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This week at The Tryon Theatre is “Saturday Night,” a hilarious and heartfelt love letter to the early days of “Saturday Night Live.” 

This film is a dramatization, with admitted artistic liberties, of the very first performance of the television juggernaut. In fact, the entire film is set in a roughly two-hour window before the program goes to air. The imagining is done with loving attention to detail and an impeccable casting of the iconic original players.

Much like the show, this film is a through-and-through comedy, with many constant attempts at getting a laugh, or, at the very least, a subversive shock. The film clips along this tightly wound story with a frenetic jazz-like energy that is equal parts energizing and dizzying but always entertaining, packing its short runtime with as full a plate as possible and not a moment wasted. 

“Saturday Night” is made for an adult audience; its dialogue is rife with raunch, and its frames include drug use. However, that rougher element is historically authentic, and a film portraying the show’s origins would be incomplete without their presence. Save for the dialogue of one particular “villain,” this film situates all its transgressiveness in the comfortable context of humor. 

As with any film that lionizes a still-living individual, some viewers may take pause at Lorne Michaels’ (Gabrielle Labelle) portrayal. Labelle’s performance is so distinct and effective that you can allow yourself to see him only as a character, saving the comparisons to real life for the other cast members. Ultimately, the uncanny accuracy with which the cast plays their parts is the strongest asset of an already competent and compelling film. 

All of the actors chosen to play the original “SNL” cast do well in portraying bodily performances and cadences that were so distinct to their real-life counterparts. The facial likenesses of the cast are not necessarily perfect, but the perfection of the performances bridges any gap in features. 

With the film being set in the time leading up to air, it doesn’t provide many moments for the cast to play their characters in the iconic early sketches the audience knows and loves. There are a handful of delightful rehearsal moments, but most of the film is concerned with the intersections of the personalities that created “SNL,” both in front of and behind the camera. In this way, the film emphasizes character rather than story. There is skillfully wrought tension to the plot, but that is simply a frame to hang the art of the dialogue and performances that bring it to life for our enjoyment. 

Tryon Theatre will be closed on Thursday, November 28, for the Thanksgiving holiday. We hope you all will enjoy some nostalgic laughs with us soon!