Emily Litella Explained

Emily Litella
Series:Saturday Night Live
Portrayer:Gilda Radner
Creator:Gilda Radner
First:segment "Looks At Books"
SNL
November 15, 1975
Lbl21:Based on
Data21:Real-life person:
Elizabeth "Dibby" Clementine Gillies

Emily Litella is a fictional character created and performed by comedian Gilda Radner in a series of appearances on Saturday Night Live.[1] Based on a person in her early life, Emily Litella was a popular character in Radner's comedy repertoire.

Premise

Emily Litella is an elderly woman with a hearing problem who appeared 26 times on SNL's Weekend Update op-ed segment between November 15, 1975 (Season 1) and December 17, 1977 (Season 3).[2] [3] Attired in a frumpy dress, sweater and Lisa Loopner eyeglasses, Litella was introduced with professional dignity by the news anchors, who could sometimes be seen cringing slightly in anticipation of the malapropisms they knew would follow. These sketches were, in part, a parody of the Fairness Doctrine, which at the time required broadcasters in the United States to present opposing viewpoints on public issues.

Litella would peer through her reading glasses and, in the character's high-pitched, warbly voice, would read a prepared statement in opposition to an editorial that the TV station had supposedly broadcast. Litella would become increasingly agitated as her statement progressed. Midway in her commentary, it became apparent to the anchor and the audience that Litella had misheard or misunderstood the subject of the editorial to which she was responding. A typical example:

The news anchor would interrupt Litella to point out her error, along the lines, "That's death penalty, Ms. Litella, not deaf ... death." Litella would wrinkle her nose, say something like, "Oh, that's very different," then meekly turn to the camera and say, smiling, "Never mind!"[4]

When Litella played against news anchor Chevy Chase (whom she often called "Cheddar Cheese"[5]), he would be somewhat sympathetic to her. After Chase left Saturday Night Life, Jane Curtin took over the anchor role and provided a more adversarial foil. Often, she would scold Litella, "Every week you come on and you get it wrong," to which Litella would reply, "Bitch!"

Appearances

Air date!scope="col"
Litella malapropism Actual phrase
December 13, 1975 Busting schoolchildren Bussing schoolchildren[6] [7]
December 20, 1975 Firing the handicapped Hiring the handicapped[8]
January 24, 1976 Saving Soviet jewelry Saving Soviet Jewry[9] [10] [11]
January 31, 1976 Eagle Rights Amendment
February 14, 1976 Canker research Cancer research
February 28, 1976 Deaf penalty Death penalty
March 13, 1976 Conserving natural racehorses Conserving natural resources
April 17, 1976 Presidential erectionsPresidential elections[12]
May 8, 1976 Violins on television Violence on television[13]
May 29, 1976 Flop story Top story
September 18, 1976 Crustacean hijackers Croatian hijackers[14]
December 11, 1976 Unisex donations UNICEF donations
January 15, 1977 Making Puerto Rico a state[15] [16]
January 22, 1977 Burning issues
Transcendental medication Transcendental meditation
Maguda triangle Bermuda Triangle
Air fags in cars Airbags in cars
(unspecified vulgarity) Duck
Flea elections in China / Flea erections Free Elections in China
February 20, 1977 Liverboats Riverboats
March 12, 1977 Endangered feces Endangered species
April 9, 1977 "(You Make Me Feel Like) a National Woman" "(You Make Me Feel Like) a Natural Woman"
April 23, 1977 Air solution Air pollution
"I Will Swallow Him" "I Will Follow Him"
May 14, 1977 beep
May 21, 1977 Stella Abzug Bella Abzug
Cat in the ring Hat in the ring
December 17, 1977 Mr. AdenoidMr. Aykroyd
Jan / Miss Clayton Jane Curtin
SST
February 10, 1979 Porky and Bess Porgy and Bess
Rodeo and Juliet Romeo and Juliet

History

Radner based Litella on her childhood nanny, Elizabeth Clementine Gillies, known as "Dibby", who was allegedly hard of hearing.[17] [18] The running gag "Never mind" became a lighthearted catchphrase of the era.[19] [20]

In her first appearance on SNL, the character of Emily Litella was an author who appeared as an interview subject on a show called "Looks At Books". Though she had the same wavery voice and somewhat frumpy wardrobe as she would in later episodes, Litella did not appear to have a hearing problem in this appearance. All but one of the subsequent SNL appearances by Litella were at the newsdesk, and featured the by-now much more familiar "editorial reply" iteration of the character. In the eleventh episode of season four, on February 10, 1979, with guest hostess Cicely Tyson, the final comedy sketch was called "Emily Litellavision", and featured Litella hosting a staging of a song from Porky and Bess, her Porky Pig–based mis-hearing of Porgy and Bess by George and Ira Gershwin and DuBose Heyward, with Garrett Morris singing a song to Tyson with added stuttering, and the orchestra shown wearing pig masks.

Outside of Saturday Night Live, Radner played the character briefly on The Muppet Show. At the top of that episode, Miss Litella is discovered backstage by stage manager Scooter, where she is vociferously complaining about the indignity of her appearing in something so silly as "The Muffin Show", whereupon Scooter gently persuades Miss Litella that she would be appearing on "The Muppet Show", not "The Muffin Show". After hearing this reassurance, she withdraws her objection, and meekly apologizes to Scooter by saying, "Never mind."

The character also appeared in Radner's 1979 one-woman off-Broadway show, Gilda Live, in which Litella took a job as a substitute teacher in Bedford-Stuyvesant, replacing a teacher who had been a victim of a stabbing by one of his students, which put him in the hospital. Miss Litella further cautioned her new students to be very careful where they put their toes, as the regular teacher's "stubbing" was the third such "stubbing", as Miss Litella put it, at the school that week alone; and that the "stubbings" must be pretty serious, in order to have put their teacher in hospital indefinitely.

A similar character, Anthony Crispino (played by Bobby Moynihan), made his first appearance on a Weekend Update in Season 35, and became a recurring character.[21]

See also

External links

Notes and References

  1. News: Barone . Michael . Michael Barone (pundit) . At NASA, an Emily Litella Moment . . September 28, 2005. September 15, 2018.
  2. Book: Fruchter, Rena. I'm Chevy Chase ... and You're Not. January 17, 2013. Random House. London. 978-0-7535-2114-4. 199.
  3. Web site: Emily Litella, played by Gilda Radner . SNL Archive . April 8, 2014 .
  4. Book: Shales. Tom . Miller. James Andrew. Live From New York: An Uncensored History Of Saturday Night Live. November 16, 2008. Little, Brown. New York, NY. 978-0-316-04582-7. 125.
  5. News: Joey the dachshund: 'OK, OK, I get it. I'm short. Must you keep reminding me?' . 8 November 2011 . Saint Paul Pioneer Press . Bulletin Board.
  6. Web site: Amusing Monday: Recalling SNL's Emily Litella | Watching Our Water Ways. 11 January 2010 .
  7. Web site: Watch Saturday Night Live Highlight: Weekend Update: Emily Litella on Busting School Children - NBC.com.
  8. Web site: SNL Transcripts: Candice Bergen: 12/20/75 - SNL Transcripts Tonight. 8 October 2018 .
  9. News: Shales . Tom . 22 May 1989 . The Afterglow of Gilda Radner; The Nutty but Nice Graduate of Saturday Night . The Washington Post . B01.
  10. Web site: Soviet Jewelry.
  11. Web site: SNL Transcripts: Peter Cook & Dudley Moore: 01/24/76: Weekend Update with Chevy Chase - SNL Transcripts Tonight. 8 October 2018 .
  12. Book: Robinson, Peter M.. The Dance of the Comedians: The People, the President, and the Performance of Political Standup Comedy in America. 2010. Univ of Massachusetts Press. Amherst & Boston. 978-1-55849-785-6. 200–.
  13. Book: Sorensen, Roy A.. Pseudo-Problems: How Analytic Philosophy Gets Done. January 22, 2002. Taylor & Francis. New York, NY. 978-0-203-04868-9. 108.
  14. Web site: Watch Saturday Night Live Highlight: Weekend Update 9-18-76, Part 2 of 2 - NBC.com.
  15. Book: Malloy, Merrit. The Quotable Quote Book. August 30, 1990. Carol Publishing Group. New York, NY. 978-0-8065-1220-4. 174.
  16. Saltzman. David A. . March 2008 . Never Mind . Life Insurance Selling . 83 . 3 . 112–114 . 2906328 . 0024-3140--> .
  17. Book: Jackson, Kenneth T. . The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives: 1986-1990 . 718 . Charles Scribner's Sons . 1998 . 0684804913 . 2016-09-04.
  18. Book: Radner, Gilda . It's Always Something . Simon and Schuster . June 2, 2015 . 978-1501126635 . 2016-09-04.
  19. Book: Robinson, Marc . Brought to You in Living Color . Wiley . 2002 . 134 . 9780471090168 . 2016-09-04.
  20. Book: Stein, Ellin . That's Not Funny, That's Sick: The National Lampoon and the Comedy Insurgents Who Captured the Mainstream . W. W. Norton . June 24, 2013 . 298 . 9780393074093 . 2016-09-04.
  21. Busis . Hillary . Saturday Night Live recap: 'James Franco and Nicki Minaj' . Entertainment Weekly . December 7, 2014 . 2016-09-04.