“Live from London, it’s Saturday night!”
Almost sounds like a sketch itself, doesn’t it? You can imagine — in days of SNL past — Aykroyd, Ferrell or Samberg with bowler hats and umbrellas, lampooning Britain from Studio 8H with skits about bad teeth, worse food, and plummy accents. But no! It’s real. And, against all odds, it’s pretty good. Colour me surprised.
For context, I’m sort of the opposite of SNL UK, which began airing in Britain on March 21. I’m a Brit who exported myself to North America a few years ago, where I worked in Toronto for this very magazine. Saturday Night Live, however, has recently hopped the pond in the opposite direction. And, before it hit British shores three weeks ago, there was some very, very mean-spirited stuff flying around online.
When Tina Fey hosted our inaugural show last month, she addressed this. During a monologue which featured a surprise appearance by Bridgerton’s Nicola Coughlan, Brits were accused of often “rooting for the downfall of others.” This past weekend, Riz Ahmed hosted the third show, and admitted that we “like it when things are a bit crap.” “We actually cheer when someone drops their pint glass in the pub,” he added.
He’s not wrong. Among our worst traits (bad teeth notwithstanding), Britons are often quick to judge, slightly spiteful, and — or so I thought — far too timid to accept SNL’s brasher, broader humour in the UK. “Less cowbell!” I imagined they’d be shouting in the streets. Dana Carvey’s anthemic “Pump! You! Up!” may as well have been “Let! You! Down!” I thought. At least, if she deigned to make the transatlantic trip, Debbie Downer would have fit right in.
And yet, by the time Fey’s episode wrapped up, SNL UK had already skewered national icons including Attenborough, Churchill, and Shakespeare. Forget the stiff upper lip, this was tongue-in-cheek territory — and most viewers were blindsided by how good the show actually was. Fey did say “pants” rather than “trousers” at one point, but we let it slide.
Things have only got better. Jamie Dornan was our week two host, and both he and Ahmed delivered genuinely funny material. The sketches were unabashed, cutting, often quite dark. But what really made it work?
In my opinion, it’s come down to the fact that this is a very British show. We’ve obviously borrowed the format and even the name, but beyond the broad strokes, most of the humour relies on deep UK references that really only land if you’re steeped in our own pub-worn, panel-show-soaked culture. The studio set, admittedly, might be the one misstep — a British boozer would arguably have suited it better than the underground, bare-brick comedy club aesthetic. That remains a little New York-y. And this US copycat problem was one of the main reasons viewers were worried about SNL UK.
In the past, presumably seduced by the long-running North American tradition of late-night talk shows, UK TV execs have tried to mimic US formats — with disastrous results. In 2017, The Nightly Show arrived on our screens, complete with an underwhelming low-rise London backdrop and stilted pre-show monologue (the monologues are perhaps the least successful part of SNL UK; we Brits don’t like being lectured). We do have popular talk shows, hosted by Graham Norton, Jonathan Ross, and the like. But these are their own, uniquely British beasts — once-a-week and considerably less topical.
SNL UK takes the weekly format, and splices in just enough Americana that we can stomach it. We’re also probably just happy to see ‘event television’ make a comeback. Or maybe it’s seeing our favourite bands have a chance to perform multiple tracks on mainstream TV — a rarity these days. Or perhaps it’s just as simple as swearing; SNL UK, unlike its US counterpart, is permitted as many Fs, Cs, Bs, Ts, and Ps as it wants. And we L to swear.
But, most of all, it’s got to be the unapologetically British edge that swings it. The best sketches from SNL UK’s first three weeks have been about Jools Holland’s Hootenanny, Lime bikes, Original Source shower gel, Fergie (not that one), and Captain Birdseye’s frozen foods. And, if none of that means anything to you, that’s the point.
As Riz Ahmed said this weekend: “Sometimes, I feel like this whole nation’s having an identity crisis.” Thankfully, I think any Brits tuning into SNL UK will feel they’ve found something that, for once, speaks their language.
