An Oral History of SNL

And now, a recurring segment where we take an oral history look at famous things – this time, stories from SNL cast members about their time at the comedy institution.

David Spade the sweet baby

David Spade “Oh boy, well getting on SNL was a super fun thing. I remember it like it was yesterday. I got the Reader’s Digest ad like many aspiring SNL people and wrote an essay about how much I loved America. A lot of people don’t realize that the best way to get on Saturday Night Live is to write an essay about how great America is. Lorne Michaels, the producer of SNL, loves to read essays about America, but it takes him a very long time, because as a Canadian he has to drink a whole can of maple syrup every time he reads the word America. Otherwise his strong love of America would overtake his DNA, and make him not Canadian anymore, and then he would no longer be a Canadian citizen, and that would make Lorne Michaels really sad. So he read my essay about how the Liberty Bell is cool, and I got to go to SNL. Everybody was so nice. There was Rob Schneider.”

Rob Schneider in the award wining surf ninjas

“It is me, Rob Schneider. A little known fact about me, Rob Schneider: one of my hands isn’t real; it’s a fake plastic hand, because me, Rob Schneider, does not trust people and is always clutching a gun. That’s why I always wear a long trench coat. When they made The Matrix, me, Rob Schneider, was the basis for the design of it. A little known fact –Keanu Reeves is really a cat that walked on stilts. Nobody knew that about Keanu Reeves until I said it. Me, Rob Schneider, very smart, but also now very afraid, because Keanu Reeves can control the weather with his mind. Rob Schneider will be most likely taken up by a tornado very soon after this interview comes out. If that happens, tell Rob Schneider’s family that Rob Schneider has angered the weather cat Keanu Reeves. They will know what it means. Well, that and I love them.

So, when I first got into SNL, I remember it like it was yesterday, because Rob Schneider is unstuck in time, because Rob Schneider does not experience time the way normal people experience time. Rob Schneider has lived his entire life in the same single instant. I am a child right now. I am also an old man. I have also just come up with the greatest catchphrase in the world – ‘eat my shorts’. Oh, no, the Simpsons stole that phrase from me, or maybe it was the evil Rob Schneider from the Dominican Republic, whose house I have broken into a number of times, and he hates even being called Rob Schneider, and he says his name is Jim.

Rob Schneider once bought a whole turkey and ate it all by himself. He didn’t tell nobody – not his wife, who Rob Schneider is married to, or his friend Wolf. Rob Schneider is very smart. Rob Schneider, that’s me, likes to buy several ping pong balls and eat them all, because he’ll soon get the strength and agility that a ping pong ball has, and Rob Schneider will be unstoppable.  First I’ll be the Demolition Man, and then Steven Seagal will carry me around on his shoulders, and Rob Schneider will finally learn the love of a father. So that’s when I met Adam Sandler.”

Adam Sandler in his first SNL sketch

“Yah, I’m Adam Sandler. I’m from New York, yah. I remember when I first got on to SNL. It was a cold day; death was in the air, and the bleakness of winter was all that I could feel. I only know pain and suffering. All of life is suffering and then we die. The French essayist Albert Camus has once said, “There is but one truly serious philosophical problem and that is suicide,” and I believe him.  Every day I wake up, whether I was accepted into SNL, or saw the release of my mega hit Jack and Jill, and I can only think of suicide.  It keeps me up at night. I dream of it. I know that my existence is meaningless, and I am nothing in this universe. I shall go to dust as I was once dust, and I shall be forgotten with deeds washed away with time, my hopes gone, and the name of Adam Sandler will be forgotten as many other names are. All man’s works shall soon perish into the void. So that was my first day on SNL.”