Saturday Night Live is a huge comedy brand, and the show has been running for almost 50 years. Sony is currently gearing up to release a film which tells the story of the first airing of SNL called Saturday Night, and the movie is set to release in October.
Just in, we have a behind-the-scenes featurette with director Jason Reitman (Ghostbusters: Afterlife), and he gives us an inside look on how much work it took to bring the film back to that fateful night in 1975. Check this out:
Lorne Michaels has always been a legend when it comes to comedy, and it’s going to be interesting to see him actually be a character in the film alongside other actors including John Belushi, Gilda Radner, and Chevy Chase. The movie is even giving the spotlight for other behind-the-scenes heroes like producer Rosie Shuster and Muppet creator Jim Henson (who the SNL writers apparently didn’t like).
Though it would have been plain enough to make a biopic about the making of the whole show, Saturday Night does have an interesting angle which only covers the 90 minutes before the show started. Admittedly, a lot of stories have been thrown around about just how chaotic that first airing was—from belligerent actors to angry writers—so it’s going to be interesting just how much the film will be able to put together to give audiences an idea of what happened before SNL blew up.
At 11:30pm on October 11, 1975, a ferocious troupe of young comedians and writers changed television – and culture – forever. Directed by Jason Reitman and written by Gil Kenan & Reitman, Saturday Night is based on the true story of what happened behind the scenes in the 90 minutes leading up to the first broadcast of Saturday Night Live. Full of humor, chaos, and the magic of a revolution that almost wasn’t, we count down the minutes in real time until we hear those famous words…
Watch out for Saturday Night when it releases in theatres on the anniversary of SNL on Oct. 11.
