Horrific.” “Not acceptable.” “Targeted mockery.” These are not exactly words you want to hear when it comes to a light-entertainment comedy sketch. But these condemnations, pulled from a damning statement by charity Tourettes Action, are just some of the reactions to Saturday Night Live’s recent skit – a lampoon of the recent Baftas controversy that seemed to mock people with Tourette syndrome. (In the sketch, a series of problematic celebrities – Mel Gibson; Bill Cosby; Armie Hammer – are seen using Tourette’s as an excuse for their transgressions.) After 50 years on the air, SNL’s waning cultural relevance is pretty much a truth universally acknowledged. This sketch may have wrenched the series back into the spotlight, but for all the wrong reasons.
The backlash arrives with SNL less than three weeks away from one of its diciest gambits: the launch of its new British version, Saturday Night Live UK. In years past, importing SNL to the UK would have made perfect sense. Early on, the show – spearheaded by producer Lorne Michaels – was an innovative, acclaimed, and (somewhat) countercultural force to be reckoned with. Brits might not have been familiar with the content of the series itself, but they certainly recognised the products of its formidable star-making machinery: bona fide A-listers like Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy, and Will Ferrell. In recent years, SNL has found breakout stars hard to come by, a fact that is probably less to do with the talent than the material they’re working with.
