Saturday Night Live Christmas (1999)

Broadway video brings us another compilation of Saturday Night Live sketches, spanning from Christmas 1975 to 1998. It is edited like a regular episode, with a cold opening featuring Chevy Chase doing his famous prat-fall, followed by Bill Murray's monologue from a show performed a few Christmases later. Every different era is featured, even though all the sketches from the seventies seem to come from one episode hosted by Candice Bergen and as usual the early eighties are represented by a single skit featuring Eddie Murphy.

We get reacquainted with all the former castmembers, half of whom became household names, while the other half seem to have disappeared completely. Occasionally even a guest star pops up, like Steve Martin, Sally Field and Bill Shatner. Still it must have been difficult to compile this collection, being restricted to Christmas while having to include appearances by all the most famous alumni. In fact, it is funny to see future stars playing second banana to other players who did not turn out to be moviestar material. Watch Mike Myers franticly portraying a little boy, while Jon Lovitz and Phil Hartman steal the show in `The Night Hanukkah Harry Saved Christmas'. Likewise, Adam Sandler was only funny on SNL when appearing on Weekend Update, as he does here singing one of his Hanukkah Songs.

Of the recent castmembers, only the females are represented. Molly Shannon and Ana Gasteyer appear in the infamous Shweady Balls sketch (with Alec Baldwin) and Cheri Oteri is featured in a clip from a show hosted by Rosie O'Donnel and Penny Marshal (why?). I guess Jim Breuer, Chris Kattan and Will Ferrell had to wait for the next Christmas show, produced in 2002.

A Jolly 7 out of 10