Susan Morrison, Author: "LORNE The Man Who Invented Saturday Night Live" Bonus #125

Susan Morrison, the author of "Lorne: The Man Who Invented Saturday Night Live," has released her book in perfect alignment with the 50th anniversary of the iconic television show. With her unique perspective, cultivated through years of connections with SNL writers and extensive interviews with Lorne Michaels, Morrison delves into the profound impact SNL has had on American culture. She argues that the show has fundamentally rewired American thought processes, embedding its catchphrases and humor deeply into the nation's collective consciousness. Drawing parallels between the show's enduring formula and the comforting reliability of a Snickers bar, Morrison's work underscores SNL's cultural significance and its role in shaping comedic generations.

Book is NOW available at all retail book stores....

(00:00:21) "Lorne Michaels: SNL's Cultural Impact"

(00:02:04) "SNL's Enduring Legacy in American Culture"

(00:03:05) "Exploring Lorne Michaels' Comedy Influence"

Transcript

Announcer: 0:04

This is another episode of Stand Up Comedy. Your host and emcee celebrating 40 plus years on the fringe of show business stories, interviews and comedy sets from the famous and not so famous. Here's your host and emcee, Scott Edwards.

R. Scott Edwards: 0:21

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the podcast. We have another amazing bonus show for you this week. Guess what? There's a brand new book coming out. You may have heard it in the news. We're celebrating 50 year anniversary of Saturday Night Live. And on the line, I have a young lady that wrote the book on Lorne Michaels and everything that's been accomplished with Saturday Night Live. So let's introduce her. Ladies and gentlemen, it's Susan Morrison.

Susan Morrison: 0:55

Hello. Delighted to be with you.

R. Scott Edwards: 0:59

It's so great to have you on the podcast. Congratulations on your new book. It came out this week. It's a wonderful book. It's called Lorne L O R N E. The man who Invented Saturday Night Live. I think everyone's familiar with Saturday Night Live, but this being the 50th anniversary. Talk about timing. Susan.

Susan Morrison: 1:24

Yep. Yeah, I missed a couple deadlines, but I think it worked out best for everybody that the book comes out just when the anniversary.

R. Scott Edwards: 1:32

It's incredible. And I haven't had a chance to read the entire book, but I have read a lot of it and it has got some fascinating information about Lorne Michaels. Now, everybody is aware of Saturday Night Live. It's kind of been a mainstay for, well, 50 years as a producer of stand up comedy. We've been able to cross paths, Lauren and I, working with a lot of the same people. When you did the book, you do quotes from a lot of the different actors and comics that appeared on the show. You must have been doing years of research.

Susan Morrison: 2:04

Absolutely. Well, I interviewed Lorne himself 40 or 50 times, and then I interviewed absolutely everybody connected with the show over the 50 years. Almost all of the performers, most of the writers. You know, it's a lot. But when I started it, I realized that in so many ways, Lauren is responsible for what generations of Americans think. It's funny. You know, it's a profound impact to have on the culture. I really wanted to kind of understand his mind and, you know, through talking to him and all the rest of these people, I began to realize that the impact of snl, I mean, it's not just a water cooler phenomenon. You know, it's not just people retelling jokes Monday morning at work, but it's kind of rewired the way Americans think. You know, people use snl catchphrases in their wedding vows. You know, it's kind of part of our collective unconscious as Americans. And I just think that's a really fascinating phenomenon and I wanted to understand it better.

R. Scott Edwards: 3:05

Well, I think you kind of explained my next question, which was, you know, this was a real in depth, research, necessary book that really goes all the way back to his early decades days at SCTV in Canada, all the way up to his recent awards at the Kennedy Center. So it's a really good biography of Lorne Michaels. So why? You kind of already answered it, but maybe. Why did you write this and why now?

Susan Morrison: 3:35

Well, I started thinking about it 10 years ago, right after the 40th, which I thought was a knockout show. And I, you know, I talked to Lorne and I sensed that he's a very private person. He likes to stay behind the curtain. He doesn't talk much to journalists. But I could tell that he was starting to think about his legacy. You know, he had noticed that at the 40th there were a lot of key players who weren't there. You know, people were starting to die. You know, obviously no Belushi, no Farley, no Phil Hartman. Tom Davis was dead. And I think he thought, boy, it's going to be even thinner at the 50s. So just started thinking about it. And I approached him and told him that I was writing this book. And he knew me a little bit because I worked for him when I was in my 20s, briefly, when he was doing something called the New Show. It was his one spectacular public failure.

R. Scott Edwards: 4:30

If you don't fail, you're not succeeding.

Susan Morrison: 4:32

Exactly. Yes, yes. And the thing about Lorne, he learned a lot from everyone. Everything that ever didn't go right. He's somebody who really takes a lesson from everything. But. So we met back in the 80s, and while I would never say we were friends, we would bump into each other every now and then. And a lot of the writers on the show were people that I knew and who wrote for me at the New Yorker and other places that I worked. So, you know, when I showed up in his office and said, hey, I signed a contract to write a book about you. I'm show, I don't need anything from you, but if you'd like to talk to me, I think it'll be a better, richer book. And he looked like he was going to faint. But, you know, he thought it over the next day. A couple days later, we met for a drink and he just started unschooling those terrific stories. And, you know, he didn't ask anything of me. He doesn't have any power over the book or any veto power or anything. But we just started meeting on Monday nights having these wonderful conversations, you know, yes, he doesn't talk much to the press, but he is known as a great talker. You know, talk just rolls out of him like jazz. His own stories are amazing. You know, he's had this forest gump of a life that's, you know, everything from, you know, being on Laugh in when Richard Nixon came on to say, you know, sock it to me, you know, to testifying in Keith Richards heroin trial and, you know, the show he did after 9 11. He's really just kind of studded throughout American history of the last 50 years. So he's got a lot to say and I was eager to write it down.

R. Scott Edwards: 6:08

Well, it's an incredible story and your book captures what you just said. There's a lot of stories shared, a lot of this country's and television and comedies benchmarks over the years. You did a really good job of bringing that all together in one book, ladies and gentlemen. It's called Lorne the Man who Invented Saturday Night Live. It's in bookstores. Now before we end this bonus show talking about this new book, Susan, what would one thing you'd like your readers, future readers and purchasers of the book to know about you and this book?

Susan Morrison: 6:44

Well, let's see. I guess to me the takeaway is one of the things Lauren always says about the show is that even though it changes, it goes up and down like the Dow or the Yankees. It has this durable formula. He calls it. He always compares it to a Snickers bar. You know, there's a comfort level. Viewers know that they're going to get a certain amount of chocolate, a certain amount of peanuts, a certain amount of nougat. So just keep in that, keep that in mind the next time you watch snl. Figure out what's the chocolate and what's the peanuts.

R. Scott Edwards: 7:17

Well, that's a great explanation picture of what Lorne was doing and you putting it together in this amazing Random House book, ladies and gentlemen, it's called the man who Invented Saturday Night Live. It's by our guest today, Susan Morrison. Susan, thank you so much for being on the podcast.

Susan Morrison: 7:36

My pleasure. Thank you.

R. Scott Edwards: 7:38

Ladies and gentlemen, go out and get this book and learn about television comedy and everything Lorne Michaels has done. Susan's done an amazing job. It's on sale now. Thanks for joining us on today's podcast. Bye.

Announcer: 7:51

We hope you enjoyed this episode of Stand Up Comedy, your host and emcee. For information on the show, merchandise and our sponsors, or to send comments to Scott, visit our website at www.standupyourhostandmc.com. look for more episodes soon and enjoy the world of Stand Up Comedy. Visit a comedy showroom near.