the comic's comic

Obligatory post on Funny or Die's SNL Presidential Impersonation round-up for a banking PSA

If you were to tell me that Saturday Night Live would gather up all of its grand presidential impersonators for a one-time reunion, then I'd remind you that Phil Hartman is dead, and stop playing me. But you kept at it, and told me, hey, what if we got Jim Carrey to play the ghost of Ronald Reagan with a dash of Ace Ventura, then I'd go, oh, really, well, which SNL is this going to be on?

Oh, it's not on SNL. It's on Funny or Die. OK. Ready for the viral video action! Wait. This is a PSA? Or as you kids call it, a public service announcement. For the banking crisis. Directed by Ron "used to be Opie or Richie Cunningham if you're an older person, and just another big movie director if you're a kid" Howard. For real this time. If you think SNL's political "cold open" sketches are weirdly too focused on making points, then full speed ahead into the danger zone. At least Dan Aykroyd looks more like Jimmy Carter a generation later (can you believe Aykroyd pretended to be Carter with a mustache on live TV?), as does Chevy Chase as the late Gerald Ford. As for Dana Carvey as Bush 41, Darrell Hammond as Bill Clinton, Will Ferrell as W., Fred Armisen as Barack Obama and Maya Rudolph as Michelle Obama, well, you're not going to see anything here you haven't seen before. Just all of them together in a room. Isn't that special? Roll the clips.

There's also a behind-the-scenes video, if you need to see how and where the magic happens. Which means bloopers and jokes. You like bloopers and jokes.

National Lampoon confirms "Vacation" reunion in Super Bowl ad, 15-minute "Hotel Hell" short film

Eddie Rawls, one of the National Lampoon writers responsible for the "Vacation" reunion of Clark and Ellen Griswold (Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo"), confirmed overnight that it's happening as part of a Super Bowl ad, promotional campaign and short film. "It’s really going to be great and I can tell you the writing is terrific, hilarious, and fresh," he wrote with obvious bias. Anyhow. Own it!

More details? I showed you the Super Bowl "Hotel Hell Vacation" ad a couple of days ago. On Super Bowl Sunday, you'll be able to watch the entire 15-minute short film on the HomeAway.com site. The plot has Chevy Chase's Clark Griswold and wife Ellen (D'Angelo) taking a romantic second honeymoon, only to end up in one mishap after another, and meeting up with their son, Rusty. There's a Clark Griswold Facebook fan page and Griswold Twitter account, as well as online games and contests.

Judging by this second teaser video put on Facebook yesterday, "Hope Ellen Doesn't See This!", it doesn't appear that your dreams of an Anthony Michael Hall "Rusty" will come to fruition. Unless the former child actor really looks and sounds a lot different now than I thought. Then again, they did seem to like changing the kids up in those "Vacation" flicks, didn't they?

Chevy Chase and the Griswolds reunite for Super Bowl "Vacation" ad, short film, or both?

My friends at Comedy dot com found this footage online of what appears to be a reunion of the original National Lampoon's Vacation family, the Griswolds, with patriarch Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) and wife Ellen (Beverly D'Angelo) heading to the beach, in a short film called Hotel Hell Vacation.

Well, actually, the circumstantial evidence -- a running-time just shy of 30 seconds, ending with a teaser for a company called HomeAway.com and a date of Feb. 7 that coincides with the Super Bowl -- would lead just about anyone to believe this is a Super Bowl commercial. Would you like to see that now? Can do. (Don't think I don't know I'm giving you free advertising, HomeAway.com) Roll it!

Jimmy Kimmel's Leno experiment, with Chevy Chase as Conan?

Last night, Jimmy Kimmel would not be denied the spotlight, even though he knew, you knew, I knew, we all knew that everyone would be tuning into Conan O'Brien to see what he'd do on The Tonight Show. So. What to do? How about putting on a fake wig and chin and doing the entire show as Jay Leno? No. Seriously? That's what Kimmel did. It was amazingly weird, for all of the reasons you're guessing, but even more so considering that one of his guests was Chevy Chase, who not only works on an NBC show currently but also more infamously had one of the more infamously brief appearances of his own in late-night TV. Which probably explains why Chase dressed up as Conan but for some reason tried to duplicate Kimmel's Leno accent. That's what his lisp was about, right? I don't know. Just watch the clip.

SNL's 35th anniversary honors include Barney's NYC holiday window display, T-Mobile ad

I was going to say something about Tracy Morgan, but before I do that, let me take a moment to note how the other alums for Saturday Night Live are getting love in a variety of ways (and I'm not just talking about Chevy Chase's lovely return to TV with NBC's Community, although there is Chevy to be chased in this post) on this, the show's 35th season.

First, I don't know how many of you noticed the new T-Mobile ad during last week's live SNL broadcast. Companies have gotten rather shrewd about incorporating humor and SNL-type elements in their real ads that air during the breaks on NBC's SNL telecasts; T-Mobile's new ad for its myTouch 3G takes the cake for SNL-relevance (although you're a couple of weeks late for me, since I just got a new iPhone 3GS!). Here is that ad, featuring Chevy Chase, Molly Shannon, Dana Carvey and Darrell Hammond. Roll the clip!

And it's beginning to feel cold like Christmas in NYC on recent windy, chilly nights, and in a month, the window display at Barney's New York store will devote its holiday display to the 35th anniversary of SNL. The reported scenes include classics such as the Coneheads, last year's Tina Fey/Sarah Palin sensation, and a couple of nods to the late 1990s, including Molly Shannon's Mary Katherine Gallagher and Chris Kattan's Mango. Here's one of the draft sketches from Barney's New York creative director Simon Doonan (via FishbowlNY):

NBC picks up "Community" for fall 2009

Would you like to see a weekly half-hour sitcom about community college that stars Joel McHale and features Chevy Chase, John Oliver and Donald Glover, among others? Of course you would. NBC announced it has added Community to its fall 2009 schedule. More details to come, both on this show and the rest of NBC's fall 2009 plans (and how this impacts Glover's 30 Rock writing). But I wanted you to know about this new development and share with you this quirky featurette. Enjoy!

Comedy Village closing (moving) May 10

The barkers for the Comedy Village now have something extra to bark about this week on the sidewalks of Greenwich Village, as PJ Landers announced to clubgoers and mailing listers over the weekend that the building has new owners and the club will close May 10. Dave Chappelle continued to make drop-in appearances at the former Boston Comedy Club (which under previous previous owner/manager Barry Katz helped propel more than a few careers) this past weekend (the blog A Day in the Life recounts Chappelle holding the stage for four hours late Saturday night into Sunday morning), while The Apiary publishes the memo from Landers about the club's immiment departure. A new site for the club has not yet been announced.

Which reminds me, here is footage "Big Red" Landers provided of Chevy Chase shaking hands with Dave Chappelle last month onstage at the Comedy Village. Enjoy!

Chevy Chase & Dave Chappelle, together (finally)?!

Warm temperatures, a full moon and Friday night meant you just knew that everyone would be out and about in New York City. After catching some live comedy around the city, I settled in for some people-watching outside the Comedy Cellar. Among the people watched last night, Chevy Chase with his wife and one of his daughters, who walked past around 1 a.m. Ardie Fuqua, hosting the Cellar last night, excitedly exclaimed, "It's Chevy Chase," and ran over to shake his hand. Chase and crew kept walking, though. And it turns out Chase already had his fill of comedy for the evening, considering he made an impromptu appearance and performance earlier at the Comedy Village, all to see Dave Chappelle. The Comedy Village is thrilled about this because they usually have barkers at the sidewalk corners trying to get passersby to pay a visit, and saying you had Chappelle and Chase in your club last night is a nice feat.

Anyhow. According to comedian/eyewitness Maria Shehata, Chappelle had the mic and began poking fun at someone who just entered the club, saying to him: "Did you say you had herpes? Did you just walk into a comedy club and announce you have herpes?" The club's staff replied first: "It's Chevy Chase!" This naturally got the audience even more excited than they were. Chase approached Chappelle and the two shook hands, and Chase said he showed up because he heard Chappelle was there. After Chappelle concluded his set about a half-hour later, Chase took the stage, sat down and worked the crowd for a few minutes, taking questions, goofing around, and in this brief clip, giving his assessment on the current cast of Saturday Night Live. "I think they're damned good. They're serious. There's not one of them in the back freebasing," he said. Roll it!

Chevy Chase at the Comedy Village
Uploaded by thecomicscomic

Related: Chevy Chase sat down earlier this month for a semi-serious look back on his career for Carl Arnheiter's Inside Joke series at the UCB. And UCBComedy.com has video from that, too!