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Dress Rehearsal Report: Maya Rudolph/Vampire Weekend [5/11/24]

Cut For Time

Thanks to my friend sashalemon96 for writing a significant amount of this report with me!

SECTION 1: CUT SKETCHES

All quoted dialogue is approximate, I do not have an eidetic memory. Also, I interchangeably use cast and character names because not every character is named, and I try to defer to in-sketch pronouns.

MOM NEWS

INT. A newsroom set. Squirm and Rudolph plays reporters on a local news station called “Mom News,” featuring them and their correspondents. All characters are referred to as “your mom” or “your father” in their introductions and provide very mother-like commentary. News stories include: “Something bad has happened to someone you barely know,” and “your mom accidentally left a reply to a post on Facebook about a funeral with a gif of “Uncle Fester spinning a cane.” 

They then turn to the weather report by Fineman, who does a Kristen Wiig voice to say the weather is going to be “gorgeous” and “stunning.” Day, as “your dad,” gives a breaking special report that your “neighbor down the street got one of those Teslas,” then pauses then adds “Yeah, that’s it.” P. Johnson and Troast then report on entertainment news. They show a photo of Zendaya at the Met Gala, and then Troast says that Zendaya is “too skinny” and Johnson says “she needs to eat a cheeseburger.” Squirm then sidebars to Maya to say, “You know Zendaya is dating Tim Holland?” Another story features Kearney warning that if you receive a “spam likely” call, you should make sure to pick it up because there’s probably an issue with your bank and you should buy as many Target gift cards as they ask for. Gardner reports on “something you’ve known about for years,” as she’s recently discovered boba before having issues with her technology and playing the Spanish language soccer channel. 

Finally, Nwodim and Thompson play a couple, “your mom and your dad.” In a snappy, well-rehearsed, back-and-forth, Thompson reveals that he had tried to fix the broken water heater and failed, and now Nwodim can hold this over his head forever. Nwodim: “And this means you’ll be wearing what at our next dinner?” Thompson: “That ugly ass shirt.” Nwodim: “Sorry, what was that?” Thompson, cowed: “...The nice shirt you bought me, I mean.” which he initially refers to as an “ugly ass shirt.”  The anchors end the segment with the news after the break: “a worrying shift in my political opinions” and an “out-of-pocket comment about your dad’s penis.”

BARRY THE MIDWIFE [recurring]

This is a sequel to the original BARRY THE MIDWIFE sketch from the Quinta Brunson/Jonas Brothers episode in Season 48.

Structured in a series of flash-forwards and flashbacks Barry, the midwife, and a doula played by Rudolph, bickering with each other before reconciling. The doula was either “Carla” or “Carly,” I don’t quite remember. 

INT. Birth #1 [present]: Troast is delivering, and Hernandez is the father. JAJ is the doctor, but Rudolph is the doula, and Yang is Barry the Midwife. The doula and midwife speak with the same odd pronunciations of words, like “curious” as “curr-ous” and “Paris” as “per-ous.” They also sport the same awkward bob. They have competing catchphrases; Barry keeps saying “Clear a path. Clear a path.” whereas the doula keeps saying “Make a hole. Make a hole.” The doula says, “It’s nice to meet you,” to Barry, which offends him. “Um, actually, we’ve met. Remember? We met in a hot tub after the season finale of Survivor in 2000 when we were both upset that Richard Hatch won.” The doula: “Oh, I guess I don’t remember that.” Barry: “Well, while you were trying to remember, I was delivering this baby.” He casually holds up a baby doll.

INT. Birth #2 [4 years later]: This time, the expecting parents are P. Johnson and Kearney. The doula enters and says “Nice to see you again,” but Barry pretends not to remember her. The doula: “What? Barry, we first met in a hot tub after the season finale of Survivor in 2000 when we were both upset that Richard Hatch won. And then we met again four years earlier.” Barry says the doula has an “elephant memory” for remembering something from 28 years ago, followed by “Girl! respect yourself.” Barry also gets mad when the doula says he’s clearly been copying her hair (at this point they both have long, flowing, silky black tresses). Barry ends with “While you were busy accusing me, I just delivered these triplets. Lesbos always have extros.” He holds up three baby dolls in one arm.

EXT. Hot tub [24 years ago]: Barry and the doula bond over their dislike of the season finale of Survivor while in the hot tub. Barry also adds “I love your hair. I might copy it one day.” (The doula has the exact same awkward bob as in the first scene.) The two suddenly make a pact to marry each other if they are both still single by the 50th anniversary of that night’s episode of Survivor.

INT. Birth #3 [26 years later]: Since Rudolph and Yang were just submerged in a real hot tub in the other set, they’re asked by the new couple (I don’t remember who these are, maybe Garnder and Day?) why they’re soaking wet. Yang’s excuse: “I just did a water birth. Girl, respect yourself.” The doula’s excuse: “It was raining outside and I fell on my head. Girl, respect yourself.” At this point, their long, flowing tresses are now grey with age. Barry then turns and says to the doula, “It’s nice to meet you,” and she finally confronts him: “Aren’t you tired of being petty?”. Barry gives in and says, “It’s nice to see you,” and reminds her of their 50-year pact which is approaching the next week.

EXT. HOT TUB [26 years and 1 week later] The two marry in the hot tub (in makeshift wedding regalia) and Squirm gets in the hot tub to throw two babies at them.

*** Editorial note from sashalemon96: “I think the reason this one didn’t land as well as the one for Brunson is because (at least during dress) they throw the baby into the fire and it starts smoking screen creating laughter as they run to the other set. They also took a very long time to get back and from the hot tub set to the hospital set.”***

JAMES AUSTIN JOHNSON AS BRIAN COX [update character]

Jost tees this up by explaining that lately, Brian Cox has been in the news for his many controversial opinions, such as “Jeremy Strong being annoying” or “the Bible being the worst book ever written.” Brian Cox is fed up with the Kendrick Lamar/Drake beef. He refers to them as a pair of “second-rate poets” and acts mock scared that “K. Dot” will throw his Pulitzer at him. Che follows up with “What about Drake?” and Cox replied, “What is Drake going to do? Have his fans throw their fidget spinners at me?” Cox also expresses mock sympathy that they’re hurting each others’ feelings, before suggesting the two men “go to Iraq.” Che warns that Cox shouldn’t be talking shit about the two rappers, but Cox retorts “What are they going to do—blow my top off like the Boeing whistleblowers?” and then mocks Kendrick’s height. At one point Cox ends a sentence with “and that’s on God… who doesn’t exist, by the way.” Cox then throws some shade at Che for his inability to find a wife even though Jost married an Avenger, adding “can you not find a woman who wants your Ant-Man sized penis?” 

SECTION 2: ORIGINAL DRESS RUNDOWN

  1. COLD OPEN <good reception>

  2. MONOLOGUE <good reception>

  3. HOT ONES [recurring] <okay/good reception>

  4. PDD: EXPLORE PAGE [pretape] <good reception>

  5. MOM NEWS ✂️ <okay reception>

  6. BARRY THE MIDWIFE [recurring] ✂️ <okay reception>

  7. CAN YOU PICK ME UP [pretape] <good reception>

  8. T.T. AND MARIO [recurring] ✂️ <okay/good reception>

  9. WEEKEND UPDATE: SQUIRM <okay/good reception>, GARDNER <poor reception>, JAJ ✂️ <okay/poor reception>

  10. TIP TOP COFFEE <okay reception>

  11. MOM JEANS [archival] [pretape] <N/A reception>

  12. TEACHER PSA <okay reception>

  13. BRITISH CAVEMEN <okay/good reception>

  14. NURSE APPRECIATION <okay/good reception>

  15. LANDSCAPERS <good reception>

SECTION 3: CHANGES FROM DRESS TO AIR

I’m gonna be so real with you guys, these days I’m so tired I just go home after dress rehearsal and sleep through the live show, so these changes are submitted by another friend.

  1. In dress, Colin was specified to be wearing a “Stormy Daniels wig” during the monologue, in hopes that he could be in the political sketch about the Trump trials.

  2. The original first excuse Rudolph comes up with in CAN YOU PICK ME UP was that the dead grandma didn’t want her funeral to interfere with work.

  3. The joke about “Republicans in bed with Trump” was added afte dress.

  4. TEACHER PSA didn’t originally end with Nwodim telling the girl to sit down. I don’t remember the original ending, but I remember it was kind of weak.

SECTION 4: SUNDRY NOTES

  1. Ezra Koenig said “Hi, Maya!” right before they started performing.

  2. There were a bunch of off-screen mistakes during the dress version of NURSE AD. Poor Fineman had the wrong cue cards when it came to one of her lines, and she looked genuinely terrified when trying to figure out what she was supposed to say. Then the camera cut to her when it was supposed to be on Rudolph and P. Johnson. Finally, she randomly had a sneeze attack during JAJ’s lines. I’ve never thought about what happens when you sneeze on SNL before, lol. 

  3. Interestingly enough, there were two cameras for LANDSCAPERS but only one set of cue cards, so Wally had to dash back and forth with the same set of cue cards every time we changed scenes. I’ve also never seen that happen before. Poor Wally!

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It’s interesting knowing the teacher sketch didn’t originally end with Ego’s line. This is a good example of how a live audience’s reactions can tell the writers exactly what they need to do.

u/seventennorth avatar

yeah, i still haven't seen the live version so idk how the rest of the sketch did, but at dress it was very much a situation where almost every other teacher vignette fell flat, but nwodim's initial TSIDDAHN line got an extreme and immediate reaction. you could see her face kind of lit up when she realized that line really worked. makes sense they doubled-down at live.

u/RockMan_1973 avatar

💯 AGREED, well-said! No better barometer what is going to land successfully than a LIVE audience.

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u/bttrsondaughter avatar

love these reports! now I need to go find a ticket to see JAJ live this summer in the hopes of seeing this impression! would rather have seen him do that for ten minutes than have seen any of this weeks update!

wish they could’ve kept Mom News and TT and Mario in the live show

Agreed, I'm surprised the "woman who claims she isn't mad" got a worse reception but it stayed in. The JAJ Brian Cox impression sounds like it was funnier.

u/seventennorth avatar

imo it was funnier but it also got a weird, sort of sparse reaction—i think cox’s insults were so vicious that people were hesitant to laugh. (interestingly, he got very little laughs for the kendrick insults but a lot of the drake insults.)

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u/seventennorth avatar

sorry for this being so late this week... passed out immediately after the episode and then had a busy sunday.

fingers crossed i can get into jake gyllenhaal/sabrina carpenter dress next week and write another, but with the luck i've been having on the standby reservations, i have a strong feeling this will be my last report this season, haha.

u/RockMan_1973 avatar

THANK YOU so much for this!! I love learning BTS insight about something I love as much as SNL. Much appreciation!

u/seventennorth avatar

of course! any time!

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u/prefab1979 avatar

I know they had a lot of mom-related content already, but Mom News sounds funnier than most of what made it to air, so I wish they'd kept it in.

I hope they bring back JAJ’s Brian Cox impression! I would have liked to see a Succession parody when it was on.

I never liked Barry the Midwife that much, but I'm pretty devastated "Lesbos always have extros" didn't make it to air.

Also, in the live version of the Nurses Appreciation sketch, JAJ almost started the sketch with the wrong blocking and Molly had to correct him. I wonder if this sketch wasn't rehearsed as much as the others or something.

u/seventennorth avatar

you take that *back* about barry the midwife...

i refuse to be silenced.

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Were there any changes for Sarah's Brainworm Wu Segment at Dress

I also went, I don’t think there were any big changes. Sarah extended the sipping of her brain drink at live. Following the line about Jost yelling at the college protesters, I remember Jost tried to go straight into the next line, but the audience was still laughing about her sipping so he restarted his line at dress.

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