SNL Was Laughworthy Despite Low Ratings

I watched “Saturday Night Live” last weekend for the first time in a great while. It isn’t that I’ve been avoiding SNL, but, as I get older, I find that I watch less television. There are just more interesting things to do than sit in front of the tube. This past weekend, however, I was waiting up for my teenage son so I decided to watch the season premiere of SNL. My reaction was that it was a funny show.

The season premiere was hosted by Woody Harrelson and the musical guest was Billie Eilish. I’ve enjoyed Harrelson’s work off and on since “Cheers.” As for Eilish, I can honestly say that I don’t recall ever hearing of her before, but I have always primarily viewed the musical interludes as an opportunity to go the bathroom and/or refill my drink.  She did fine though.

As you’d expect, the show started with a dig at President Trump. I mean, honestly, how could a show like SNL avoid taking on the biggest scandal of the week that features a president that is a ripe target for satire? Alec Baldwin reprised his role as Donald Trump in an amusing cold open skit that featured everyone from Rudy Giuliani to Ray Donovan (who I also didn’t know but the context was easy to figure out), Kim Jong Un, and Kanye West.

But, despite the claims that SNL only targets Republicans, the show also skewered the Democrats with an “impeachment town hall” skit that hit the presidential candidates. Beto spoke “eighth grade Spanish,” Corey Booker left early “to beat the traffic,” Marianne Williamson planned to trap Trump in a crystal, Buttigieg waffled on pronunciation of his name, and Elizabeth Warren described herself as a “school librarian” with the “energy of a mother of five boys who all play different sports.” Maya Rudolf drew acclaim for her portrayal of Kamala Harris as an actress shilling for a television crime drama and repeatedly exclaiming, “That was me.” But that isn’t the best party. Larry David returned as Bernie “I’m back to ruin things a second time!” Sanders, a curmudgeon who cannot program his television remote.

Harrelson stole the skit with his portrayal of daffy Joe Biden, however. One of my favorite lines of the night was Harrelson’s complaining in Biden’s persona, "I'm like plastic straws. I've been around forever, I've always worked, and now you're mad at me.”

After enjoying the show, I was surprised to learn today that the SNL premiere came in a bit lower in the ratings than the show’s premiere last year and below average for last year’s episodes. It was, however, a higher rating than for last year’s season finale for 18-49-year-olds.

My guess is that there are several reasons for this. One is our tribal political environment. SNL has become identified as a liberal show and now conservatives are apparently supposed to root for bad ratings and the show’s demise. It seems that we can’t laugh at our own side anymore even though our own side is eminently mockable at the moment.

Sometimes that’s understandable. Comedy has to contain a grain of truth to be funny. Often these days, comics take the low road and simply go for applause and moral superiority by making political statements instead of jokes, i.e. “F-ck Trump” or “Trump is a racist.” That’s not funny. However, the cold open on Saturday night was different. It did caricature Trump and others, but it did so in a way that was close enough to the truth to be funny. The same treatment was applied to the Democrats.

Both sides seem to have lost their sense of humor. The left is comprised of humorless scolds who police jokes for biases and stereotypes that must be atoned for. The right venerates Donald Trump to a degree that it cannot see the humor in a man whose Twitter feed often seems to be more of a caricature than the SNL script.

For another thing, American culture and society are so drenched in politics that we need a break. When a political lens is applied to every issue under the sun, viewers might not want to hear another hour-and-a-half of political humor late on Saturday night.

Maybe it was just a factor of unseasonably warm weather that made it attractive to be outside rather than in front of the television.

I hope that the rest of the season is as funny as this weekend’s episode. I grew up watching SNL and laughing at the political jibes. The show was especially relevant in election years with its mockery of debates on both parties. For some reason, whenever I think of SNL politics, I think of Democrat Paul Simon thinking, “I think I really scored big with the bow tie” back during the 1992 election.

For much of the time that I’ve watched SNL, it has been trendy to say that the show isn’t as good as it used to be. Maybe that’s true. Adam Sandler, Dana Carvey, and Mike Myers were hard to beat. Not to mention Eddie Murphy, Dan Akroyd, and John Belushi. But I’ll bet that most of the people who say that probably never watch the show. The skits have always been hit or miss with some that flop and some that turn into comedy gold. One of my favorite SNL skits, “David Pumpkins,” came from the 2016 season.

A good part of the rating slump may be that Republicans don’t want to tune in to watch Donald Trump being ridiculed. If they can’t stand to see Trump roasted, that is their choice, but if they don’t watch, they’ll miss more really funny stuff that mocks the left as well, such as the faux ad for Levi’s “Wokes” jeans from two years ago.

My advice would be to not take your politics so seriously that you can’t laugh at people who should be laughed at. Maybe laughing at ourselves as well as the opposition can help bring us back together as a nation.

Originally published on The Resurgent

You Can See “Unplanned” In Theaters, But You Won’t See Its Ads On Most TV Channels

The new pro-life movie, “Unplanned,” scored big points at the box office on its opening weekend. The story of Planned Parenthood executive-turned-pro-life activist, Abby Johnson, earned more than $6.1 million on its opening weekend, enough to rank fourth in gross revenues. The strong performance was despite many networks refusing to run ads for the socially conservative film.

The creators of “Unplanned” told The Hollywood Reporter that they tried to buy advertising from a number of cable networks, but few channels other than Fox News and the Christian Broadcast Network would accept the ads. Among the networks that refused to air commercials for the move were Lifetime, the Travel Channel, Cooking Channel, HGTV, Food Network, the Hallmark Channel and USA Network.

“We were looking to spend money, but they didn't want to get involved,” John Sullivan, one of the film’s producers, said.

“Most of the networks didn't go into detail beyond citing the subject matter of the film and that they didn't want to get into politics. But we don't believe we're in the political category,” Joe Knopp, another producer added, despite the fact that the film was screened at CPAC.

Several networks, including Lifetime, cited the “sensitive nature of the film” in refusing the ads. Up TV, a family-friendly network, and some Christian radio stations cited the film’s R-rating in denying the ads. The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) gave the film an R-rating in February due to “some disturbing/bloody images” in a scene that uses a computer-generated image of a sonogram to simulate an abortion, noted CNS News. The film’s marketers pointed out that Lifetime, which is owned by A&E, a joint venture of Hearst Communications and Disney, previously promoted an interview with Scarlet Johansson in which the actress promoted Planned Parenthood.

Despite being handicapped by the lack of television advertising, “Unplanned” did extremely well in its opening weekend. The movie finished the weekend in fourth place after “Dumbo,” “Us,” and “Captain Marvel,” per Box Office Mojo. When the fact that “Unplanned” was shown on only 1,059 screens is taken into account, its revenue per screen outperformed “Captain Marvel,” which was released on March 8.

“We are thrilled, gratified and humbled,” co-directors Cary Solomon and Chuck Konzelma said in a statement. “We are so pleased that the American people have responded with such an enormous outpouring of support at the box office. It humbles us and we look forward to seeing what happens in the weeks ahead.”

The financial success of “Unplanned” is largely due to Glenn Beck, who actively promoted the movie, and MyPillow founder, Mike Lindell, who was both an investor and promoter. The CPAC screening sparked word-of-mouth and social media recommendations by conservative activists.

The movie also may have benefitted from a controversy over the weekend in which Twitter suspended the account for “Unplanned.” Twitter told the Daily Caller that the account was “mistakenly caught in our automated systems for ban evasion.” The account was ultimately reinstated, but the spat may have inspired some conservatives to get out and go see the movie.

Pure Flix, the production company for “Unplanned,” has also produced such films as “God’s Not Dead,” “Mom’s Night Out,” and “The Case For Christ” as well as a number of movies about Biblical characters. The company also operates an on-demand video streaming service and offers a free home school curriculum.

Originally published on The Resurgent

The Biggest Problem With "50 Shades"

Much has been written about the problems with the “50 Shades of Grey” series. Through all the discussion, however, few have hit on the most compelling moral problem of the trilogy.

People have discussed how Christian Grey, the hunky billionaire at the center of series, is controlling and manipulative and a borderline stalker. Volumes have been written regarding the sado-masochistic nature of the relationship between Grey and Anastasia Steele, the protagonist of the books, as well as the fact that their relationship began with Grey basically offering to pay her for sex. The codependency of the relationship has been covered as well as the charge that the series is, at its core, dressed-up pornography.

After losing a bet with my wife that required me to read the series, I discovered the biggest and most dangerous problem of the trilogy. First, let me say that the books are much better than the movies. My wife acknowledges this as well. The written version is less creepy and, as with many book-to-screen projects, provide a better understanding of what is happening to the characters.

My wife has said that the books would be good reading for men who want to understand women. She says that author E.L. James does a good job of explaining how women think and feel. Unfortunately, if you want this insight you’ll have to read the books because this does not carry over to the movies.

She also says that the primary attraction of the books is not the kinky sex, but the love story at the center of it all. The problem here is that the unlikely love-at-first-sight-with-a-hunky-billionaire plotline reflects a morality that is almost a mirror-image of reality. “Fifty Shades of Grey” comprises the modern myth that sex leads to love rather than the traditional ethos of love, marriage and then sex.

Granted, “50 Shades” is far from the first franchise to make this claim. Starting with the sexual revolution of the ‘60s and the advent of the birth control pill, sex has become increasingly divorced from love. Radical feminism preached that women could empower themselves by rejecting traditional sexual mores. These days sexual hookups with no emotional hang-ups can be had as easily as swiping right on Tinder.

The result has been a cultural cataclysm. Out of wedlock births have exploded since the 1960s to the point where almost half of all births are to unmarried mothers. Unsurprisingly, government entitlement spending has shown a corresponding increase over the same period.

“Fifty Shades” includes [spoiler alert] the subplot of an unplanned pregnancy, but for Anastasia the shocking news came after she was already married to Christian. Millions of women are not so fortunate. I applaud the pro-life message of the book here as Anastasia rejects the idea of not keeping her baby, but without marriage it seems plausible that a man of Christian’s persuasion would have pressed for an abortion or abandoned her entirely.

The damage has not been limited to unmarried mothers, entitlement spending and a soaring national debt. While sex may easy to find, long-term relationships are not. The marriage rate has steadily declined as people miss out on the fulfilling relationship with a lifelong partner in exchange for a series of one-night stands or casual flings.

Not everyone is unhappy with the arrangement. Conventional wisdom holds that men give love to get sex and that women give sex to get love. If sex is separated from love, many men are getting what they want, but women are left unsatisfied.

That doesn’t mean the arrangement is necessarily good for men. The tradeoff used to be that men would fall in love with a woman and get married, in part to get regular sex, and the women would settle the men down and help them mature. Without the civilizing effects of marriage and the pressing need to provide for a family, many men are suffering from a Peter Pan syndrome in which they never grow up and are content to drink beer and play video games or engage in extreme sports as their lives slip slowly away.

“Fifty Shades of Grey” is a fantasy. Women want to be swept off their feet by a rich, sexy man. They may even want a bit of rough sex. There is nothing inherently wrong with the bondage and masochistic sex described in the book as long as both partners consent. In that respect, “50 Shades” may help to spice up some marriages.

But the real and most damaging fantasy of “50 Shades” is that casual sex leads to love. In most cases it does not. It is far more likely that one or both partners will emerge from the relationship emotionally damaged and possibly with lives financially ruined as they try to support a baby on their own.

The reality is that great sex comes from strong relationships with someone that you love. You’re more likely to find great sex if you find love first. 

Originally published on The Resurgent