Drake played a Disney World cast member at Hollywood Studios' Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular and did a solid job capturing the hopeless enthusiasm that theme park employees have to bring to the show when working with an audience volunteer, uh, doesn't go so well.
It might be worth noting that Saturday Night Live airs on NBC, which is owned by Disney's archrival NBCUniversal, and the whole audience volunteers schtick traditionally has been more Universal's thing. But Universal's been backing off that in recent years, so hey, why not spoof the Disney show?
What did you think?
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The spoof doesn't even parody the reality. It does seem to imply the woman is an idiotic Indian. If a person doesn't know the language, the show moves forward. It doesn't get stuck in the wasteland of lets keep repeating myself until you learn English. Oh well.
Has SNL been funny since Bill Murray left?
As with all sketch comedy, the skit went for the lowest common denominator, and I think there would have been a bit more outrage and allegations of racism if Nasiim Pedrad had not played Rahat. I was waiting for them to work the name into a joke, but it never came, and with so many SNL sketches, it ended with a thud after the third repetition of the schtick. You have to give them credit though for doing a really good job with the set design. For those who have either seen a taping or toured the NBC studios in New York, that soundstage is extremely small and cramped.
I don't think it was a direct shot at Disney, but a situation one of the writers thought was funny, perhaps from personal experience, and was at least humorous enough at the walk through that it made the cut for the show.
Perhaps it's more telling that SNL is NBC's highest rated scripted show despite airing at 11:30 PM on Saturday. SNL, as it was even in the 70's, can be hit or miss, and has a lot to do with timing around historical events and the guest host and musical guest, who are booked months in advance. Everyone's going to say that SNL was better "back in the day", but if you go back and watch those early seasons (you can purcahse the entirety of the first 5 seasons on DVD), there are some serious duds on either side of the classics. It's pretty amazing that the show has lasted for nearly 40 years, and continues to reinvent itself. This year's cast is not as strong as recent years, mostly because they lost a number of veterans over the past 2 years, and are about to lose their lead writer (Seth Myers) to Late Night. Not only that, but they're dealing with their Executive Producer (Lorne Michaels) having his time split between SNL and launching the new Tonight Show in New York with Jimmy Fallon. Many critics would say that SNL had a rebirth over the past 5 years, and that the show goes through cycles like this as casts turn over. I think there are 4 or 5 new permanent cast members this season (some were "featured players" in previous seasons).
I've just never really found immigrant/foreigner humor to be very funny. Even when someone like Margaret Cho parodies asian stereotypes, I don't think it's in good taste, and this wasn't either.
Bad sketch. Don't watch SNL anymore either.
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