Just a reminder that tonight’s episode will be performed live (in front of a studio audience), with–allegedly–slightly different variations for the East and West coast broadcasts.
They turned one of the best shows on television into an SNL sketch. (I was going to say bad SNL sketch but I realized that would be redundant.)
Never do that again.
God that sucked.
Is it too late to stop them from repeating that abomination again on the west coast? Maybe they could run a repeat of “Happy Days.” I hear the one where Fonzie straps on some water skis and jumps over a shark is really funny.
It could have been a lot worse. It coulda been “The Event” live 
NB Matt Damon was really funny
It was just wrong with a laugh track. There was something I laughed at, but I don’t remember what it was.
ETA I remember. It was the Brett Favre joke.
Surprise!Jon Hamm is just about the best surprise ever. Throw in Matt Damon, and I don’t have any complaints.
The live laugh-track was very distracting (they laugh at things that aren’t funny) and the timing of the writing just didn’t seem to work live.
The only thing that made me laugh was Dr. Spaceman. God, I love him.
Watched the West Coast airing, and I didn’t think it was that bad (aside from Kenneth and Tracy, who didn’t work well as live actors). Laughed at quite a few parts, especially the Dr. Spaceman and Jon Hamm commercials. The audience (laugh track?) was annoying as shit, but overall I thought it was OK. Not deserving of hate, in any case.
“Why are you speaking like a Persian immigrant?”
Just saw the West Coast version too and I thought it was hilarious. Maybe the West Coast one was better, or maybe I’m just easy to please? Jon Hamm was great as Dr. Drew as was Dr. Spaceman. Julia Louis-Dreyfus made a very convincing made-up Liz Lemon although it was distracting when you compare the difference in acting skills between her and Tina Fey. Then again, it plays into the whole fantasy aspect of it pretty well.
Yeah, laugh track sucked, but I think there was an actual audience? When they panned out at the end, it looked like there was a big crowd.
I thought it was pretty tight for live. Live will never be perfect. This was much better than SNL. Those of you who thought it was poorly done, can you give an example of something (current or recent) that was done better live? Was it wrong for them to even try a live show?
I remember The Drew Carey live episodes being much better. They also were largely improvised with the help of the Whose Line cast. I turned off 30 Rock after ten minutes.
I assume they shot it at SNL’s studio (8H) at 30 Rockefeller. I doubt NBC has any other studios large enough to fit an audience of that size. And looking at my TiVo schedule, SNL is a rerun this week, so they could use the studio.
I enjoyed the episode. I thought there was some funny bits, and really laughed during the Liz flashbacks. I thought that was a clever idea well executed. As a regular thing I would hate it, as a one time thing it was fun.
The laughter was irritating. The sound was off. And, Tina Fey must take a few takes to get her BLARG right when they tape the show, because her BLARG was off.
Still. I liked it. Hope they pick one episode to do it for next year.
Saw the west coast and the timing was just off. Jane Krakowski was noticeably bad. I don’t know if she was thrown or the space around the character doesn’t work with a live studio audience. There were moments that were ok-ish (Dr. Spaceman, Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, and John Hamm did pretty well), but generally it was slightly uncomfortable to watch.
I hope they’ve gotten it out of their system.
I thought the Canadian guy was off the show - is this his first episode this season?
I saw the West Coast version, and I thought it was funny as hell. I don’t expect razor-sharp timing and perfection from something like this. Of course I wouldn’t like it as a regular thing, but as a one-off, I thought they did a great job. They used a bunch of jokes that could only be used in this situation, as many were based around lampshade-hanging. This might be my favorite 30 Rock episode - not because of the timing, the story, the jokes, or the acting, but because they stepped out of the taping comfort zone and did something different, and did it well. This wasn’t just any episode of 30 Rock done live, it was an episode specifically written for a live performance.
Aaand I just watched the East Coast version. The timing was a lot tighter for everyone, I thought, and Jane Krakowski in particular was better.
I just appreciate the fact that they did a separate live show for the west coast. I’m tired of “live” being a live taping.
I was impressed that they came up with an in-story reason for everything looking different, and when Jack took a drink at the end, it all went back to “normal”. Always a pleasure to see Jon Hamm in goofy mode.
I thought it was a fun experiment and I love their solution to how to to do a flashback cutaway. JLD was a fun surprise especially for NBC which has literally ruined many an episode of various shows by revealing everything in the ads.
I also, for some reason, really liked the transition back to film at the end.
To the person who asked, that wasn’t a laugh track, they filmed this in the SNL studio. She thanked their staff at the end.
I am curious how different the west coast feed was. I am sure both will be on the DVD.