But subsequent casts created their own indelible marks as well-including Billy Crystal as Fernando (“You look mahvelous”) Dana Carvey and Kevin Nealon as Teutonic workout coaches Hans and Franz (“Ve vant to pump you up!”) Will Ferrell as Alex Trebek doing “Celebrity Jeopardy” battle with Darrell Hammond’s sharp-tongued Sean Connery or, more recently, Bill Hader as super-fey club kid Stefon, always willing to direct viewers to the most bizarre New York attractions (“This place has everything!”) and Wiig, showing up on a recurring parody of “The Lawrence Welk Show” as the Lennon sister that the Lennon family probably kept locked away in a closet. The original group had more than its share-including Bill Murray as Nick the Lounge Singer Murray and Gilda Radner as the nerds, Todd LaBounta and Lisa Loopner and Garrett Morris as baseball star Chico Escuela (“Beisbol been bery bery good to me”). Which of the greatest hits that you remember may depend on which generation of “SNL” cast you watched regularly. Some movies (Wayne’s World) were better than others (It’s Pat, Superstar). Al Franken as self-help nerd Stuart Smalley) to A Night at the Roxbury (with Chris Kattan and Will Ferrell reprising two mostly silent characters who, unfortunately, spoke in the movie). Through the years, some of the most popular characters have even spawned movies, from The Blues Brothers, with Aykroyd and John Belushi, to The Coneheads, from Stuart Saves His Family (starring now-U.S.
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More often, however, the best skits showed up regularly and the recurring characters become part of the performers’ repertoires, even generating their own catchphrases: Mike Myers and Dana Carvey as the stars of “Wayne’s World,” with “Shwing!” and “No way! Way!” Eddie Murphy as Buckwheat (“O-tay!”) and, occasionally, as Gumby (“I’m Gumby, dammit!”) Jon Lovitz as Tommy Flanagan, the liar (“Yeah, that’s the ticket”) Carvey as the Church Lady (“Could it have been … Satan?”) and, most currently, Kristen Wiig as Gilly (“Sorry!”) and the “SNL Digital Shorts” starring Andy Samberg and Justin Timberlake in parodies of smooth early-90s soul videos, beginning with “Dick in a Box.” Early on, Aykroyd played a fast-talking commercial pitchman on an ad that still has people talking: “Super BassoMatic 76,” in which he put a whole fish into a blender. Not that all of the classic skits involved a character who returned over and over.
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Recurring characters became the show’s bread and butter, whether it was John Belushi as the multi-occupational samurai warrior (who once actually accidentally cut guest host Buck Henry’s forehead with his sword during a sketch) or Dan Aykroyd and Steve Martin as the swinging Czech brothers who told anyone who would listen that they were “two wild and crazy guys.” Right from the start, “SNL” seemed to understand that, when a sketch went over so well that people were talking about it at the watercooler the following Monday, there was practically a mandate to bring those characters back. Find a popular catch-phrase associated with “Saturday Night Live”-past or present-and you will undoubtedly be talking about one of the long-running comedy-sketch show’s most popular sketches-its greatest hits, if you will. Two wild and crazy guys? Yeah, that’s the ticket.