Looks like Sanz, Parnell and Thompson for sure, maybe Hammond too (I hope! Can’t stand the @#$%^&, can’t believe he is the longest lived cast member ever)? Link.
Man, fuck this. Chris Parnell is my favorite cast member, and Kenan Thompson is way funnier and more useful than Finesse Mitchell (assuming the logic is they could only keep one of the two black guys). Plus, does Mitchell have Snakes on a Plane on his resume? I don’t think so!
I don’t hate Horatio Sanz as much as the rest of the Internet apparently does, but he’s pretty expendable at this point. I also won’t miss Darrell Hammond at all, but they’re making a mistake letting Parnell go (if this rumor is accurate).
Sanz and Thompson aren’t funny, so good. Parnell and Hammond do some good stuff, so it’ll be a bummer to see them gone. Fey will be missed, but good riddance to Dratch.
Sudeikis is going to helm Weekend Update? I can’t say that he would have been my first choice, although just the fact that he’s not Colin Quinn or Kevin Nealon is certainly positive.
I have absolutely no idea how Finesse Mitchell is employed as a comedian. Not funny. He’d be mildly amusing as one of your friends… but he’s not a professional.
Horatio Sanz is even worse. He ruins every skit he’s in. His signature character Carol is offensively unfunny, and his Jimmy-Fallon-inspired snickering through the skits isn’t funny. Remember when the cast would break character only if it was really funny and it happened maybe once a season, not every other fuckin’ skit?
Parnell has been around for a while. Isn’t SNL a waystation and not a destination? Tim Meadows? Anyone? He can actually be funny so hopefully he goes on to better things. Darrell Hammond may be the exception - it might be okay for him to be an SNL lifer. It just suits him, I guess.
I like the new woman they brought on… she is really funny, especially the Target lady she plays. I like Andy whatshisface and the other new guy as well. Will Forte is pretty good… so with any luck they’ll make some good hires.
They might want to raid the MAD TV cast… some of those performers are really funny. And Lorne Michaels? I’d rather you hired a funny-as-hell, all-White cast than bringing on chronically unfunny people of color (Ellen Cleghorne, Mitchell, and Sanz come to mind) or squandering the talent of genuinely funny people of color (Chris Rock, Tim Meadows). Just sayin’.
I’ll miss Parnell and none of the others. I am especially glad that Horrible Sans and Rachel Dratch are departing. The show needs a shake-up badly and Tina Fey departing is probably for the best. I hope they find a new core and get funny again.
Jim
This article says Will Forte is getting a pink slip (amongst others already mentioned elsewhere). Mega-boo-urns if that’s true (his Bush is just okay, but I enjoy his other stuff). I thought Kenan did a very good job last year, so I’ll be disappointed if he’s gone. Parnell? He had a decent run, and Lazy Sunday can be a nice capper if he’s gone.
I won’t miss any of them. I can’t even watch SNL anymore, it’s so pathetically unfunny. They either need a complete purge, or just cancel the damn thing and get it over with. It’s gotta happen someday. Maybe now’s the time. Free up the spot for something more entertaining, like infomercials.
What they really need to do, IMO, is to go back to improvisation.
Or at least get some performers who can read cue cards without looking like they’re reading cue cards.
I haven’t watched SNL in probably 15 years. Now with the advent of Youtube, any good buzz I have heard, I can get there.
My personal favorite was Hugh Jackman and the australian Christmas kangaroo.
Some of them I like, and I won’t say who.
I hate to use a cliche here, but I think it’s good for the show even if they throw the baby out with the bathwater.
It’s still a show for younger people that’s supposed to be fresh, and they’ve never been afraid to toss out a cast member (even a still funny one) who was just becoming part of the scenery and getting a paycheck.
I don’t really see any of them going on to great things (Parnell could get some work, maybe Keenan Thompson). I do see some horribly misguided projects in the future of Horatio Sanz.
Something that’s really telling to me, is that I have to go to a pic to remember who is who, the names alone don’t tell me squat. And I do watch the show every now and again. Used to be, if a cast member was mentioned, I automatically had a picture in my head of them. So, not being able to place names with faces means to me that none of them have made any comedic impact with me.
Of course, I know Tina Fey, and the Sanz is so bad he stands out, but overall…?
Vacation Bible School has been more entertaining.
I heard Al Franken on the radio yesterday morning saying that there are far too many cast members and this move is to reduce that, so the sacked players are’t to be replaced, just gone.
Agree, Keenan is WAY funnier than Finesse, who can only play “ghetto girl” characters, and even those got old after the first couple. Sanz’ Carol is probably the worst recurring character in the history of the show, which means a feature film is probably on the way. Glad he’s suipposedly leaving. They fired Parnell before, so its no surprise they would fire him again, even though I do think he’s funny. If they let Hammond go, they’re gonna probably have to stop doing political sketches, because he’s the only one who seems to know how to do people like O’Reilly, Rumsfeld, etc. Fred Armisen is all they really need, though- he’s far and away the most valuable member, although his comedy style probably is too cerebral for the average viewer.
I dunno, he does those painfully unfunny “Noony and Nuni” sketches with Maya Rudolph. Yeah, we get it, they’re Euro-freaks and they sit in weird chairs and eat bizarre foods. We got it the first ten times you did it. Yeesh.
We got it when Mike Myers did it.
I would say that Dratch’s Debbie Downer gives Carol (un)fair competition for worse recurring character ever. Just our misfortune to have both during the same run. I really hope both are gone from the show. They are the cholesterol that clogs the comedy arteries of SNL.
Jim
Amen brother.
Watching SNL is like eating day old supermarket donuts in the office. They’re stale, taste like crap, are bad for you, but for some reason you still try them just because they’re there even though your brain is saying “What the hell are you doing?!”
Debbie Downer has always been more funniy to the cast members than the audience. Still, Carol is way beyond that. One reels from that sketch, as one reels from a man who has been shot in the face.
I love Carol. On the surface those sketches seem to be dismissably low-brown and based only on one joke, (ha-ha, fat guy in drag), but the type he’s burlesquing is so familiar, and he plays her so well. She’s the perky fat girl who doesn’t realize how unattractive she is with a encyclopedic knowledge of trademark junkfoods from chain restaurants which she demands over eating real, non-branded food.
As far as the “unattractive girl who doesn’t realize how unattractive she is” staple goes, he plays it pretty subtly. Amy Sedaris gave Jerri Blank a permanent cartoonish overbite, Jamie Foxx gave Wanda crossed eyes and protruding lips, but Sanz just does a little thing with his mouth after saying “I’m Carol” and doesn’t hold his balance well.
And that diet of only brand-named foods by the perpetually portly is a familiar phenomenon, as are group situations where those restrictions become a nuisance.
The best part is that Sanz is known for ruining his parts by laughing during sketches. Here that works for him, playing someone so perky and giggly. Every extra snicker enhances his performance.