Alan Zweibel on the Early Days of ‘Saturday Night Live’

Larry is joined by Emmy Award-winning writer and producer Alan Zweibel to discuss his time during the first few years of Saturday Night Live. Alan begins the conversation by sharing his feelings about the 50th anniversary of SNL and detailing the anatomy of a good joke. Larry and Alan then talk about Lorne Michaels’s original concepts for the show and detail the inspiration for some of Zweibel’s favorite sketches (15:34). Next, they examine some of the iconic performers and hosts who made those first shows so special, including Chevy Chase, Steve Martin, and Andy Kaufman (24:36). After the break they talk about the lasting influence of SNL’s early commercial parodies and pay tribute to the great Gilda Radner (38:11). Alan ends the show by remembering some of the lessons he learned as one of the original writers at SNL and some of the projects he has lined up for the future (49:17).

Host: Larry Wilmore
Guest: Alan Zweibel
Producer: Chris Sutton