Tina Fey makes TV history with her opening monologue on her debut episode of ‘SNL UK’
As she herself said on Saturday’s premiere, she is now “the youngest person ever to host SNL UK,” to cheers from the live audience. “Here in the UK, you may know me as the teacher from Mean Girls. Or you may remember me from a long time ago when I played Sarah Palin on SNL in the US. Or perhaps you feel you recognize me as the woman from the show Veep. That’s okay too.”
Fey then dipped her comedic toe into the current political climate, attempting to answer the question “Why make a British version” of “SNL?”
“Well, like many large-scale American operations these days, no one knows why,” she said.
It was then up to a series of celebrity guests to break out Faye’s monologue, including Nicola Coughlan, Michael Cera and Graham Norton. Asked by Coughlan why an American rather than a British host would host the debut SNL UK show, Fey said it was a fair question.
“What was explained to me was that for this first episode, just to be polite, none of these motherfuckers would do that. Does that make sense?”
Faye also managed to demonstrate her impressive knowledge of British comedy in front of Norton, delivering lines from a series of shows including “Keeping Up Appearance,” “Fawlty Towers,” “Are You Being Served,” “Monty Python,” “Eastenders,” and even some recent advertisements (particularly the much talked about narration for “Jet 2 Holidays”).
There’s no doubt that Fey’s casting as the lone American on the premiere episode of the first British “SNL” weighed heavily in both her status as one of Hollywood’s most powerful comedy icons and her legendary ties to the show in her home country.
First joining as a writer in 1997, she quickly became SNL’s first female lead writer, and by 2000 was appearing in sketches and joining Jimmy Fallon as co-anchor of the Weekend Update segment. Fey was the longest-serving anchor on “Weekend Update” before leaving in 2005-2006 to develop “30 Rock,” and was credited with reviving both the segment and the show. Since then, Fey has made numerous guest appearances on SNL, most famously impersonating former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.
Unfortunately, Fey’s reign as SNL UK’s youngest host only lasts for one week. Jamie Dornan will host the show on March 21st, and Riz Ahmed is scheduled to host it on April 4th.
