Awww. See, I rather liked that song, and the summer fill-in show that he did. However, in college (Eugene, Oregon) I met a guy who was from Toronto (Hi, Mitch, if you're seeing this and you're still alive!). He and a friend went to the filming of that show. It was excruciating, for the audience. They did big repetitious chunks, and assembled 13 shows out of the chunks.
One of the excruciating things was a young Steve Martin, who came out and did his "I've got a banana in my ear!" schtick. No, it wasn't that funny on SNL, and it was even LESS polished on the summer filler show. But ... as they were changing sets, scenes, etc. they kept the audience entertained by having Martin tell jokes. They should have had Fozzie do it. He had more material and it was funnier. Martin... had one 15 minute routine. So he did it over and over again.
These people were basically locked into a production studio. They were given three ten-minute bathroom breaks and no craft service was provided for the audience (other than sodas, if I recall the story correctly.)
After Martin's five millionth "I've got a banana in my ear!" Mitch's friend was fed up. He snuck into the dressing room area and took the banana.
Martin was livid. He had tantrums. The producer whined at the audience, "Aww, come on, give the man his banana." The audience, who KNEW who had done it, said nothing. Quite justifiably, after being forced to sit through the excruciating torture of thirteen different sessions of Ray and his band doing "Everything is Beautiful", standing, waving, applauding, etc. on cue, they were taking their collective revenge on the production team.
I believe that Mitch's friend still has that banana. It was a $2.00 fake fruit from a craft store.
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Date: 2005-08-19 09:31 am (UTC)Awww. See, I rather liked that song, and the summer fill-in show that he did.
However, in college (Eugene, Oregon) I met a guy who was from Toronto (Hi, Mitch, if you're seeing this and you're still alive!). He and a friend went to the filming of that show. It was excruciating, for the audience. They did big repetitious chunks, and assembled 13 shows out of the chunks.
One of the excruciating things was a young Steve Martin, who came out and did his "I've got a banana in my ear!" schtick. No, it wasn't that funny on SNL, and it was even LESS polished on the summer filler show. But ... as they were changing sets, scenes, etc. they kept the audience entertained by having Martin tell jokes. They should have had Fozzie do it. He had more material and it was funnier. Martin... had one 15 minute routine. So he did it over and over again.
These people were basically locked into a production studio. They were given three ten-minute bathroom breaks and no craft service was provided for the audience (other than sodas, if I recall the story correctly.)
After Martin's five millionth "I've got a banana in my ear!" Mitch's friend was fed up. He snuck into the dressing room area and took the banana.
Martin was livid. He had tantrums. The producer whined at the audience, "Aww, come on, give the man his banana." The audience, who KNEW who had done it, said nothing. Quite justifiably, after being forced to sit through the excruciating torture of thirteen different sessions of Ray and his band doing "Everything is Beautiful", standing, waving, applauding, etc. on cue, they were taking their collective revenge on the production team.
I believe that Mitch's friend still has that banana. It was a $2.00 fake fruit from a craft store.