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Why Wasn't "Lazy Sunday" Part Of The SNL 100th Digital Short?
By
Ben Yakas
Published May 13, 2012
Modified May 13, 2012
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By
Ben Yakas
Published May 13, 2012
Modified May 13, 2012
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Saturday Night Live celebrated the 100th Digital Short last night with a star-studded video, featuring cameos from Justin Bieber, Jon Hamm, Natalie Portman, Justin Timberlake, Julian Casablancas, Usher, Will Ferrell, and Michael Bolton. There were also tons of references to past hits including Shy Ronnie, Two Worlds Collide, Iran So Far, Jizz In My Pants, Stumblin' and more. But one sketch was conspicuously absent: there was no sign of alum Chris Parnell nor any references to the first Digital Short breakout hit, "Lazy Sunday."
"Lazy Sunday"—an ode to cupcakes, using online maps, Mr. Pibb, The Chronicles of Narnia—became a viral sensation on YouTube in 2005 (it was also performed live on Jimmy Fallon in 2010). Digital Shorts became a regular SNL feature because of it, and the segment helped propel Lonely Island into a much wider audience. So it seems very odd to us that in a short that touched upon every other famous/beloved Digital Short they've done, they left out the first major one entirely.
Maybe Parnell just isn't welcome on SNL anymore—he was fired from the show twice during his eight year stint, and hasn't made an appearance since 2008. In an interview with Vulture, he talked a bit about being fired, saying that although his SNL experience overall was fantastic, "It wasn’t always great, there were definitely tough times, the toughest of which was when I was fired the first time and which really came out of left field and was pretty devastating."
He also gave some background on the origins of "Lazy Sunday:"
Yeah, well Akiva [Schaffer] and Andy [Samberg] and Jorma [Taccone], you know they had had this website already, the Lonely Island, and they had been making music videos and stuff for the site, so they came to SNL with the skill set already. They had seen the raps I had done previously so they came to me and said, "Hey, we want to try and do a rap and do you want to do it with us." And I said, "Yeah, of course, absolutely." So the four of us sat down in their office and wrote it over the course of a Monday and Tuesday and recorded it that Tuesday night, went out and shot it all on Thursday. Akiva was doing the camera work and Jorma was sort of doing everything else, holding the playback of what we recorded on Tuesday night and just sort of running around New York shooting it. That was my involvement with it.
And then Saturday night, I got to see what they had come up with, what they put together and it was just crazy. It got a really nice response from the audience and I was like, "Ah, that was gratifying, that was fun." I knew they were going to post it to their site, I didn’t know that it was going to be posted necessarily to YouTube, I don’t think. That was the last show before Christmas and I went back to Memphis for the holidays, and I was there with my family and I got a call from Marc Liepis from NBC publicity saying, "Hey, the New York Times wants to interview you about this music video, it's become this thing," and I was like, "What?" I really had no idea, that was my first hint that it had become a phenomenon.
Below, check out a behind-the-scenes look at the Digital Shorts and how they started:
Tagged
chris parnell
digital short
lazy sunday
saturday night live
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Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
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