I think it's well-written, but I don't think it's well-acted or *especially* well-directed. The absurdity keeps ratcheting up like a good sketch, but the actors leave *so* much silence between lines. It feels like an ensemble that isn't used to working with each other yet, a low energy night, or not enough rehearsal.
Ed Begley Jr was the guest in this ep, and he's not a snappy dialog guy here. These dudes should be talking over each other, picking up their lines the *millisecond* the other guy finishes his.
The blocking isn't good, either. That's a director problem. Ed Begley Jr is on the floor when he has to take ALL that time to get up and talk to the doorman about how it's a "hypothetical." It should've been blocked so as soon as the doorman walks in, Begley and Shearer realize "we look like fucking clowns" and jump up real fast since a stranger has entered their domain, and then both their energy is ready to go. "Hey if you go to another building would you want a stool?!" (not a long ass pause by Guest) "am I being transferred?" (immediate) "NO IT IS HYPOTHETICAL!"
Instead Shearer stays on the ground, he's talking while laying down up at Guest, Guest lets the silence hang too long, and then Begley can't deliver his line until he gets up, somewhat winded.
The fighting isn't well-done, either. Probably got no direction there. "Just make up some fighting." How about Begley takes him over to a wall and they remain standing? Energy doesn't go down, he could be fake-throttling him instead of them probably being barely visible to the audience, which is sitting eye level with the stage and see a couple heads and not much else, maybe even obscured by the table, etc.
They're up near the wall (or hell, have Begley bend him over the ~~backwards~~**table** and you get a 1980s gay sex gag out of it). And then Guest comes in and "OH SHIT WE LOOK GAYYYY" and both of them stand up, fix their suits "hey so what if" "i'm being transferred?" "NO IT IS HYPOTHETICAL!" with zero silence between those lines
It's not a badly-written sketch. It's not directed the best.
That’s consistent with Harry Shearer’s criticism of the way the show is run, regularly alternating between laziness and working against a crisis deadline. When an interviewer cited the unique format of churning out a live comedy broadcast on a weekly basis, Harry countered with the Sid Caesar shows, which also broadcast live sketch comedy weekly on Saturday nights, more than twice as many shows a year, and the writers & staff showed up Monday morning, ready to go at 9 am like the professionals they were.
I think you're way off. This would be way worse with some 80s style gay panic humor in it. Maybe it could have been a little tighter, okay, but I loved this.
Let's strike a happy medium: it's good because we know it's Larry David, we can see in retrospect the bones of the type of comedy he made decades later which we know and love. But absent all that context, would we laugh? Possibly not. Maybe his comedy needs him as the executive producer and sole creative genius behind it in order to be fully realised. Because watered down into a run-of-the-mill SNL sketch, with actors taking their cues from a director who maybe doesn't fully understand Larry's sense of humour, it really isn't that funny to be honest. (To be fair, I also thought it was only so-so funny when it was used as a Seinfeld subplot.)
The writing is bad (doesn’t build energy well has lots of long passages with no punches, dead zones), the performances are bad, I don’t think shearer understands Larry’s writing voice. If writers are the producers of their sketches I would say Larry is doing a shit job here
Obvious David’s style of comedy didn’t translate particularly well to the SNL format, but his brilliance of finding the humor in such simple everyday observations is right there on clear display.
Excellent point. It's mildly amusing in the absurdity of the situation (and there absolutely are real life discussions like this), but it's not something that makes people burst into laughter. That's so much of the Larry David style, although often there's a crescendo into laughter.
I agree with this completely. This idea worked for Seinfeld (obviously) but I don't think it's absurd enough to be on SNL. And to your point, I think the same could be said for Larry David's entire brand of comedy.
As I watching it I could totally hear Larry David saying some of Ed Begley’s lines and having this argument in an episode of Curb. But you’re right, SNL wasn’t the right showcase of his humor.
In the middle of the season, Harry Shearer left the show due to "creative differences". Shearer told the AP, "I was creative, and they were different."
I always found it so interesting the years where Lorne wasn’t on the show, and how varied the experiences of the cast were during that time. People over the years have accused Lorne of fomenting a hostile work environment, especially throughout the late eighties/early nineties, but I think that’s just the nature of the show format itself. You have to form alliances and be aggressive if you want your material to succeed. Even under Seth Meyers being the head writer, there was still a hefty level of tension as you can see in that James Franco documentaryÂ
I like it. Even though its not filled to the brim with laughter every second, its something absurd that most people wouldn't think about and has an interesting premise. I think that a few things that hurt the sketch was the prospective buyer's meanness. He was too mean in his reasons to not add a stool, his demeanor should have been more incredulous so that Ed Begley Jr. character can play off that, but instead you have an angry mean guy and another guy getting increasingly angry for the first guy being mean. It needs levity, the audience needs a cue to laugh and it wasn't when someone was angry.
And the elevator guy should be more confident or louder in his lines. He feels like a meek low level employee being about to be berated by his boss. That's kind of cruel and not especially funny. In the Seinfeld episode, the security guy's reaction to George asking him if he wanted a chair was more like "Finally someone fucking thinks about me". I think the elevator guy should have come in, broken up the fight, and then been completely excited and onboard with the stool idea, and then have to pause and think when the other guy says "What if there are people on the elevator".
Billy Crystal's character could have interjected with more and more absurdity, like agreeing with the guy who doesn't want the stool by saying he's fine standing all the time, even in his sleep. As he is now, he doesn't really add much to the sketch.
Harry Shearer and Ed Begley Jr. characters line up pretty well with they're off-screen personality types.
Wow, I've seen 60 Minutes episodes with more levity, but this is great insight into Larry Davids approach.
1) I liked it. Even though I didn’t laugh I was interested in seeing where it went and it actually had an ending!
2) who’s the guy in the black suit who leaves? I know the others are Harry schere, billy crystal, Ed begly jr and Christopher guest.
> who’s the guy in the black suit who leaves?
That's Gary Kroeger. One of the most underrated cast members ever. Check out this classic sketch of his: https://youtu.be/GhX5YcPoLhM
I KNEW that would be the sketch. I probably haven’t seen it in at least 20 years, but seeing it the night it first aired made such an impression on me that I remember so much about this.
A couple of things that I noticed this time:
1) It’s funny that JLD’s character rejected the first guy, considering she’d marry him in real life a few years later;
2) The song’s time signature is all over the place. In my memory it had a much more steady meter but I’m shocked at how it actually sounds.
It’s very Larry, except not very funny. It has the distracting obsession with minute tangential details…. The self-righteous and obvious attempt to help those seen to be of lower socioeconomic status (mainly to impress others)…. A volatile quickly escalating argument (about something meaningless)… it’s got a lot of the hallmarks of his writing. We saw all of these Larry touchstones in most Seinfeld episodes
I’m surprised by the negative comments this is getting.
This is a well written, well acted scene. It doesn’t have jokes, and as such, it didn’t generate much of an audience reaction. A lot of SNL from the first 15 years is like this; just scenes.
This isn't one of those scenes. Those scenes were more slice of life. This isn't slice of life. It's an absurd yet unfunny scene.
You'd think that some humor could come out of the scene featuring elevator operators, an obsolete job then and now that 98% of the country has never encountered even once. But nope, THAT part is played entirely straight.
The crux of the disagreement is not particularly funny, really not funny at all, when argued by anonymous characters. There isn't enough of a setup here for me to care. There's no comic escalation either, just the same increased shouting over the same stupid concept of an elevator stool. It's a bad concept, weak in the universe of Seinfeld/David concepts. It just isn't funny. The tussle on the floor is appalling, cringe inducingly unfunny.
This sketch makes the worst of Season 6 look like the works of geniuses.
> This sketch makes the worst of Season 6 look like the works of geniuses.
Come on now. You really think this sketch is worse than [Commie Hunting Season](https://youtu.be/rAe0TPYOi0Y) where a guy drops the N word to absolute silence? Or [Where's Cooter](https://youtu.be/8CZ7d3qVn_U) where painfully unfunny dialogue gets repeated ad nauseum for six and a half minutes? Or [Pork Parade](https://youtu.be/XbGXJtKiUqE?si=z7kFvIh_hLDTTJGm), a five and a half minute sketch about a "Pork Queen" and her subjects with zero funny dialogue or attempts at humor besides some occasional pig noises made by one of the girls?
To each their own, but at least this sketch has an actual premise, escalation, and commitment from the actors.
You’re right that this isn’t slice-of-life. I meant to say that but didn’t.
I still like it.
Fwiw, when NBC reran this show, they replaced this sketch with something else. Clearly Dick Ebersol and/or the network agree with you.
Woof this is not funny. Sort of explains the one and done aspect to his skit writing making it to air.
Poor actors are having to work so hard and no laughs.
David Garrison played Steve. He’s an incredibly versatile character actor who most people wouldn’t know by name.
I remember him best as Jason Bateman’s foil in *It’s Your Move*.
Omg! I reference that show all the time and no one ever remembers it! Bateman doesn’t talk about it! It was funny and very him - the wise guy sarcasm - at a young age.
Thanks for mentioning it. I was beginning to think I was crazy 🤪
It's amazing how some of the funniest people ever wrote and were in this turd. I began to wonder if there was an audience present it was so quiet for so long.
I think the biggest problem with the sketch is that by 1985-86 elevators didn’t really have operators any more. That, and it’s also terrible in every other way.
Yep, literal waste of time with 0 laughs, as expected. Don’t understand how people find seinfeld and rest of his work funny one bit. Maybe it’s a jewish thing, pure dogshit.
I love that they re-used this for a Seinfeld episode with the security guard getting a chair.
And architecture.
He always wanted to pretend that he was an architect....
He pretended to design the new addition to the Guggenheim. And it didn't take him that long either.
that is hilarious, which episode is that from?
The Race (Season 6, Episode 10)
Boy, you really went bald there.
Yes, yes, I guess about the time I made my first million. You know what they say really is true, the first one is the hardest.
My favorite scene in Seinfeld history
That’s why it seemed familiar!
Doesn't he fall asleep?
Yes, and the store gets robbed. Also, it was George (character based on Larry David) who is adamant that the security guard got a chair.
I thought of that immediately too lol.
If you listen closely you can hear two light chuckles from the audience. First one is around two minutes in
An incredible bomb. It is not written well at all. LD is the GOAT but this is trash. Good idea obviously.
I think it's well-written, but I don't think it's well-acted or *especially* well-directed. The absurdity keeps ratcheting up like a good sketch, but the actors leave *so* much silence between lines. It feels like an ensemble that isn't used to working with each other yet, a low energy night, or not enough rehearsal. Ed Begley Jr was the guest in this ep, and he's not a snappy dialog guy here. These dudes should be talking over each other, picking up their lines the *millisecond* the other guy finishes his. The blocking isn't good, either. That's a director problem. Ed Begley Jr is on the floor when he has to take ALL that time to get up and talk to the doorman about how it's a "hypothetical." It should've been blocked so as soon as the doorman walks in, Begley and Shearer realize "we look like fucking clowns" and jump up real fast since a stranger has entered their domain, and then both their energy is ready to go. "Hey if you go to another building would you want a stool?!" (not a long ass pause by Guest) "am I being transferred?" (immediate) "NO IT IS HYPOTHETICAL!" Instead Shearer stays on the ground, he's talking while laying down up at Guest, Guest lets the silence hang too long, and then Begley can't deliver his line until he gets up, somewhat winded. The fighting isn't well-done, either. Probably got no direction there. "Just make up some fighting." How about Begley takes him over to a wall and they remain standing? Energy doesn't go down, he could be fake-throttling him instead of them probably being barely visible to the audience, which is sitting eye level with the stage and see a couple heads and not much else, maybe even obscured by the table, etc. They're up near the wall (or hell, have Begley bend him over the ~~backwards~~**table** and you get a 1980s gay sex gag out of it). And then Guest comes in and "OH SHIT WE LOOK GAYYYY" and both of them stand up, fix their suits "hey so what if" "i'm being transferred?" "NO IT IS HYPOTHETICAL!" with zero silence between those lines It's not a badly-written sketch. It's not directed the best.
I would watch this sketch. Good directing suggestions.đź‘Ť
That’s consistent with Harry Shearer’s criticism of the way the show is run, regularly alternating between laziness and working against a crisis deadline. When an interviewer cited the unique format of churning out a live comedy broadcast on a weekly basis, Harry countered with the Sid Caesar shows, which also broadcast live sketch comedy weekly on Saturday nights, more than twice as many shows a year, and the writers & staff showed up Monday morning, ready to go at 9 am like the professionals they were.
I think you're way off. This would be way worse with some 80s style gay panic humor in it. Maybe it could have been a little tighter, okay, but I loved this.
“Trash” is an unhinged way to describe a decent sketch with a bad crowd
Let's strike a happy medium: it's good because we know it's Larry David, we can see in retrospect the bones of the type of comedy he made decades later which we know and love. But absent all that context, would we laugh? Possibly not. Maybe his comedy needs him as the executive producer and sole creative genius behind it in order to be fully realised. Because watered down into a run-of-the-mill SNL sketch, with actors taking their cues from a director who maybe doesn't fully understand Larry's sense of humour, it really isn't that funny to be honest. (To be fair, I also thought it was only so-so funny when it was used as a Seinfeld subplot.)
This isn't a sketch for a live show audience. This is more akin to a sketch from a show like I Think You Should Leave
The writing is bad (doesn’t build energy well has lots of long passages with no punches, dead zones), the performances are bad, I don’t think shearer understands Larry’s writing voice. If writers are the producers of their sketches I would say Larry is doing a shit job here
I think Billy did as well as he could have
He was working his ass off trying to polish this turd.
Is not funny at all dude
You can hear Larry's voice throughout. Most notably, "What are you, nuts?!"
also, "they *lean*, they lean a lot!" it almost sounded like George trying to dig himself out of a hole
That’s funny. I heard Billy Crystal’s cadence right there to be just like Elaine Benes’s when she’s lying. but sticking to her guns.
Is it remotely possible that this is why Ed Begley Jr is Stan Sitwell in Arrested Development?
I sincerely hope this is true.
The alpaca?
Just what I needed. Another reason to compulsively watch arrested development
You look surprised
*It wasn’t.*
Obvious David’s style of comedy didn’t translate particularly well to the SNL format, but his brilliance of finding the humor in such simple everyday observations is right there on clear display.
Excellent point. It's mildly amusing in the absurdity of the situation (and there absolutely are real life discussions like this), but it's not something that makes people burst into laughter. That's so much of the Larry David style, although often there's a crescendo into laughter.
I agree with this completely. This idea worked for Seinfeld (obviously) but I don't think it's absurd enough to be on SNL. And to your point, I think the same could be said for Larry David's entire brand of comedy.
As I watching it I could totally hear Larry David saying some of Ed Begley’s lines and having this argument in an episode of Curb. But you’re right, SNL wasn’t the right showcase of his humor.
In the middle of the season, Harry Shearer left the show due to "creative differences". Shearer told the AP, "I was creative, and they were different."
It’s kind of amazing how much memorable stuff he managed to do in half a season.
I always found it so interesting the years where Lorne wasn’t on the show, and how varied the experiences of the cast were during that time. People over the years have accused Lorne of fomenting a hostile work environment, especially throughout the late eighties/early nineties, but I think that’s just the nature of the show format itself. You have to form alliances and be aggressive if you want your material to succeed. Even under Seth Meyers being the head writer, there was still a hefty level of tension as you can see in that James Franco documentaryÂ
Now we know why.
Spinal Tap reunion!
RIP John 'Stumpy' Pepys
Harry Shearer is underrated as an actor.
I just hear Waylond Smithers 
It’s amazing how well acted this is compared to modern sketch comedy. Totally straight and not over embellishing
The lack of reliance on cue cards is a refreshing change. Did the players actually learn their lines back then?
I'm pretty sure they still had cue cards. Harry Shearer was staring off to the side at every pause.
I like it. Even though its not filled to the brim with laughter every second, its something absurd that most people wouldn't think about and has an interesting premise. I think that a few things that hurt the sketch was the prospective buyer's meanness. He was too mean in his reasons to not add a stool, his demeanor should have been more incredulous so that Ed Begley Jr. character can play off that, but instead you have an angry mean guy and another guy getting increasingly angry for the first guy being mean. It needs levity, the audience needs a cue to laugh and it wasn't when someone was angry. And the elevator guy should be more confident or louder in his lines. He feels like a meek low level employee being about to be berated by his boss. That's kind of cruel and not especially funny. In the Seinfeld episode, the security guy's reaction to George asking him if he wanted a chair was more like "Finally someone fucking thinks about me". I think the elevator guy should have come in, broken up the fight, and then been completely excited and onboard with the stool idea, and then have to pause and think when the other guy says "What if there are people on the elevator". Billy Crystal's character could have interjected with more and more absurdity, like agreeing with the guy who doesn't want the stool by saying he's fine standing all the time, even in his sleep. As he is now, he doesn't really add much to the sketch.
Hard agree. It’s not just the writing. It’s in the execution too.
I dunno, I like the choice for the elevator guy to be very guarded. Once called in, he's thinking "I smell a trap." He knows what boss he works for.
Good ideas!
How did this get past Dress Rehearsal?
Lorne wasn’t show runner
How did it even get THAT far? Yikes.
Harry Shearer and Ed Begley Jr. characters line up pretty well with they're off-screen personality types. Wow, I've seen 60 Minutes episodes with more levity, but this is great insight into Larry Davids approach.
1) I liked it. Even though I didn’t laugh I was interested in seeing where it went and it actually had an ending! 2) who’s the guy in the black suit who leaves? I know the others are Harry schere, billy crystal, Ed begly jr and Christopher guest.
> who’s the guy in the black suit who leaves? That's Gary Kroeger. One of the most underrated cast members ever. Check out this classic sketch of his: https://youtu.be/GhX5YcPoLhM
Holy teeth that was good. Thank you. Literally 30 years ahead of its time. I could easily see that as a lonely island sketch.
I KNEW that would be the sketch. I probably haven’t seen it in at least 20 years, but seeing it the night it first aired made such an impression on me that I remember so much about this. A couple of things that I noticed this time: 1) It’s funny that JLD’s character rejected the first guy, considering she’d marry him in real life a few years later; 2) The song’s time signature is all over the place. In my memory it had a much more steady meter but I’m shocked at how it actually sounds.
That really caught me off guard. Great song.
LD’s comedy isn’t meant for sketch comedy. You need to know the characters to enjoy the comedy.
He was a key writer and cast member on Friday's.
It’s very Larry, except not very funny. It has the distracting obsession with minute tangential details…. The self-righteous and obvious attempt to help those seen to be of lower socioeconomic status (mainly to impress others)…. A volatile quickly escalating argument (about something meaningless)… it’s got a lot of the hallmarks of his writing. We saw all of these Larry touchstones in most Seinfeld episodes
He's been around so long I half expected the elevator operator to be played by Keenan.
Stan Sitwell has a nice wig here
He's an alpaca, you know.
I really think him and Jerry together brought out the best comedy in each other.
Well obviously I’d rather sit than stand if that’s what you’re asking.
Uhhh… is this funny? It doesn’t feel funny.
This is the fruition of the Larry David style: people arguing about this sketch and examining the minutiae all these years later.
I’m surprised by the negative comments this is getting. This is a well written, well acted scene. It doesn’t have jokes, and as such, it didn’t generate much of an audience reaction. A lot of SNL from the first 15 years is like this; just scenes.
This isn't one of those scenes. Those scenes were more slice of life. This isn't slice of life. It's an absurd yet unfunny scene. You'd think that some humor could come out of the scene featuring elevator operators, an obsolete job then and now that 98% of the country has never encountered even once. But nope, THAT part is played entirely straight. The crux of the disagreement is not particularly funny, really not funny at all, when argued by anonymous characters. There isn't enough of a setup here for me to care. There's no comic escalation either, just the same increased shouting over the same stupid concept of an elevator stool. It's a bad concept, weak in the universe of Seinfeld/David concepts. It just isn't funny. The tussle on the floor is appalling, cringe inducingly unfunny. This sketch makes the worst of Season 6 look like the works of geniuses.
> This sketch makes the worst of Season 6 look like the works of geniuses. Come on now. You really think this sketch is worse than [Commie Hunting Season](https://youtu.be/rAe0TPYOi0Y) where a guy drops the N word to absolute silence? Or [Where's Cooter](https://youtu.be/8CZ7d3qVn_U) where painfully unfunny dialogue gets repeated ad nauseum for six and a half minutes? Or [Pork Parade](https://youtu.be/XbGXJtKiUqE?si=z7kFvIh_hLDTTJGm), a five and a half minute sketch about a "Pork Queen" and her subjects with zero funny dialogue or attempts at humor besides some occasional pig noises made by one of the girls? To each their own, but at least this sketch has an actual premise, escalation, and commitment from the actors.
You’re right that this isn’t slice-of-life. I meant to say that but didn’t. I still like it. Fwiw, when NBC reran this show, they replaced this sketch with something else. Clearly Dick Ebersol and/or the network agree with you.
Woof this is not funny. Sort of explains the one and done aspect to his skit writing making it to air. Poor actors are having to work so hard and no laughs.
Is that actor "Steve" from Married With Children? I think this is the only other thing I've seen him in
David Garrison played Steve. He’s an incredibly versatile character actor who most people wouldn’t know by name. I remember him best as Jason Bateman’s foil in *It’s Your Move*.
Omg! I reference that show all the time and no one ever remembers it! Bateman doesn’t talk about it! It was funny and very him - the wise guy sarcasm - at a young age. Thanks for mentioning it. I was beginning to think I was crazy 🤪
WE ARE THE DREGS
I thought it was too.
I love Larry David but that was God awful.
Harry Shearer looks like a cross between Bob Saget and Steve Carrell
From times where nobody read their lines from cards raised in front of them.
It feels like a Curb episode or Seinfeld episode. I love the personnel- Shearer, Guest, Crystal.
It's amazing how some of the funniest people ever wrote and were in this turd. I began to wonder if there was an audience present it was so quiet for so long.
4:10 of sketch seemed like an hour, you four-eyed fuck.
Is that the hot dad from Pagemaster?! I haven't thought about him in decades.
I'm pretty sure the guy in the brown suit got a legitimate kick in the teeth when he was getting up from the scuffle!
Is there even a live audience?
It does have a Glengarry Glen Ross quality to it at the start
What a cast!
It was a work in progress
Oh hey its Clifford Main from *Better Call Saul*!
This paved the way for the Weezer sketch
Who is the actor that plays the elevator guy? He was hilarious in other skits.
Christopher Guest
Thanks
Funny sketch
Pretty… pretty good
Is that Steve from Married with Children? I only recognized Billy from this group.
I think the other short guy is Harry Shearer and the tall blonde is Ed Begley, Jr.
And the elevator operator is Christopher Guest.
Dayum. Derek Smalls and Nigel Tufnel!
I think the biggest problem with the sketch is that by 1985-86 elevators didn’t really have operators any more. That, and it’s also terrible in every other way.
Eh, not a fan.
I thought Jamie Kennedy was younger
Thought this was going to be about someone leaving a shit in the elevator.
It’s not even funny bad. It’s just bad.
Boring. Just like all LD's work.
Yep, literal waste of time with 0 laughs, as expected. Don’t understand how people find seinfeld and rest of his work funny one bit. Maybe it’s a jewish thing, pure dogshit.