“Saturday Night Live” is celebrating its remarkable 50 years on the air this year with lots of A list hosts, musical guests, and prme time special in February 2025/
But something has gone wrong with the new Jason Reitman movie, “Saturday Night,” about the show’s first night in 1975.
The Sony release is not launching at the box office. Last night, “Saturday Night” made $102,000 in 21 theaters. That’s five thousand dollars less than it made last Friday night in just 5 theaters.
Fans of the show are not going to see this movie. The audience that saw the first show in 1975 isn’t going.
The Reitman film has mixed to good reviews with a 79% on Rotten Tomatoes. There is no audience score as of yet.
“Saturday Night” has had odd marketing. It played at Telluride and in Toronto. But for a New York movie, it had no big local premiere. The surviving stars — Jane Curtin, Laraine Newman, Chevy Chase — have been very mum. There’s been no effort so far to plug in on “SNL.”
Maybe fans feel they know the story already. Or that “SNL” is a TV thing. But I’m surprised. Overall buzz going into “Saturday Night” was high.
PS One note — I don’t know why Sony released this movie and not Universal, which owns NBC and SNL. Probably a great reason that will be explained to me by smarter people.
