Ivan Radford | On 13, Apr 2025

Half a century on from when Saturday Night Light first aired in the USA, there’s probably little new to say about the iconic comedy series. But to mark its 50th anniversary, this documentary series is an excellent starting point for anyone who’s wanted to know about the show.

Split into four parts, it’s an excellently conceived balance of behind-the-scenes details, celebrity tributes, insider anecdotes and favourite clips. The first episode takes a Gogglebox-like approach to the casting process, as we watch comedians rewatch their own audition tapes – mostly to cringe-inducing effect.

This extensive reliving of desperation, ambition and raw talent threatens to get repetitive but the mix of faces – from Pete Davidson and Amy Poehler to Bowen Yang and Heidi Gardner – keeps things varied and personal. We hear about the pressure of the audition room rarely laughing, even when they like someone, and about the panic to try and work out what on earth to present in each person’s five-minute tryout. It’s the tiny bits of trivia that make it worth tuning in, from the fact that people would sometimes audition multiple times before being accepted, some wouldn’t get the nod at all – including Jennifer Coolidge and Jordan Peele – and others still don’t know why they got picked. (For Bill Hader, it turned out to be an Al Pacino impression that got him the gig.) It’s also a reassuring reminder that some comic talent, even if not being picked up by SNL, still found other ways into the industry.

Episode 2 is the best of the bunch, as it takes us into more candid territory to offset the glossy sentiment elsewhere. It’s a present-day tour of the whole process behind one episode – specifically, the one hosted by Ayo Edebiri. We don’t just hear about but witness the infamous Tuesday all-nighter writing session, before the ominous Wednesday table read. The sense of anxiety and pressure to turn 90 minutes of TV around in a week is keenly felt, and the documentary does well to hint at how that environment can be difficult as well as rewarding. The underlying stress of this gruelling conveyor belt is balanced out with some affectionate celebrations of all the other departments who normally get forgotten, such as costumes and props, and there’s a warmth to the documentary’s determination to recognise each part of the sausage getting made – and just how involved each writer of a chosen sketch gets to be, as they step into the role of producer for those few minutes of live TV.

Episode 3 is the nerdiest of the bunch, as it takes a deep dive into the More Cowbell sketch from 2000. For many, particularly outside of the USA, that was likely their first taste of SNL, so it’s a thrill to get what is effectively an oral history of the heavily memed slice of silliness. We learn that the idea had been sitting around, rejected, for ages before Christopher Walken came along, we’re reminded of Jimmy Fallon’s habit of corpsing at every opportunity, we see how the sketch was performed in the worst spot in the studio, we spend time talking with Blue Oyster Cult, and even hear from a cowbell manufacturer about the supposed impact of that episode. If you’re going to pick a sketch to do a forensic examination of, it’s hard to think of a better one to shocase – for existing fans wanting something extremely specific, this is the episode for you.

Episode 4 zooms out a bit more to take a look back at the so-called “weird year” – the season that ran from 1985 to 1986 and almost ended the series entirely. It was when creator Lorne Michaels returned to the show after a five-year absence. Frequent SNL host Tom Hanks makes an appearance to comment on the 11th season of the show, which is how you know things are getting serious.

Following the success of Eddie Murphy on SNL in previous years, Lorne’s return came at a time when SNL’s ratings were on the decline. But Lorne shook things up even further, deciding to axe the cast and build a new ensemble from scratch, including Robert Downey Jr, Anthony Michael Hall, Joan Cusack and Randy Quaid, as well as Terry Sweeney – the show’s first openly gay cast member – and Danitra Vance, the first Black woman in the SNL cast. With no experience in sketch comedy, the cast struggled to find their groove – and to find ways to get the writers not to pigeonhole them to certain formats or stereotypes.

It’s a fascinating and surprisingly frank account of how the show made bad decision after bad decision – but you suspect the documentary was only allowed to focus on such a tumultuous year because it led to a golden era. Whether the classic years that followed would have happened without disrupting the formula entirely is a whole other question.

Overseen by exec-producer Morgan Neville and showrunner Juaquin Cambron, the result is a nice balance of familiar stories and honest reflection – and leaves you, whether you’re a newcomer or not, feeling like an SNL expert. Besides, when else are you going to get to watch four hours of TV about the making of live comedy?

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