Saturday Night Live animal sketches

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This list includes write-ups for animal-themed recurring sketches that appeared on Saturday Night Live. The sketches are listed chronologically.

Character Lists: Alphabetical and Chronological

Character Articles:

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Contents

[edit] The Killer Bees

The Killer Bees were the first characters to recur on SNL. According to a Lorne Michaels interview for the book Live From New York, "The only note we got from the network on the first show was 'Cut the bees.' And so I made sure I put them in the next show." The bees were played by all the repertory players at the time, who wore yellow and black horizontal stripes, wings, and overly springy antennae. Much of the humour from these scenes came out of puns or metaphors that had to do with well-known activities and body parts of bees.

[edit] Episodes Featuring full sketches of The Killer Bees

[edit] Additional appearances of The Killer Bees

[edit] The Land Shark

The Land Shark was the only recurring character Chevy Chase created during his relatively short stay on SNL, although he often played the character when he would come back to host and portrayed Gerald R. Ford in a number of shows. Initially the Land Shark was created as a Jaws parody, but eventually fell into a more predictable pattern. The shark would always prey on vulnerable women and the sketches began with a knock at the door from a stranger. The person inside would ask who it was, hesitant to answer the door for just anybody. The still unseen shark would usually begin by guessing the woman's name. When that didn't work he would try a number of strategies like telling her he was delivering a parcel or a candy-gram. Eventually he would come up with something that would convince the person on the other side of the door to let him in, only to find that it had been a shark all along. By that time it would be too late, and the unsuspecting individual would be swallowed.

[edit] Episodes featuring The Land Shark

[edit] I Married A Monkey

The I Married A Monkey sketches were created by Tim Kazurinsky to remind the viewing public that the show was indeed live. He essentially played himself, working with the premise that he had married a chimpanzee named Madge in a bizarre soap opera world. There was a real chimp onstage, and some sketches featured their "children" played by baby chimps.

Kazurinsky felt that the show had become too polished, and felt that the idea would offer some unpredictability. He explained in Live From New York, "I did it because I knew something would screw up and people would see that it was live. People would ask me 'When do you tape the show?' No, it's called Saturday Night Live. It's live." He eventually decided to put a stop to the sketches when he realized the dangers chimpanzees posed when they got agitated.

[edit] Episodes Featuring I Married A Monkey

[edit] Ching Chang's Pet Chicken Shop

The character Ching Chang was played by Dana Carvey, whose only goal in life is to put his chickens in their own show on Broadway. Ching Chang is a typical Asian-American stereotype.

[edit] Toonces, The Driving Cat

Main article: Toonces the Driving Cat

Toonces was the family pet of Lyle (Steve Martin in the first sketch, thereafter by Dana Carvey) and Brenda Clark (Victoria Jackson). At first, they were delighted that their cat had the ability to drive, and then Toonces, for the first of many times, drove over a cliff. (This sequence was always characterized by some one in the car yelling in horror, "Toonces, look out!" with the Toonces puppet appearing to scream also, followed by stock footage of a car falling off a cliff, sometimes exploding.) Someone also usually said the line: "See! I told you he could drive...just not very well."

[edit] Episodes featuring Toonces

[edit] Lenny the Lion

See entry: Lenny the Lion on Saturday Night Live characters appearing on Weekend Update.

[edit] Goat Boy

Goat Boy was a half human-half goat hybrid who hosted the fake SNL show, "Hey! Remember the 80s". He was played by Jim Breuer. At the outset, Goat Boy was a typical veejay/talk show host who would announce 80s video clips and introduce guests from the era. Contrarily, when his goat instincts kicked in, he would start braying and kicking, and would have to be subdued by scientists standing by with electric prods.

The character might be a parody of the 1996 version of The Island of Doctor Moreau, specifically Ron Perlman's character, "The Sayer of the Law" (they are both goat-human hybrids, and have a similar "one hand-one hoof" configuration). However, the sketch debuted a few months before this version of the film was released. More likely, it was inspired by the recurring character of Goat Boy, a man in a suit wearing a goat mask, in "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse", a cult show that ran on Manhattan Cable TV in the 70's and 80's.

His appearances tended to have a polarizing effect on audiences, some finding his antics hilarious, others finding them just plain annoying.

[edit] Mr. Peepers

Mr. Peepers was a part monkey-part human character created and portrayed by Chris Kattan. His signature bit of physical comedy involved eating apples one after another in rapid succession, and spitting out the pieces machine gun style. Often he would spit the apple chunks directly at characters in the scene.

Mr. Peepers was first introduced as an animal act brought out by John Barbary (played by Tom Hanks) on a parody of The Tonight Show (with Darrell Hammond as Jay Leno). In an episode in the 25th season, "Papa Peepers" (played by The Rock) was revealed to be Mr. Peepers's father. Another memorable sketch was a parody of an episode of Dawson's Creek, featuring Katie Holmes as Joey, the character she played on that show.

[edit] Episodes featuring Mr. Peepers

[edit] Additional Mr. Peepers appearances

On the Weekend Update segment of the May 17, 2003 episode, Chris Kattan performed a lightning-round montage of his most popular characters, and assumed the character of Mr. Peepers for a brief moment during that bit. It was the final episode of the 2002-2003 season, and also Kattan's last episode as a cast member.

[edit] Dog Show

Dog Show was an aptly titled parody of an Animal Planet show featuring people who are more than enamored with their dogs. It was hosted by Miss Colleen (Molly Shannon) and Mr. David Larry (Will Ferrell), a bizarre couple who were supposed to be married even though he was a homosexual ("Separate bedrooms, separate baths"). The two admit that they "don't like most people" but are extremely fond of dogs.

The sketch would open with David Larry banging on a snare drum, followed by the two hosts shouting "DOG SHOW!" The hosts would then introduce their dogs, "Mr. Rocky Balboa" and "Mr. Bojangles", (who was actually a female, but was given the title "Mr.", because as David Larry would point out, he is "playing a trick on her"), a pair of miniature dogs who were displayed dressed in costumes. Often the hosts would have their dogs participate in things such as seances and weddings.

Each sketch would introduce a guest to the "show". The sketch was popular due to the dogs misbehaving, and Shannon and Ferrell frequently breaking character by laughing.

[edit] Brian Fellow's Safari Planet

Brian Fellow's Safari Planet was a recurring sketch on Saturday Night Live featuring Tracy Morgan. The character premiered on May 15, 1999 and appeared ten times; its last appearance was on April 10, 2004.

The sketch consists of Brian Fellow (Morgan), a man with a sixth grade education, who is not a licensed zoologist, interviewing representatives from zoos, animal sanctuaries, or other wildlife centers who bring animals to his show.

Following a somewhat predictable pattern, Fellow asks bizarre, nonsensical questions of his guests, soon becomes angry with them (he seems to know nothing about animals and is extremely defensive when this is brought to light), and ends with him insulting them and/or asking them to leave. Often Fellow has delusions that the non-present or even imaginary characters are speaking to him in a vulgar manner, resulting in him blurting things out like "I don't want to see your wiener!", "That parrot better not mess up my credit!", or "No you won't punch my mom!" He also wears shiny clear lipgloss on the show, and acts effeminate. His usual response to anything a guest says is "that's crazy!"

[edit] Popular catchphrases

  • "I'm Brian Fellow!"
  • "That's crazy!"
  • "So let's get going!"
  • "Now let's welcome a/an (animal name)!"
  • "That's weird and I don't like that!"

[edit] Episodes Featuring Brian Fellow

[edit] Brian Fellow's Remarks on Animals

On a boa constrictor: "That's one big worm!" or "Does the snake still work for the Devil?"

On a tarantula: "That's one fuzzy bug!...If I had a bug like that, I'd make a coat out of him!"

On a parrot after the bird mimics his catch phrase "I'm Brian Fellow": "That bird is a liar!"

On a bat: "I understand bats live in caves," to which the trainer acknowledges this, "Does he know where Osama bin Laden is?" (This episode aired after the September 11 attacks.)

On a pig: "Why does that pig hate Jewish people?"

On a Minature Horse: "That's the biggest dog I've ever seen!"

On a goat: "I didn't Like That goat, he had devil eyes!"

On a turtle: "If that turtle bites me I'm gonna kill it!"

On a rabbit: "That rabbit just winked at me!"

[edit] References

[edit] The Falconer

"The Falconer" is a recurring Saturday Night Live sketch chronicling the adventures of former businessman Ken Mortimer (Will Forte), who left his job to become a hermit, living in the forest with his trusted pet falcon, Donald. The Falconer, who speaks in a loud, strident voice, routinely encounters trouble and sends his falcon to get help, who—in turn— often gets sidetracked along the way. Ken, trapped in his distress, calls out for Donald, however Donald is beyond hearing as he is not fetching help for Ken but instead wantonly mixing in the society that Ken the Falconer turned his back on. Donald, with one or more human partners, indulges in vice, explores his sexuality, or otherwise displays unfaithfulness to Ken. The two then reunite and the Falconer accepts the falcon back gratefully, unaware of or not caring about Donald's second life. The sketch is written and created by comedian Leo Allen.

[edit] Episodes Featuring The Falconer

A Falconer sketch where The Falconer discovers that his life is a lie and he is just an SNL recurring character was performed in the dress rehearsal episode of the Rainn Wilson/Arcade Fire episode, but not shown in the live show.

[edit] Bear City

This series of very short films by longtime SNL writer T. Sean Shannon was about a town abandoned by humans after a meteor strike but then quickly repopulated by bears, who had rapidly evolved due to some strange chemical property of the meteor. City life continued as normal, only with bears in the place of humans. The introduction to each film, explaining the origins of Bear City, used a pre-recorded narration by Fred Willard.

[edit] Phoebe and her Giant Pets

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