“In the tank.” “‘Jack’ and ‘squat.’” One of Saturday Night Live’s trademarks is its ability to take political and cultural gossip, assumptions, trends, etc. and solidify them into Conventional Wisdom. This weekend, Fox-as-arm-of-the-RNC got the SNL treatment:
‘See you on the other side’ - Meet Jessica Lum, a terminally ill 25-year-old who chose to spend what little time she had practicing journalism
#Realtalk: This is the best moment to be in journalism - The old stuff isn’t coming back, but that’s okay
Streams of consciousness - Millennials expect a steady diet of quick-hit, social-media-mediated bits and bytes. What does that mean for journalism?
Sticking with the truth - How ‘balanced’ coverage helped sustain the bogus claim that childhood vaccines can cause autism
An ink-stained stretch - Can Aaron Kushner save the Orange County Register—and the newspaper industry?
This is the best moment to be in journalism (25)
The WSJ editorial page hits rock bottom (19)
A backgrounder for understanding the storm that hit Moore, Oklahoma
Is the ‘chilling effect’ real?
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/113219/doj-seizure-ap-records-raises-question-chilling-effect-real
One year ago four journalists were brutally murdered in the bloodiest attack on the press in Mexico’s drug war. For those left behind the pain — and the threats — continue
50 years of foreign reporting from the NYRB
CJR's Guide to Online News Startups
Uptown Messenger – Hyperlocal news for a neighborhood in New Orleans
Who Owns What
The Business of Digital Journalism
A report from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
Questions and exercises for journalism students.
Wow, SNL takes some risks. SNL is on NBC . . . NBC is the corporate partner of MSNBC, which nips at Fox's heels on a nightly basis . . . wonder if anyone will deplore the apparent toadying of SNL to its corporate parent?
#1 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Mon 9 Nov 2009 at 11:50 AM
Has there ever been a documented instance of a SNL skit being driven from corporate management (a "top down" edict) or of the SNL writers offering up a skit to please their senior management?
Since the show has been on the air for 35 years, and since comedy writers are just about the least disciplined corporate employees known to Man, I would think that any examples of such behavior (in the real world) would be widely known.
On the other hand, it could be that not every broadcast organization is like Fox News, pursuing and presenting a corporate political vision with tremendous focus and discipline. Maybe there is ony one like that.
Just a thought.
#2 Posted by garhighway, CJR on Mon 9 Nov 2009 at 01:05 PM
SNL didn't offer up its sketch to please GE and NBC; it declines to satirize the politics of MSNBC, however. Chris Matthews has been the subject of imitation in sketches, but not caricatured as fully as much of a blowhard, and a less successful one at that, as O'Reilly. Keith Olbermann's fixed gaze, out of the famous Apple '1984' commercial, and his unwillingness to invite on his program anyone who disagrees with him (in contrast to O'Reilly) might come in for satire now and then - but Olbermann also does double duty as a 'Football Night in America' talking head, and that program is important to NBC.
The stuff that doesn't get on the air, doesn't get written about in the papers - that stuff is as telling as what does. Granted that Fox is a bigger target thanks to higher ratings, why no kidding of MSNBC as, say, a cable news program that no one except zealots on the Left takes seriously, as reflected in its ratings? It doesn't take much nerve to slam on Fox News in the media-political-entertainment echo chamber . . . zzz . . . but it would take nerve to for SNL to slam on MSNBC.
#3 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Mon 9 Nov 2009 at 05:06 PM
RE: it declines to satirize the politics of MSNBC
Over a year ago SNL did an extended satire on MSNBC's politics.
http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/clips/countdown-with-keith-olbermann/805561/
#4 Posted by Steve Souza, CJR on Mon 9 Nov 2009 at 11:11 PM
Steve, I stand corrected. SNL has also satirized Nancy Pelosi a couple of times, but not on the same scale as, say, Sarah Palin, though Pelosi is at least as rich a target. One question, though - was the sketch highlighted and linked to by CJR as a good laugh at the expense of the left side of the news business?
#5 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Tue 10 Nov 2009 at 12:41 PM
Mark:
Are you seriously suggesting that the comedy writers at SNL have a guiding principle beyond "make it funny"? Do you really think they sit around calibrating their humor to sync up with the (percieved) political beliefs of anyone? (Or for that matter, to try and achieve some sort of false humor equivalence: "We did O'Reilly last week, so we have to do Maddow this week.")
Or could it be that delivering 90 minutes of live funny every week is hard enough that they can't afford the luxury of sacred cows?
They lampoon Matthews because it's funny. They probably haven't done Olbermann because they haven't figured out how to make HIM funny. From what I have read about SNL, the process of getting sketches on the air is ruthlessly Darwinian: funny makes the show, unfunny doesn't. Obviously, they don't bat 1.000. Some sketches and some shows miss the mark. That just shows how hard it is to do well.
But if you have any examples of a proposed sketch being spiked for political reasons, I'd like to hear it. That would be pretty interesting. My guess is that you don't.
#6 Posted by garhighway, CJR on Tue 10 Nov 2009 at 12:42 PM
Hi, Gar, well, the inevitable 'show me the evidence'. It's hard to show what hasn't been run. SNL is trying to satirize Joe Biden as blathering, but still can't do Obama in a genuinely cutting way - an old 'liberal' weakness that has something to do with a stereotype of white liberals I won't go into.
BTW, I don't know if SNL is participating in General Electric's 'Green Week', but the other entertainment shows are, including Tina Fey's '30 Rock', complete with appearance by Al Gore, and there is a tie-in to NBC News. Yes, the entertainment division does know who signs its checks. So does the news division.
#7 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Mon 16 Nov 2009 at 04:41 PM
Being characterized as a do nothing isn't anti-obama enough for you? "Snl, you have to raise the bar a bit. Get some more conservativy humor like this:"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv-HNakadIw
We don't constantly bitch and whine about newbusters including liberal content, like humor,
http://www.youtube.com/user/newsbusted
So why are you demanding non conservative humor shows to include conservative content or to reflect conservative values? Are you some kind of communist fairness doctrine freak?
If you want humor conservative content and conservative bias, nothing is stoping you from making it except the requirement to be funny; damn liberals with their regulations.
Wouldn't it be nice if there was a free market of tv programming where people could pick and choose their programming as easy as changing the channel?
I think people would pay money for that, don't you?
#8 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Mon 16 Nov 2009 at 11:32 PM
Mark says: "It's hard to show what hasn't been run. SNL is trying to satirize Joe Biden as blathering, but still can't do Obama in a genuinely cutting way - an old 'liberal' weakness that has something to do with a stereotype of white liberals I won't go into."
I would respectfully suggest that he misses the point of SNL. It is a humor show. They do what they think is funny. Not "cutting", not "fair and balanced". They aren't about politics. they are about humor. It happens that politicians are often funny. (I recall a Weekend Update/Bill Clinton piece where he reviewed The American President that was particularly good.) But some are and some aren't, and SNL puts their chips on the funny ones.
But it's about funny. If Mark thinks he can write humor better than they can, he should submit a spec script and see how it goes. Or just post it here for us all to read. Now that WOULD be funny.
#9 Posted by garhighway, CJR on Tue 17 Nov 2009 at 08:21 AM