The London-based version of Saturday Night Live is here, and while British audiences may not know what to make of the sketch-heavy live show, the first episode was good enough to keep most critics at an arm’s length.
Tina Fey, a former cast member of the U.S. version of SNL and a former head writer of the program in the States, was the first host of the British version, to mixed results.
On one hand, Fey provided an anchoring point for this new SNL. But on the other, she was miscast in sketch work, seeing as that was never her strength. She also stuck out like a well, red-white-and-blue thumb among the lady fingers that make up an interesting British cast.
Saturday Night Live UK is produced by Lorne Michaels-owned Broadway Video. Michaels is also listed as executive producer, but it’s unclear if he did anything more than stand on stage pre-sketch with his signature win glass in hand. The show feels like Michaels effort to spread his legacy to a second continent. No one seems to have asked for this program in Britain, but by god or king, the island is going to get it.
Much of the heavy lifting in sketch work was performed by George Fouracres, who looks like what we might get if Rowan Atkinson and Dana Carvey had a child. Fouracres is clearly a capable sketch performer and character comedian, but he seems more like your dad than an edgy, hip SNL star.
The show was stolen a bit by musical act Wet Leg and its mesmerizing lead singer and founder Rhian Teasdale, who mastered the stage with confidence and sexuality matching anything Britain has produced since Mick and the Stones.
SNL UK missed an opportunity by not having Fey appear on its version of Weekend Update, which she could have done as a correspondent or guest commentator. That type of situation is Fey’s wheelhouse. Instead, we were reminded how mediocre the American actress is in sketches.
As with the U.S. show, SNL UK will take time for its cast to mesh and for comedic timing to emerge. A new audience in a new country will also have to be sold on a program whose major “hook” is that it’s performed live. In an age when most viewers are consuming shows on their own time, binging when they want to, a live show must be an event to draw viewers, or create so many viral moments it can become an online phenomenon.
The show will now perform its first one-week turnaround before next Saturday’s show, which will be hosted by Jamie Dornan, with musical guest Wolf Alice.
SNL UK reruns can be seen on Peacock in the U.S. roughly 12 hours after they air live in Britain.
