Very few good things have come out of the national nightmare of the coronavirus pandemic and its consequent social and economic closure. Measuring against hundreds of thousands of dead Americans, countless more dealing with serious persistent health problems, a Republican-led government cackle that all that misery and human death is just the cost of doing business (and ‘Murican’s freedom), and the loss of the 2020 baseball season, finally being able to break through those episodes of Show me a hero lurking on your DVR just won’t register. In fact, those of you who really learned a foreign language or finally finished that birdhouse, the rest of us take our little bits of pleasure where we can snatch them off on these long and worrying days.
What can be the why The longest days of our Life is still so funny. Of course, the Tonight’s show Recurring sketch reliable features SNL royalty Will Ferrell and Kristen Wiig alongside Jimmy Fallon and some equally game and responsibly lock up the guest stars. And the sight of her characters in a socially distanced soap opera Zoom repeatedly hitting her kisser instead of the usual in-person slaps and white wine from the classic soap showdown is kind of fun. (This week, Wiig apparently recruits someone kicking his house for an unexpected off-camera punch.) And watching big stars willing to probe their own early experience with less-than-stellar TV drama to deliver a villainy in the service of Faux Soap’s incomprehensibly complicated plot is worth laughing at. (Former guest Jake Gyllenhaal’s purring arc, “Hello daddies, “When he reveals himself as the possible son of Fallon and Ferrell he remains a thing of laughing beauty.)
And maybe we’re just hungry for something dated Saturday night livelow style recurring bits. (Look, these have, in fact, it’s been some of the longest days of our lives.) Joined tonight by The Roots lead MC Black thought (AKA Tariq Trotter) like an awesome mindless private eye revFeeling (occasionally in verse) alone who shoved the bastard son heir to the Gyllenhaal empire into a suddenly frozen California lake (don’t ask), the melodramatically panting slums / low-street comedy legends swarmed, despite teleconferenced performances from their soap that failed in the middle of each extended expository speech. We may never find out how Fallon’s moon-slain co-patriarch returned to Earth. And it’s alive. Stay tuned. You’re aI do not have any other option.
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