punchlines were always anticlimactic. SNL also happened to be on at the same time as Monty Python, so once I discovered that irreverant show, there was no turning back to SNL.

[Ediacara]

24. that's the problem with SNL... PUNCHLINES

Actually most skits don't even HAVE them anymore. The skits just kind of fizzle out. NOT FUNNY!

Kids in the Hall, Laugh In, SCTV, all FAR SUPERIOR.

MadTV however, not even close to funny, even compared to modern SNL...

[supernova]

3. Yes, I prefer MadTV

of the american sketch comedies.

Still the British are better at this than we are. I love British comedy.

[Deja Q]

6. In terms of modern tv,

it is just about the best thing that's edgy.

I haven't seen any British sketch comedy lately. Not since "Alexei Sayle's Stuff", and I'm wondering how it has aged all these 12 years... I should find and re-watch my old VHS copies. I can handle dated humor, mainly to lament on it, but will it remain as edgy?

[ronzo]

5. It's all good! but...

Phil Hartman ruled all, man! They did some great stuff back then, either side of 1990. good cast.

[Deja Q]

7. I'll agree, he was da man!

Strange and sad, his death... his nutter of a wife killed him.

[ronzo]

11. Yeah...

That was a real shame. Phil was something else.

[Philostopher]

8. I remember when SNL came on.

But I was tainted -- I'd already seen some Monty Python by the time SNL hit the air, it certainly gave me a different perspective on American comedy.

I also remember 'Laugh-In' and that my older sister thought it was hot shit, and my parents, while they liked the anti-establishment tone (they were Dems and Nixon was in office for most of it; they also didn't totally agree with LBJ about Viet Nam), they didn't really 'get' the humor. Being a four-to-six year old, I didn't get it either, but my sister thought it was great.


We also watched 'The Smothers Brothers' and Carol Burnett's show, so I had a pretty good education in comedy by then.

I've seen reruns of most of the episodes of Laugh-In, the past few years, and I will say they had one of the most consistently funny casts of any long-running ensemble show -- much better than SNL, after the first couple of seasons, even when they had less bad casts in later years.

Fast-forward a few years, to SNL. I was eleven or twelve during SNL's first season, so I was old enough to 'get' a lot of what they meant. It was apt cultural commentary, and some of the physical comedy in the early seasons -- especially Belushi's and Gilda Radner's -- still hasn't been matched, especially on live or semi-live television.

All in all, though, I really prefer early Second City Television to any of it, except some of the better Python. Kids In The Hall was good, too -- and most of the Canadian shows were ad-libbed, where SNL and Laugh-In were scripted. As far as I know, SNL still is pretty tightly scripted -- it's always had to be, so they could make their commercial breaks live without chopping dialogue or cutting sketches before they were finished.

I bailed out on SNL in 1980 (Joe Piscopo gags me to this day), came back when Eddie Murphy was on, and left again just after Marty Short and Billy Crystal bailed. I loved Will Ferrell's 'Get Off The Shed!' recurring character, but that's about the best I can say for the last decade or so of the show.

I didn't like MADTV, I watched several episodes a few years back and I thought it was too mean and they telegraphed the jokes too far in advance for my taste. But I know lots of people who do like it, it just doesn't do it for me.

[BlackVelvetElvis]

15. Second City?!

You mean SCTV? My all time favorite!
I have about 40 hours of it on video and most of it hilarious.
My favorites: Andrea Martin as Libby Wolfson (especially the play "I'm taking my own head, screwing it on right, and no man's gonna tell me that it ain't!"), Lola Heatherton, Tex and Edna Boil's Organ Emporium, and Sammy Maudlin.
Early SCTV was so esoteric and a rare thing to see. You could tell those writers had a liberal arts education' i.e.; "Philosopy Street", a takeoff on "Sesame Street".
Lucky Canadians get to still see it while we in the States are starving.
Of course, I love Gilda on SNL.

[ronzo]

16. Really...let us not forget SCTV.

That was good stuff. Tex and Edna... oh man. C'mon down...

[BlackVelvetElvis]

19. Come on down, we got budgies/sausages...

Loved that skit. When Tex left Edna and she was depressed and they interviewed musicians to fill Tex's spot. Classic!

[lpbk2713]

21. I liked the McKenzie brothers.

Hoser, eh?

[ronzo]

22. Yeah...

That's real "time & place" for me. SCTV and Strange Brew.

[EFF BrandyWine]

23. SCTV was hysterical...

and remember Eugene Levy as the janitor who represented the janitor's union? He sat behind a desk so low that only his head was visible, and in a discussion about travel he asked: "Did you drove or did you flew?" They were so clever.

The early SNL was great comedy, but the very, very best was the Monty Python episodes. The British really do comedy well.

Laugh In was funny...still is.

I enjoyed the nuttiness of Absolutely Fabuous too.

[mlawson]

9. ??? Is there some new version of Laugh In???

Or are you referring to reruns of the original?? I was a teenager in the late 60s when that show was on. I tried to watch it once or twice, but it was just so dumb; what was funny about someone saying, "Sock it to me", for the 1000th time??? Or the lady with the hairnet beating up the bum?? Please.

No, we didn't have cable back then, and we didn't have Simpsons or Southpark, or SNL, or BBC comedies, but no one I knew would look at Laugh In. It was mostly silly slapstick. Smothers Brothers was far better, and they were VERY anti- Vietnam.

[soupkitchen]

12. Interesting but stupid

[BlackVelvetElvis]

14. My first TV memory

is of Laugh-In. I bought the DVD because of it and the memories came flooding back.
What a great show. For that time, they really pushed the envelope; hell, even for this time! I forgot how incredibly fast-paced it was. Today, TV executives would be canceling it after 1 episode: "too controversial!". They made fun of everything! I don't think anyone would have the balls to make a contemporary version of it.

[PurityOfEssence]

17. One show ran for a few years, the other one's in its 28th season

You simply can't compare them.

[-..__...]

18. Richard Nixon...

"Sock it to me"? I remember it well. Goldie was hot then as she is now (or at least 10 years ago).
SNL has sucked ever since Joe Piscapo and Eddie Murphy left.

[2cents]

20. "wanna see my walnetto?"

Laugh-In was better - the humor, pace and professionalism (not to mention the painted dancers) - was much more entertaining than SNL.