dick ebersol and SNL--7/10/26

10 Jul 2026

dick ebersol and SNL--7/10/26

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Today's selection -- from Never Mind the Happy by Marc Shaiman. For five years in the 1980s, Dick Ebersol was the producer of Saturday Night Live—as recounted here by Marc Shaiman:

"I'm going to be a complete cliché and start this chapter by saying, ‘The first time I tried cocaine was up at Saturday Night Live.' But at first, my various stints at SNL only involved pot. A whole lotta pot.

“After the show's first five groundbreaking years, the original cast, writers, and many senior staff left. But in 1981, a fantastic musician named Tom Malone, who played trombone in the original band, was promoted to musical director. Tom is one of those geniuses who can play practically every instrument on Earth.

“Luckily for me, though, he wasn't the thing that all comedy shows need: a funny Jewish guy at the piano. It's a law!

“So, with no one at the piano–Jewish or otherwise–whenever a musical idea would come up, a freelance piano player/arranger was called in. The first year I went up to the SNL studios on the seventeenth floor of 30 Rockefeller Center, a landmark Art Deco skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan, was 1984. Tom was an avid marijuana enthusiast, and no one at that time ever needed to twist my arm to get high, so he and I would sit in the music office and smoke. And smoke. And smoke.

Duncan Richard Ebersol

“The only sketch I remember working on (who could remember anything after ingesting that much marijuana?) was setting out the arrangement for Julia Louis-Dreyfus singing in a spoof of Linda Ronstadt's new album of standards with the famed arranger/orchestrator Nelson Riddle. That was probably the first time I sat down and analyzed a Nelson Riddle orchestration, but it certainly wouldn't be the last.

“The following year, producer Dick Ebersol (who is barely mentioned now but produced the show for five years, including the Eddie Murphy years) pretty much cleared the decks and brought in a bunch of comedy all-stars including Billy Crystal, Martin Short, and Christopher Guest.

“My sense of humor completely meshed with those three guys. I've remained friendly with Christopher, who went on to create brilliant mockumentaries like Waiting for Guffman and Best in Show. But my close relationships with Billy and Marty have continued far past their one year on Saturday Night Live.

“My most vivid memory from that year is when Ringo Starr hosted. I remember being at the table read on Wednesday thinking, ‘Sure, a Beatle is sitting right over there, but if only it was Paul or George or the late John Lennon.’

“After the read-through, someone suggested Billy do his phenomenal Sammy Davis Jr. impression (which is now outlawed) in the opening monologue. Ringo and ‘Sammy,' in Rat Pack fashion, could sing each other's hits. So we all piled into the music room, and from the piano I said to Billy and Ringo, ‘You know what would be helpful? If we start with you guys first singing your actual songs, not each other's, just for us all to remember what they are before we trade off.'

“Billy sang a few measures of a bunch of Sammy Davis Jr. hits, and then it was Ringo's turn. This was before he started touring with his All-Starr Band, which reintroduced audiences to him performing his solo and Beatles hits. But at the time, no one had seen or heard Ringo sing any of those songs in the flesh for almost two decades.

“So, I began playing 'With a Little Help from My Friends’ and then Ringo f**king Starr started singing and my blase attitude was quickly obliterated by a bolt of electricity that went from the base of my spine, straight up my back, around my head, back down through my arms and legs, and repeated over and over again.