Why are SNL and MadTV so bad?

Last night I went to bed relatively early but couldn’t sleep so I got back up, turned on the television and watched some MadTV and some Saturday Night Live. All I could think of as I was watching was that if the writer’s strike was about this kind of work resulting in a bigger paycheck something was terribly wrong.

Up until the start of this season I had been telling people that at least MadTV was good. Bobby Lee was a standout. And somehow now he is embarrassingly bad. This used to be cutting edge and funny and now its dull and gross. I can accept that not every show is rip roaring funny but aren’t there some sort of safeguards before they throw all their resources at these juvenile scripts? Isn’t somebody, and you’d think the actors themselves would know what was funny, saying let’s do something else, or let’s get new writers.

When I turn on SNL I always seem to land in the news portion which traditionally has been weak but now is (and how innapropriate it is to use this figure of speech here) a joke. Amy Poehler and Seth Meyers act like young children act…delivering lines, smirking and laughing at their own item and looking for their parents in the audience.

I realized as I was watching was that I may have been watching more than just bad talent (both performers, writers and directors) but a sea change in how SNL works. In the past someone like Dennis Miller would zoom along throwing out both common and obscure cultural references and concentrate on doing a good job rather than micromanaging their own laughs. They acted like professionals. The new approach seems to be based on never leaving your audience behind, no matter how dumb they might be, erasing that idea that the reason you showed up was to see somebody being funnier than you know how to be. With most of the meat of these skits derived from celebrity news what we end up is with quirky gossip more than substantial comedy.

Still, even then, it should be funnier. Both these shows have been around for years, they have piles of money, and even when so bad, attract a great deal of attention. They should be hilarious.

There is good comedy out there: Dave Chapelle, This Hour has 22 Minutes, Rick Mercer, and a sitcom or two, and what seems to make these work is that 1. the people on and behind them have more than two ideas to rub together 2. they don’t underestimate their audience (they know its a range out there but they err on the side of quality) and 3. they keep moving forward. SNL and MadTV used to be cool places but they have now become the McDonald’s and Burger King of comedy - always open but yeesh!