17 ‘SNL’ Writers Remember the First Sketch They Got on the Air

The typical week for Saturday Night Live writers goes as follows: On Monday, they all cram into Lorne Michaels’s office to pitch ideas. Most of these ideas are fake ideas they scrambled to come up with and have no intention of actually writing. On Tuesday, they stay up all night working on the sketches they do intend to write, getting them ready for the Wednesday read-through. On Wednesday, they read anywhere from 35–40 sketches. They spend Thursdays rewriting as a group; Friday is for blocking (i.e., figuring out the logistics of each sketch); and Saturdays are dedicated to rehearsing before it all goes out live. Less than 48 hours later, they start the cycle all over again.

The show’s past writers are a who’s who of comedy greats, with people like Chevy Chase, Adam Sandler, Tina Fey, John Mulaney, Sarah Silverman, JB Smoove, Seth Meyers, Conan O’Brien, Al Franken, Larry David, Paula Pell, and Mike Myers all having walked the halls on their way to stardom. The show’s rigorous writing process—and the challenges that each week brings—is highlighted in an episode of the new Peacock documentary series SNL50: Beyond Saturday Night, which is streaming on the platform now.

In honor of the show’s 50th anniversary, we had some of the program’s writers take us through their first weeks on the show, as well as the first sketch they got on the air.

GETTING HIRED AND (KIND OF) COMFORTABLE

Michael Schur (writer, 1998–2004): I interviewed in the summer of ’97. We got interviewed in pairs to meet Steve Higgins, Lorne Michaels, and Adam McKay, who was the head writer at the time. And I was paired with this woman, and I remember thinking, Oh, I’m never going to get this job, because this woman is so much funnier than me. And it was Tina Fey. She got hired and I didn’t. But in December, I got a call that said, “You start January 3.”

Sarah Silverman (writer, 1993–1994): I didn’t know how anything worked. And it just felt like you were thrown in the river and you were figuring out if you could swim.

Schur: No one explains anything to you when you’re new there. No one explains to you, “Here’s where the bathrooms are, here’s how to get down from the 17th floor to the 8th floor, here’s how the system works.”

Kevin Nealon (writer-performer, 1986-1995): Basically, we were all just living out of our suitcase. I don’t think anybody unpacked their suitcase for the first couple of weeks. I had no idea what it was like to live in New York. Al Franken said you have to find a good neighborhood, and I thought, What do you mean neighborhood? I thought New York City was the neighborhood.

Ian Maxtone-Graham (writer, 1992–1995): In fall of ’91, I had been laid off at the National Lampoon. I called up Jack Handey—who I asked to send us some Deep Thoughts—and I said, “I’m leaving, so don’t bother sending them.” Then Jack says, “Hey, if you’re not working there anymore, why don’t you apply at SNL?” That spring, I get a phone call, and I have a three-week tryout for the last shows of the season.

Robert Smigel (writer, 1985–1993, 1996–2008): Mine was a landmark first show: the return of Lorne Michaels [after he had taken five years off]. I’d never have gotten the job if it wasn’t that particular season and all of the turnover that came with it. I was hired as an apprentice writer, which meant that I didn’t get a whole salary.

Natasha Rothwell (writer, 2014–2015): I didn’t really have any expectations going into it. I auditioned to be on cast, and then a few months later, they reached out to me to write on the show. I was in the middle of teaching an improv class when I found out that I had gotten the gig. And I immediately took them all out for drinks. [Laughs] It was a cool kind of teachable moment, to be able to show them what hard work was going to result in.

James Downey (writer-performer, 1977–1980, 1984–1998, 2000–2013): People get a sense of what you do, what your style is. And then you start to collaborate with other people based on ideas you had or vice versa.

Chevy Chase (writer-performer, 1975–1976): Lorne hired me [as a writer initially]. But he said, “You can’t act [on the show].” I said, “Okay, never mind.” Because I was starting to think about acting. I was doing this Smothers Brothers show as a writer, and it seemed like more fun to be in it. Eventually, though, I joined as a writer.

Robin Duke (writer-performer, 1981–1984): I was the first woman performer-writer on SNL. In the first year [as a performer], I had written more sketches that had made it to air than some of the writers. So at the end of that year, I handed in all of the sketches that I had written as my portfolio to Dick Ebersol, and he had to hire me [as a writer].

Silverman: There were so few women there. And you had to have a key to go to the ladies room. But the men didn’t need a key! And, of course, the reason is because it was dangerous for women. Because one of the guys might come in and…you know… So it’s like instead of expecting appropriate, non-rapey behavior from the men in the cast, they just lock it.

David Mandel (writer, 1992–1995): I worked with Al Franken at Comedy Central in the summer of 1992. At the end of the summer, he said, “I want to put you up for SNL.” Next thing I knew, I was meeting Jim Downey for a late-night bite at 30 Rock. In typical Jim Downey fashion, I waited downstairs for him for, like, an hour. He finally came down and we talked a bunch. I left the meeting, and I immediately called Al and said, “I think I got hired, but I’m not sure.” Al said, “I’ll call you right back.” Then Al called back and said, “Yeah, you got hired.”

Jillian Bell (writer, 2009–2010): I remember going in to meet with Seth Meyers to potentially be a writer. And he basically was just saying to me, “What’s your relationship like with your family?” And I’m like, “What? This is the interview?” I left the meeting, and then I wandered around Times Square. I went to the wax museum, and then I went to Magnolia Bakery. I thought I lost the job. And then I got a call while I had cake in my hand, walking up to the counter at Magnolia Bakery, and it was Seth. And he said, “Hey. What’re you doing?” I’m like, “I’m getting cake.” And he said, “You got the job. You start tomorrow.”

Tim Herlihy (writer, 1994–1999): My first show was after the Martin Lawrence show, which was kind of controversial. So everybody was kind of down about that. I think March is just a down time generally. People are just tired. I was full of energy. Everybody else was just trying to get to the end of the season.

Mandel: The first week of the show, I turned 22. And on my birthday, I was still living with my folks, but they were at work. So I went to the office. Nobody there knew it was my birthday. I was too scared to have given anybody I knew the phone number for the office, and we were there until after midnight. So nobody wished me a happy birthday.

Paula Pell (writer, 1995–2013): I was in Orlando performing for the theme parks. I got to know an improv group that did a pilot, and they asked me if I wanted to put some of those characters on this pilot. I was just sitting in the greenroom, and my agent called and said, “Are you sitting down? Saturday Night Live saw this tape and they want to meet you.” I’m like, “Excuse me??” My entire life, I was obsessed with SNL. I flew up [for the meeting], and then I had, like, four days to get my whole life together.

Robert Carlock (writer, 1996–2001): There was a little bit of a feeling of, Oh, this could go away. We’re on thin ice. This new cast needs to click. They had a year of warming up before I got there. Everyone felt a little new, even the people that had been there a year. I still had placenta dripping off of me. It felt kind of tense.

Pell: When I met Lorne, he said, “The show is like a phoenix. And there have been a few times where it’s crashed and burned and then it’s risen again. So we’re in that phase right now where we’re trying to rise again from the ashes.” So we had very low expectations of what was going to happen.

Smigel: I remember the read-through on Wednesday and being dazzled and overwhelmed by the talent of the writing staff. Sketches that were incredibly clever and dry. They were killing at the table read. And then there was the shock of seeing things mostly bomb on that first show.

Schur: I joined at this really odd moment where Norm [Macdonald] had just been fired and Chris Farley had just passed away over that holiday break. It was a state of confusion and chaos. So I joined the writing staff, but I don’t think anyone noticed I was there for three months, because it was so chaotic. And then I came back the next year and slowly but surely figured out the job.

Silverman: Ian Maxtone-Graham had an office that was kitty-corner to mine. In his desk, he had a fresh drawer of socks and boxer shorts. This is what I don’t understand. I have memories of myself doing things, and they’re not acceptable things in polite society. Halfway through Tuesday night, I would just take a pair of fresh boxer shorts—and they were big, like almost to my knees—and tube socks, and I would take off my pants and my underwear and I would change into that. And if I bumped into him in the hallway and I was wearing his shorts and his socks, I just had an attitude like, Fucking say something! And he never did.

Max Brooks (writer, 2001–2003): My first show week was a crazy time after 9/11. The major concern was how to be funny. So I called an old family friend, Larry Gelbart. And I said, “Larry, what do you do?” And he said, “You just focus on human foibles. Basic human nature does not change. It doesn’t matter what the situation is. Times change, we don’t. Focus on people and the dumb things people do.”

Smigel: A lot of what I wrote before the season started were all short films that never had a real chance of getting on. There was one that was a candid-camera show, and they played practical jokes on animals. It was called It’s a Wild, Wild, Wild, Wild Kingdom. It was a hidden-camera show with narration. So you’d hear the narrator go, “Take a look at this goat reacting to the moving mailbox.” And the goat would just be standing next to a mailbox and it’d move. Unlike a human who would be confused, the goat just does nothing.

Colin Jost (writer-performer, 2005–present): My first show was Steve Carell and Kanye West. I was very psyched. I was a fan of both of them. It was very exciting. I had just been hired maybe the week before. I think I might have been the last writer hired. The first thing you do is, you all go into Lorne’s office on the 17th floor. And Lorne calls on every cast member and writer to pitch ideas. It was kind of nerve-racking, because it’s all these people you’ve barely met. You just got hired. You feel like everyone’s kind of looking at you like, Who is this person? Are they even funny? You’re intimidated just being there.

Maxtone-Graham: When Seinfeld came in to host my first week, he brought with him two writers: Larry David and Larry Charles. So not only am I up against Jim Downey, Robert Smigel, Jack Handey, Al Franken, Fred Wolf, the Turners, all these amazing writers, I’m up against these two other legendary guys.

Downey: It’s like learning a new language. Not a super-complicated language, but it is new, and it has rules that aren’t necessarily intuitive.

JB Smoove (writer, 2003–2006): I didn’t get a lot of things on air, partly because I was still learning how to be a writer on that speed. That speed is different than writing a movie or writing a TV show at your leisure. This is live TV. They needed that shit yesterday.

Bell: I grew up watching SNL. So to be at that table and they pull your sketch up next to read, it’s the most magical and terrifying moment of your life. You’re also like, Did I spell everything right? Is this gonna get a laugh? What is Lorne Michaels’s facial expression doing? He reads all of the stage directions. So there’s also moments where you’re having him say, “And then the llama enters wearing Kristen’s hat.” And you’re like, Why did I have that be the ending?

Downey: Writers tend to write idea-oriented pieces, which involve plot and changes to locations and things. And performers tend to favor things that are about a character. And they’re happy to do their character sitting on a park bench for four and a half minutes, whereas writers tend to want to wander off and do something. But as the show became more performer-focused, the pieces got simpler.

Smoove: I pitched lots of things that never got on. A guy who used to work in the bank and now he owns a deli and he can’t stop licking his finger to put cheese on bread, like how you count money. I pitched “Urine Detective” for Johnny Knoxville. I pitched Tom Brady a sketch about the first player in the NFL to slap another player on the butt after a good play. I really had to figure out how I was gonna navigate through this new challenge for myself.

GETTING A SKETCH ON THE AIR

Chase: We had a big table read. I think Lorne asked everybody, “Okay, do something.” I decided to do a Weekend Update concept, which was about a little baby sandpiper that had been born at the zoo. All the goddamn newscasters end with a touching story. So I did, “And then on a lighter side, the baby hippopotamus that was born yesterday stepped on the baby sandpiper and killed it.” There was laughter everywhere. Based on that, Lorne decided that I should talk. I think Weekend Update was born that way.

Downey: My first piece was kind of a disaster. It was Ralph Nader answering questions from activist students. It was just dumb college kids asking stupid questions. I wrote the piece entirely by myself, which was probably a mistake. I should have hooked up with other writers who knew how television worked. I had only written for print. I just thought you write stuff and somehow the camera captures it. It was kind of a horrifying experience. Unlike some people, I didn’t have a great first outing.

Duke: My first sketch was “She’s a Pig” [in my second week]. Mary Gross and Tim Kazurinsky are out on a date, and I come in as Tim’s old girlfriend, and I’m a pig. I’m in tight pants, teased hair, and Mary is her sweet little Mary Gross self, and I’m Tim’s former girlfriend.

Jost: One idea I pitched my first show was in the news, a JetBlue airplane that had an emergency landing. Luckily, no one was injured. I pitched how crazy it would be for people to be watching news coverage on the in-flight TVs of their own plane crash as it was happening. Afterwards, Eric Kenward and Bill Hader, who was also brand-new, told me that they really liked the JetBlue sketch and would I want to work on it with them. We wrote it for Steve Carell and Amy Poehler. Amy’s really worried because she’s seeing the news, and Carell is completely oblivious because he’s just watching an animated movie on the TV. We did it at read-through, and it went pretty well. Then it got picked. Having a sketch on the show is so lucky, and you’re seeing how this all works, because you don’t know unless you go through it. I was being guided by people who knew better than I did. The sketch went well, and I was extremely relieved. Then Liz Cackowski told me, “Just so you know, last year a writer got two sketches on his first show. And he got fired at the end of the year.”

Smigel: I did get a sketch in my very first week. It was very low-concept but performer-friendly. It was a parody of a Spanish variety show. Marika was the name of the character I wrote for Madonna. She just had a look about her that made me think that she’d be great playing a Spanish variety show host. It was strange to have Madonna be the first host I wrote for and have her sing this mash-up that I wrote of “Take on Me” and “La Bamba.” I even wound up being the backup singer in the scene with Damon Wayans and Jon Lovitz. Mark McKinney and Bruce McCulloch helped me write it. It couldn’t have been a stranger way to break into show business.

Nealon: I had this thing in my act called tagging, where I would slip a word in. When I got to SNL, Al Franken liked that. So we sat down and wrote this “Mr. Subliminal” thing together. I had gone to school for advertising, and I had learned about subliminal advertising there. I remember right before the sketch, Lorne came up and put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Are you sure this is what you want?” [Laughs] Then kind of overnight, I’d walk down the streets of New York the next day, and it’d be like, “Hey, Mr. Subliminal!”

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