Review: Not Ready for Prime Time, an Expensive and Dull Drama about SNL

Saturday Night Live is one of a handful of things (the Super Bowl, the Olympics, Taylor Swift) that still make me feel like I’m part of a cohesive national culture. The political right largely dismisses the Manhattan-based sketch comedy show as woke, but that hasn’t stopped producer Lorne Michaels from inviting them to the party with appearances by the decidedly un-woke comedian Shane Gillis (who has hosted twice), country singer Morgan Wallen (who stormed off during the closing credits last season), and yes, even Donald Trump 10 years ago, when the idea of him ever becoming president still seemed like a punchline.

Michaels, a Canadian by birth and a naturalized American, clearly has an interest in making his show, which just embarked on its 51^st season, a place where all Americans can tune in on Saturday nights and laugh at themselves—which seems like an essential activity in a free society. So, I was eager to see Not Ready for Prime Time, Erik J. Rodriguez and Charles A. Sothers’s new play about the early years of the late-night sketch show, which is now making its off-Broadway debut.

The lavish production, which is renting MCC’s Newman Mills Theater, sports a sprawling set by brothers Justin and Christopher Swader with stairs, a small thrust for asides, a stage right payphone for the many one-sided telephone calls, and two rotating pieces to realize the locations and sketch sets that the script demands. A live band occupies a stage right mezzanine (excellent pop medleys arranged by music director Annastasia Victory). Onto this steps Michaels (Ian Bouillion), NBC executive Dick Ebersol (Nate Janis), and the entire first season cast.

The performances range from memorable to adequate. Ryan Crout is a dead ringer for John Belushi, capturing the late comedian’s the party animal mania and brooding intensity. Evan Rubin brings perfect comic timing and emotional vulnerability to the role of Gilda Radner. Surrounded by kids, Jared Grimes provides much-needed maturity as Garrett Morris, SNL’s original social conscience. And Kristian Lugo easily conveys the sexual magnetism of a young Dan Ackroyd, although his accent seems to be permanently stuck on Elwood of Chicago rather than Dan of Ottawa.

We also meet Jane Curtain (Caitlin Houlahan with a businesslike sass), Laraine Newman (Taylor Richardson, making the most out of a heroin addiction subplot that mysteriously vanishes), and Chevy Chase (an appropriately punchable Woodrow Proctor). Bouillion’s Michaels is a little bit Ed Sullivan and a little bit Richard III, which feels about right. Janis returns in the second act as a surprisingly virile Bill Murray.

Big personalities clash, their conflicts exacerbated by casual sex and recreational drug use. Yet somehow, they’re a hit. Rodriguez and Sothers cover enough ground for two seasons of a Netflix series, cramming it all into two-and-a-half hours of unrelenting exposition. You’ll feel like you’ve just gone down a rabbit hole and read everyone’s Wikipedia pages, but you probably won’t walk away with any insights into why this variety show became the premier finishing school for American comedians in the last half-century.

Conor Bagley competently directs the stage traffic but is unable to impose an overarching vision on a play that is mostly a laundry list of events. By the time a novel angle does present itself (the players begin to treat significant scenes in their lives like SNL sketches to be revised or cut entirely) we are already deep into the second act.

At least the production values are top notch, with authentic costumes by Sarita P. Fellows, who can convey so much about a character through a pair of blue jeans. Liam Bellman-Sharpe’s sound design takes us to studio 8H and wherever this well-traveled script might go. And lighting designer Mextly Couzin directs our vision on the incredibly wide stage. One suspects she could have done even more to shift our perception of reality and possibility, had the writers fully committed to going there even earlier than just the last 20 minutes.

But Not Ready for Prime Time seems hamstrung by the need of the writers to show their homework, especially how a variety of topical social issues helped shape and undermine this American institution. That seems like a worthy goal for any chronicler writing a book about SNL, but it makes for a fairly exhausting, unrewarding play.