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September 21, 2010
The Ten Worst Saturday Night Live Hosts of All Time
In honor of next week's season premiere, we remember some less honorable moments.
By Phil Nugent
Saturday Night Live returns for its thirty-sixth season on September 25th. Amy Poehler will host, and hopefully kick off the season on a good note. After that, hosting disaster could strike any week, as history shows. Here are ten people whose invitations to host SNL can only be filed under Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time:
1. Louise Lasser (July 24, 1976)
In the late '60s and early '70s, with her appearances on TV and in movies (some of them directed by her onetime husband, Woody Allen), Lasser proved herself an eccentric charmer, and she should have been a neat fit for SNL. But when she did the show, she was imploding from her work schedule, and had recently made headlines after being arrested for unpaid traffic tickets and possession of six bucks worth of cocaine. As the live broadcast began to loom close, Lasser begged producer Lorne Michaels to let her cancel, but it was too late to replace her and Michaels used the threat of legal action to force her onstage. Her "monologue" was a rambling attempt to account for her own self-destruction that concluded with her running offstage, with the camera in hot pursuit, and barricading herself in her dressing room. By then, SNL had done so many sketches revolving around cast members and guest hosts pretending to break down or bug out on the air that most viewers probably thought this was more of the same, though they might have noticed that the timing seemed off. The regular cast managed to make it through the next eighty or so minutes, with minimal assistance from the host.
2. Frank Zappa (October 21, 1978)
Of all the dubious choices for show host, Zappa may be the most baffling, because he'd made a brief, wordless appearance in a previous episode (hosted by Candice Bergen), and even there, his suffocating air of smugness and unconcealed contempt for what he'd agreed to do were obvious. If his Mr. Snide routine wasn't the absolute low point of his career, that's only because some genius also once booked him as a guest star on Miami Vice. He must have been a delight during rehearsals, too, if the final bows during the closing credits were anything to go by; the cast members, obliged to join him onstage, clustered near the edge as if fearing his personality might be contagious.
3. Milton Berle (April 14, 1979)
In its early years, as the first TV comedy series created "by the TV generation for the TV generation," SNL often used hosts from the golden age of television (Desi Arnaz, Broderick Crawford, Rick Nelson) to pay tribute to the black-and-white era. but Berle's gruesome ego-tripping performance, which began with a crowd-clearing monologue overstuffed with crude ethnic wisecracks and climaxed with a maudlin song, put a stake through the heart of that tradition. Lorne Michaels was so grossed out by what Berle did to the show that he insisted that the episode never be shown in reruns, a decree that stood for almost twenty-five years.
4. Andrew Dice Clay (May 12, 1990)
When Clay was tapped to host the show, he was already heading towards the end of his fifteen minutes, a short-lived period of notoriety based on his chanting dirty limericks to audiences of cheering misogynists too dumb to figure out how to find a copy of Hustler on the newsstand racks. The news that Clay had been invited aboard inspired cast member Nora Dunn and scheduled musical guest Sinead O'Connor to boycott the episode out of feminist disgust, though they could rightly have refused to appear with Clay for the simple reason that he wasn't funny. The especially lame episode that resulted is notable only as a historical curiosity.
5. Steven Seagal (April 20, 1991)
Seagal bears the special distinction of being the SNL host with the least detectable sense of humor. It's not just that he didn't know how to play comedy, but that he seemed to have no understanding of what this thing called "funny" was. Compared to him, hosts like George Steinbrenner and Rudolph Giuliani look like Conan O'Brien on laughing gas. The show's success depended on Seagal eliciting people's laughter, a reaction that he couldn't seem to get past responding to as a personal insult. This aroused concerns that, in the unlikely event that the audience might laugh at what he did in a sketch, he might take offense and charge into the crowd with violent intentions. The fact that the musical guest that night was Michael Bolton made for an amount of pure awfulness per square inch that may have been unprecendented, not just in SNL history but that of all recorded time.
6. Deion Sanders (February 18, 1995)
From O.J. Simpson to Wayne Gretsky to Nancy Kerrigan, few profesional athletes have really distinguished themselves as SNL hosts. By the time Sanders got the call, expectations were set pretty low for football stars; still, this episode is remembered for two low points: Sanders attempting to rap, and Chris Farley (accidentally, it's said, though who can ever be sure with such a man) losing his pants and mooning the audience. In other words, unless you both stuck your fingers in your ears and shut your eyes tight, you were gonna get it.
7. Quentin Tarantino (November 11, 1995)
Tarantino's hosting gig was part of a two-year period of intense overexposure during which he tried to ride the success of Pulp Fiction to an official enshrinement as the King of All Media. In retrospect, it is a tribute to the depth and richness of Tarantino's genuine talent (for directing movies, which he's actually good at) that nobody organized a campaign to have him shot after this episode aired. Things got off to a rousing start with his unbearable performance of a fake-rock song ("Blow You a Kiss in the Wind", from an episode of Bewitched). It was supposed to suck, of course: the ego-maniac pop-addicted fame junkie is sending up his image as an ego-maniac pop-addicted fame junkie. (Ha ha!) But compare it to Bill Murray doing his old lounge singer act to realize that there's a right way of performing deliberately badly, and then there's a way that just amounts to badness squared.
8. Paris Hilton (September 5, 2005)
SNL is, at its heart, a New York institution, and the producers seem to have invited Hilton to host just to watch the inevitable post-show analysis spill over into New York media. Paris hurried to inform Page Six that the cast thought she was "so chill" that she had an open invitation to return whenever her busy schedule permitted. But an anonymous source described her "an energy vacuum on stage" whose "performance was minimally acceptable," and Tina Fey booked time on The Howard Stern Show to offer the unsisterly observation that, as a host, Hilton was "a piece of shit" who had hair "like a Fraggle." All this noise came in marked contrast to the episode itself, which set a new record for sketches played out to uncomprehending or appalled silence.
9. Michael Phelps (September 13, 2008)
SNL signed the star of the 2008 Summer Olympics to host the season premiere, thus giving Phelps the chance to disprove the popular notion that potheads are relaxed. On the other hand, the producers appear to have anticipated that Phelps might not turn out to be an aquatic Steve Martin, loading the episode up with goofy celebrity cameos: William Shatner, Jared the Subway sandwich guy, etc. The most prominent of these was, of course, the debut of Tina Fey's Sarah Palin impression, armed with the line, "I can see Russia from my house!" In fact, Phelps's appearance wasn't so much painful to watch as one of the most invisible hosting jobs since Louise Lasser locked herself in the ladies' room. Come Monday, everyone around the water cooler was talking about Fey as if she'd hosted the show herself, which was probably fine by Phelps anyway.
10. January Jones (November 14, 2009)
I sometimes think that Mad Men fans are too hard on Betty Draper, but in this arena, Don emerges as the clear victor. In two hosting appearances in the past couple of years, Jon Hamm has thrown away the starchiness of his best-known role and revealed a frisky streak of inner lunacy; in contrast, Jones was borderline zombified. In her defense, she may have never recovered from the shock that she must have experienced upon seeing the material that the fabled SNL writing pool had prepared for her: in one notoriously idiotic bit, poor Jones had to play Grace Kelly, overcome by flatulence on the set of Rear Window. To their credit, her co-victims, Bobby Moynihan and Jason Sudeikis, tried to mitigate her affectless performance by pretending that they were the only people on Earth incapable of delivering halfway decent impersonations of Alfred Hitchcock and Jimmy Stewart. Let no one say that chivalry is dead.
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Saturday Night Live
Commentarium (93 Comments)
agreed on hilton, jones, and seagal, but the Louise Lasser opening is great, and obviously staged... and Zappa was also awesome.
Of course it was staged, how old is this writer 23?
Hahaha no it wasn't staged. She did have a breakdown :( As a performer, that was terrifying to watch.
Louise Lasser? Are you out of your mind??? This was so completely in character with her Mary Hartman persona, and her actions were so utterly logical and rational in that context that I can't imagine that anybody could possibly mistake her actions for something unscripted.
If she hadn't been coked to the gills for her appearance, that would have made her the exception since the SNL cast was in the same state, but she did a great job of staying in character for the show.
I was gonna say January Jones, glad you got that one.
That picture of Andrew Dice Clay looks like Jon Stewart in a Guido Halloween costume.
Actually, I agree with the top nine, but not with January Jones. She was nowhere near great, but she was at LEAST as good as the material the writers gave her. They didn't come up with a single decent sketch that week.
January Jones was just awful, she should be #1. The best athlete of all time is definitely Peyton Manning, he can actually hold his own.
true, it's hard to know where to place the blame for JJ. (but don't the hosts usually collaborate on ideas?) as far as louise lasser, whether that was scripted or not, it was extremely uncomfortable to watch. (and it did make her the first person ever to get banned from the show.)
SNL began to decline in quality the second Albert Brooks turned down the chance to be the permanent host in '75. And Frank Zappa may not have been all that fun to work with (as tons of former band members would readily attest) but he was easily one of the two or three most talented people ever to be on that horribly overrated show. Maybe not comedically talented, but still...
that Jan Jones sketch was painful to watch. i felt embarrassed for her having to BE IN IT. maybe that's why she looks uncomfortable - b/c the material is embarrassingly bad!
Zappa was great - and the experience must not have been so bad since he even wrote a song called "Conehead" after the fact. I think Zappa would have been great to work with.
Hate to say it, but I found myself laughing a bunch during JJ's skit.
Is this a qualifier for the 10 worst Nerve articles?
It's spelled "Gretzky," not "Gretsky."
Um... does nobody remember John McCain?
people kept watching SNL after the mid 90s?
George Forman.
"Um... does nobody remember John McCain?"
People really liked him on SNL, he's a naturally funny guy. I'd add Charles Barkley.
Although Michael Phelps was dull, I have to admit that Tom Brady's was harder to watcher.
All snark aside, I don't even really understand how it's possible to misunderstand the Louise Lasser opening that badly. 100% staged, and the timing is pretty flawless.
Zappa was single-handedly the worst host ever.He mugged through every sketch cause "get it".....i'm way too cool for this,but maybe i can shill my latest record masterpiece that no one wants to listen to twice.
Louise Lasser was brilliant in all things she did! This was so obviously staged, and well done. Nerve writer is from the overfed with today's garbage and can recognize a real performance. Also Zappa was awesome!
Zappa's guest spot in a Coneheads sketch as Connie's date is one of classic SNL's all-time greatest moments.
Nancy. Kerrigan.
Gabourey Sidibe - she just read the cue cards and paused mid sentence.
Paris Hilton did have that awesome geek sex-line sketch though. I busted out laughing when she put on the Fourth Doctor hat and scarf.
Good call on the Dice Clay photo. Looks like he was in Massachusetts. As far as Sidibe, what about the skit as the old lady who yells out the window? I wanted to add Barkley too, but he comes in already unintentionally funny, white people tend to laugh at him, not with him, and Frank Caliendo does him no favors, so he has a kind of immunity, as if he were on Survivor or Top Chef.
honestly, wtf with the louise lasser. even if it weren't clear from the get-go that it was staged, the ending should have been a dead giveaway. jesus.
Seagal seems an odd choice, as he was hilarious a couple of years ago presenting "The Friday Night Project" here in England, even making jokes about "I'm enjoying it so much here with Alan and Justin, I'm thinking about going gay" and flirting with Alan Carr... Maybe he's lightened up since '91...
Nany Kerrigan was PAINFUL to watch... I still remember that nightmare!!
George Steinbrenner was awful but Charlton Heston was worse
Doesn't anybody remember Jason Patric? He was so awful that it became embarrassing to even watch it at home. That poor audience must have been mortified.
Maybe I'm a 8 year old at heart but I thought Jones' sketch was funny. And good impersonations by SNL stars.
The rumor about the Milton Berle episode was that behind stage Milton pulled out his cock and showed it off to one of the reluctant female cast members. A real class act that one.
I haven't seen the Louise Lasser episode. But from the clip Ive seen I have to say the cast was either very well prepared or completely in on the joke. While I was reading the list I have to admit I expected to see Robert De Niro. I also agree that Nancy Kerrigan was painful to watch, But I don't really expect pro athletes to provide many laughs. (just ratings)
I didn't remember the LL episode until I saw it now but, Jesus, how could anyone not know that was a staged sketch? She has a couple moments of really convincing method acting but it was clearly a pre-planned sketch. I'm guessing that they anticipated a meltdown and this was a preemptive way of dealing with it.
does anyone remember tom greens ep? that was the worse, it had all these long uncomfortable sketches that i guess worked on his canadian show but to a live new york audience fell flat.
That Louise Lasser sketch was so obviously scripted it makes me seriously question the intelligence of the person who put this list together.
Stopped watching in the mid 90's? How about after the Billy Crystal/Martin Short/Chris Guest period. Even then......Luoise Lasser was staged, it was what, the 2nd season, naff timing was not unusual.
It couldn't have been worse than Freddy Got Fingered.
well zappa seams allright... he's just not the guy for the snl...
I remember the Dice Clay episode well and as I recall he was still pretty damn famous at that time his downfall being a couple of years later...I think that Nora Dunn and Sinbad O'Connor made their political statements for feminists but I wouldn't rank Dice as one of the worst SNL host ever.
I think it's unfair to put athletes on the list, with the exception of Deion Sanders (due to his horrible rap performance). Also, the Louise Lasser monologue WAS scripted, but was based on her behavior during the week leading up to the show. The REAL bad part came in her "2nd monologue" towards the end where she rambled on about her year, sang "Maaaaaaaary, plain as any name can be", almost started crying, got distracted, and awkwardly did a bit about putting her shoes on. I also agree Jason Patric should be on there... awful show.
Zappa was basically Weird Al with less charm and humor. Yikes.
Did Shaq ever host? I can't imagine anyone being worse than him.
I'm glad to see someone else mention it first (and as much as it pains me to say it), Robert DeNiro should really be on this list. He hosted TWICE and both times fumbled over nearly every line; constantly straining to read the cue cards! January Jones may have been stiff (though I thought her filmed piece about dinner party tips was really funny), but I'd give her the benefit of the doubt seeing as how bad the rest of the material was.
That Louise Lasser monologue was obviously staged, so how it have the worst?
Pro athletes, singers as hosts are usually pretty awful....
Has there been a remotely consistently funny SNL since Phil Hartman left? I don't watch it much, but when I have, there hasn't been. I loved the show initially, even with shortcomings, and rather liked Harry Shearer's second season, with Martin Short and all...but, since then, only the Hartman years have had even the slightest consistency, despite scattered good work in every season before and since, and people who often go on to better work.
I'd say Gabouray Siddibe was at least number 11.
If Governor David Paterson had ever hosted, he would easily have been the worst of all time.
Damn, lost a little respect for Tina Fey. Still love her, but... two wrongs (or incidences of bitchiness) do not make a right.
You forgot Drew Barrymore.
Jon Heder had the worst episode of the past decade. He was a wooden plank, and just as bad as January Jones and Gabourey Sidibe live.
I actually love how it’s easy on my wide opened eyes and the facts are well written.
Don't let anyone on who smokes or otherwises uses the tobacco drug.
BAN THE TOBACCO DRUG, NOW!
YOU ARE A MORON.
The Louise Lasser routine was scripted. Obviously.
I dont think its very fair to blame the hosts completely for bad shows, the writing on snl is so god awful 90% of the time most comedians (and especially not just random actors and athletes) couldnt salvage it.
there is no way in hell that Lasser's opening wasn't staged. I don't know what you guys where thinking, but her and Zappa were both great and really funny. seriously, when the shark came to Lassers door in the video, they wouldn't do something like that if she was just wacked out.
You've got to admit....Gabourey's song and dance" I'm Gabourey" was pretty entertaining!
The Louise Lasser episode was Not scripted. She went through a nervous breakdown and may also have been on drugs. Lorne Michaels said she was one of the worst hosts in the history of the show and refused to rerun her episode. It didn't appear even in syndication for many many years.
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zappa was funny, this writer seems to have an irrational dislike for him? The coneheads sketch with him in it is swell
I try and watch the show religiously since it first aired. Without Lorne- it was tough to watch.
I enjoyed JJ- Phelps was brutal to watch. LeBron's episode was pretty funny.
Anyone remember when Sid Cesar hosted back in the eighties? Horrible, especially the over long and unfunny silent movie sketch.
Heather Locklear didn't make the list? She was obviously reading the whole time - the bar sketch was her best work, because she didn't have to speak!
Lasser was obviously staged (and she's a good actress because before Dan and the shark came to her door, I believed she was really freaking out, thanks to your dumb comments). And I guess we can file you under the large percentage of idiots who simply do not understand Frank Zappa's sense of humor. He was an all-around great and nice guy who treated people fairly and got a lot of shit in return. Yet, up until the end, he was civil and professional to everyone including those who didn't deserve it. He was also right about almost everything he ever said, including the ideas that seemed really "far out" and pessimistic at the time about hippies, the government, organized religion and big business. The trend-mongers really DO get the public hooked on drugs and entertainment while hiding behind the guise of religion and government to "protect" you while taking away your freedom, brainwashing you to buy junk that makes them rich and kills you off faster.
Clay was at "the end of his 15 minutes" at the time?? Bull! He was very famous at that time and stayed so for quite some time, and he WAS quite funny and the episode was not bad at all! I think the writer is engaging in some odd politically correct revisionism to show what an enlightened, progressive sort he is. It's pathetic!
Thanks to Netflix I was able to watch the Frank Zappa curtain call. The actors don't cluster near the edge of the stage afraid to be near Zappa. They one by one come up and shake his hand, are all smiles, Zappa even does seem comedic interplay with Laraine Newman and Dan Aykroyd. Wow, I guess it's all in the eye of the beholder.
Lasser was not staged? LOL. Wow. You get to write articles for the public to read, Phil? How did that happen? What a moron.
Drew Barrymore after E.T. She was horrible. Of course, she was a kid. Who really thought a kid was going to be able to read cards and do live skits? You even had Eddie saying "Good job!" out of character after Drew finally finished reading her card in a skit. Whose idea was it to have Drew host?
Louise Lasser's performance was so obviously staged. If she really was having a panic attack like that they wouldn't have followed her, SNL isn't reality TV and contracts work differently, the second she goes out of character and leaves the stage like she did they wouldn't own rights to it, and they wouldn't have tried to get her to come out of her changing room by dressing like a shark. And the Time magazine thing wouldn't have worked. That is all.
Ben Affleck's hosting gig was pretty bad.....love him though....
Any show the past 2 season would qualify as crap. Awful host and equally awful sketches and writing.
Elton John... Nuff Said
Zappa hated by the cast and crew? No way. I heard he was just a little too 'excited' and sort of blew off attempting to act, especially during the Coneheads episode. Compare Zappa to Burt Reynolds as a big shot Hollywood star tearing through teen groupies, and Zappa makes the list?
Lasser episode was rerun but I never saw the Uncle Milty one until Netflix. Search for the inside story on why Gilda was harassing him during the 'Widettes' sketch.
The other famous one is Charles Grodin, who you think would be perfect, only hosted once, with every sketch him flubbing or professing to not understand, for example how are 'Killer Bees' funny.
He missed the dress rehearsal for a live TV show!
Well, then, that makes Frank Zappa a moralistic twerp. Glad he's dead!
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Martin Lawrence's episode was BY FAR THE WORST. IT WAS PAINFUL TO WATCH!!! It was worse than anyone previously listed here. Charles Barkley was terrible, and he hosted more than once, which was just baffling!!
I think Frank was disgusted by the rampant drug use and encouragement of drugs on the show. He was a very anti-drug individual and SNL at that time was awash in cocaine and other substances. He looked at the show as just a diversion from the concerts he was already booked to play at the Palladium in NYC.
Frank took all work seriously and seeing drug use rampant like this would have triggered his "Who the F&*K Cares" attitude.
The Coneheads sketch was very funny because Frank can't act worth crap, and he made no bones about it, he was playing to his base, his fans and if others didn't find it funny, tough sh&t.
His best performance of Coneheads live is seen here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkQDhv0KErE&feature=related
Lorne Michaels should've let go of the series and let it grow naturally on its own from the 80s on. It seems that current hosts are given far too obvious characters, along with very sophmoric writing that offers very little creativity, nor appreciation of the guest at hand. This year alone, I've witnessed at least two episodes wherein they used Jim Hader in three game show sketches in one show!!! I've felt so sad for the lost integrity of the show, that I've thought about giving them some scripts just to remind them that they do in deed write for an audience.
Ummm.... Jeff Gordon?
uhmmm, does anyone really think seth meyers banged paris hilton?
or was that just a joke?
In one of Christopher Walken's many appearances he appeared to just read the offscreen cue cards in a monotone voice. Looked like a table read rather than a performance, and every skit he was in fell flat. (I know, I know, he's an icon and was a great SNL host many times, but not on this night.)
How did you not include Pamela Anderson?
Robert Conrad in the 80's. Read off the cue cards without even pretending not to
I actually laughed my ass off when January Jones hosted. But i laugh a lot anyway so i might just have this thing called humour.
Steve Forbes? Didn't he host once.
I think Robert DeNiro needs to be in the top 10, both of his have just been painful to watch.
It wasn't staged you morons. Louise Lasser wanted to back out at the last minute due to her personal and mental problems and had to be threatened with legal action to be brought onto the show. Why do you think it was incoherent and rambled? Why do you think she was in, like 2 skits? The cast did a wonderful job going with to make it seem staged because this was live television goddammit. She was subsequently the first person to be banned from hosting the show. Do your research, I'm 22 and I know this