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Of all the great things about television, the greatest is that it’s on every single day. TV history is being made, day in and day out, in ways big and small. In an effort to better appreciate this history, we’re taking a look back, every day, at one particular TV milestone.
IMPORTANT DATE IN TV HISTORY: October 27, 1966
PROGRAM ORIGINALLY AIRED ON THIS DATE: Saturday Night Live, “Hugh Laurie / Beck” (Season 32, Episode 4). [Stream on Hulu.]
WHY IT’S IMPORTANT: Jokes about ostentatious performances of “The Star-Spangled Banner” at sporting events go back farther than I can remember. The current political lightning rod about athletes choosing whether to stand during the anthem or kneel in protest is only the latest instance of the national anthem at sporting events serving as a media sensation. Sometimes we pay attention to watch a singer not know the lyrics. Sometimes it’s Roseanne Barr grabbing her crotch after screech-singing the anthem. Sometimes it’s Carl Lewis doing … well, this:
No, Carl. We all weren’t ready.
Of course, then there are the transcendent ones. Marvin Gaye. Whitney Houston. The ones that move crowds of sports fans (and those watching at home) to tears. It’s the promise of achieving that kind of moment that leads to the bulk of the show-offy anthems that we get today. Ten years ago today, those were the kinds of show-offy national anthems that Maya Rudolph was making fun of in her anthem sketch on Saturday Night Live.
The beauty and genius of Maya Rudolph is that she knows exactly when too much will not be enough. Simply throwing a Christina Aguilera parody at the Anthem wasn’t going to do it. There are about 25 different little absurd flourishes in Maya’s rendition, from mispronunciations to wrong words entirely to wrong songs entirely. The pace changes at a moments notice, the voice changes, the mood changes. It’s utter lunacy and absurdism at its finest. I’ll stand up and salute that for sure.
