Well, it was a good run while it lasted. After one classic episode after another, we find ourselves with Dick Cavett. At least Jimmy Cliff is around to energize things.
THE HOST
Nothing against Dick Cavett, but he doesn't mesh well with the cast at all. Most of his skits are solo affairs. He seems to be over-thinking the whole thing, as if he was taking part in an interesting experiment and not there to entertain.
THE GOOD
We get another opening touching on Chase's burgeoning popularity. Garrett Morris playing with a voodoo doll, and clearly enjoying it, takes us into more mean-spirited territory. It'll get worse.
Aside from John Belushi's commercial parodies of H&R Block, the rest of the episode is a wash to me. And even those are funny entirely because of Belushi's performance.
THE BAD
At least there's not much that's terrible, but the one thing that is is a doozy. A construction worker delivers a monologue about being true to himself, strips to a bra and panties, and sings "I Gotta Be Me". It's the type of time filler we saw in the first few episodes, and it feels very out of place at this point.
THE MEH
Pretty much everything else. Cavett does some commercials for various vocational schools for unlikely vocations. He delivers a monologue parodying Our Town that's okay, but weighed down under the strain of striving too hard to be cerebral. Chevy Chase interviews him about a book detailing his time as a Nebraska pimp, which makes no attempt to go further than "Dick Cavett as a pimp, isn't that funny?" We get a Dick Cavett look-alike contest, featuring a winner who looks nothing like him and takes up far more screen time than he should. They just don't seem to know what to do with their host, and it shows.
A skit involving Chevy Chase as an accident prone hunter never rises above mere silliness, and Jane Curtin playing Betty Ford as she delivers a speech through interpretative dance is just odd.
We also get a standard Weekend Update (again with Emily Litella), as well as a rerun of another tired commercial (cat food versus tuna). And Gary Weis' film isn't too bad this week.
THE MUSIC
Thank goodness something salvages this episode. Another great musical guest from season one - the legendary Jimmy Cliff, riding high from his movie The Harder They Come. He does two classics (the film's title track and Many Rivers To Cross) as well as a song I'm unfamiliar with. He's amazing, and the performances haven't dated at all.
GRADE: C-
There's not much that's dreadful (and what is doesn't involve the regular cast or host), but there's little to recommend from this episode, either. The cast takes a two week vacation after this, and it looks like they need it.
RANDOM THOUGHTS
I could have sworn I'd heard somewhere that Cavett wasn't the first choice to host this week, but I may be confusing him with Buck Henry. There's little attempt to integrate him with the cast, so it's possible he was shoe-horned in late in the game.
Is this the first time a musical guest has been allowed to perform three numbers? I'm used to big names like McCartney and U2 being given the opportunity, but Jimmy Cliff more than validates the choice.
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