I’m running out of seventies Sissy Spacek material, to the extent that I had to resort to watching the March 12th, 1977 episode of Saturday Night Live that she hosted. It’s up on the Internet Archive, downloadable from here.
Honestly, this can barely be considered a review, as I fast-forwarded through the episode so I could get to Sissy’s parts. And even during those parts, I often skipped to her next speaking part or at least the moments where she appeared on screen. I was searching SNL for Sissy Spacek and resenting everything that got in the way.
Every time I’ve ended up with SNL on screen, I feel like I’m in crazy town where people live under the collective delusion that SNL is funny. I’ll have more to say about delusion further on, regarding the second guest they had on this episode.
This SNL episode started with Dan Aykroyd, fellow autist (he has spoken publically about having Asperger’s), pretending that their director died. Aykroyd presented some of the SNL actors one at a time, letting them do their little bit. Two of them were recognizable as Bill Murray and John Belushi. The rest I guess sank in the sands of time. Sissy was brought in, looking awkward and maybe scared, and said her bit. That was all for the first part.
Sissy then came on stage alone to introduce the episode, looking hella adorable and also scared out of her mind. She spoke about coming from the small town of Quitman, Texas, which she speaks about at length in her autobiography. Quite the idyllic place during the sixties, when she grew up there.
This episode was fresh off Sissy rising to further fame due to her work on Carrie; she was even nominated for an Academy Award which she likely deserved to win but didn’t. Faye Dunaway won it for Network. Sissy, suggesting that she wouldn’t win it and therefore wouldn’t be able to give her acceptance speech, thanked her mother, father, brother Ed, husband, and a bunch of other less important people. One of the glaring omissions from her list was her brother Robbie, who died of leukemia when she was a late teenager. Maybe she forgot one of the most important people in her life, or she just didn’t want to sour the moment during a comic bit.
Anyway, Sissy ends up trying to tear off her getup gracefully, only for it to get awkwardly stuck for a moment. But the temporary lack of grace slides into familiar territory for her: a twirling routine. I was introduced to this woman on Terrence Malick’s Badlands with her performing twirling, which she also speaks about in her autobiography. As she said, she performed it for all her boyfriends, and it was, in her words, “very effective.” I’m sure it was, Sissy.
That was one of the highlights of the episode, which mostly degenerates from there.
In her next part, she’s dressed hella sexily in a black-and-white getup with a dress that ends in a delightfully short skirt. Apparently she was pretending to be a child. This is the first of two instances this episode in which she’s supposed to act like a child, if that tells you anything. Then a black guy in drag comes in. The part only gets more awkward from there. The black guy sits down and asks Sissy to sit on his lap, then he goes into a monologue I didn’t pay attention to, while Sissy interjected in a childish voice. Overall, Sissy’s expression suggested to me that the thought “What the hell am I doing” popped up in her mind more than once.
After a bunch of skits, Sissy shows up again, this time to introduce one of the biggest enigmas I’ve ever encountered in my life: Richard Baskin. I wouldn’t blame you for not knowing who this guy was, as time has rightfully erased him from popular consciousness. The history of this creature is bizarre: a musician with very questionable talent who somehow got most of the seventies scene, including directors associated with Robert Altman, pretending, or even believing, that this guy was the next big thing in American music. The seemingly few exceptions were some bewildered critics.
If you’ve seen the horrid Welcome to L.A., a movie I subjected myself to because it features Sissy prominently and looking amazing, you’ve gotten a taste of the depths of collective delusion that somehow centered around this Baskin character. He wrote a series of songs about feeling empty while hooking up in L.A. Those songs aren’t good by any extent of the imagination: they sound like an amateur trying to capture emotions that he doesn’t have the writing talent to depict. The music itself isn’t much better. They could have been considered charming at best if the songwriter didn’t look like he believed God put him on Earth to create his songs.
Somehow, someone associated with Robert Altman listened to those songs and decided to build a whole screenplay around them, which became Welcome to L.A. Baskin plays his songs in the movie, and there are various scenes in which the actors, including Sissy, awkwardly praise the musician and his work as if he were God’s gift to music. Baskin himself looks like a narcissistic creep. Gives off bad Rodney Alcala vibes. The whole thing is utterly bizarre.
Anyway, Baskin decided to grace SNL with his presence, so I’ve been subjected to his music once again, if only during the parts when Sissy joins him to sing the chorus. The things I do for you, Sissy. While singing next to the guy, she looks like she barely wants to meet his gaze. And they end that performance by kissing on the lips?! What about your husband?
In Sissy’s next significant part, she’s dressed as a child, her hair in pigtails, and acting like a little girl. She faces the camera in a way that makes her flash her panties or whatever she’s wearing underneath multiple times. That whole skit was awkward as hell, and mostly made me think that someone in charge wanted to have Sissy dressing and acting as a child for their own satisfaction.
The next skit is a long exchange with John Belushi, in which she pretends to be his young wife and the marriage isn’t going well. I didn’t understand the appeal of it, or why they wrote it the way they did, but it was still more interesting than any other skit they involved Sissy in (apart from the twirling, if it can be called a skit), as it required Sissy to act. John Belushi was also sweating prominently under the studio lights, which made it more uncomfortable for me.
Sissy then presents a short film of her twirling again, this time looking like a fashion shoot. She looked gorgeous, so I enjoyed that. There seemed to be little point to the bit other than to show how hot and graceful she was. The close-up shots reminded me once again that Sissy had one of the most unique, beautiful faces I have ever seen.
Sissy then appears in a short skit I didn’t understand at all, and didn’t try to, in which she’s held by Bill Murray while wearing a medieval dress.
The final bit that features Sissy prominently is a compilation put together by Robert Altman of her appearing in movies throughout the seventies, mainly Altman’s 3 Women, and also Welcome to L.A., intercut with seemingly original, mostly pointless footage of Sissy (if there’s such a thing of pointless footage of Sissy Spacek) pretending to interact with scenes of the movies. Mostly, this compilation made me think that Altman was out of his mind as well.
Finally, Sissy shows up on stage to tell the audience that she had a great time, which I honestly doubt. Throughout the episode, I kept reading discomfort into her expressions, maybe hoping she disliked the material as much as I did. The cast start greeting each other. There’s a moment in which Belushi tries to get Sissy’s attention as the credits roll, without knowing that he would be dead less than five years later. Sissy finally notices him and hugs him as if she has an inkling that Belushi would be dead less than five years later, which she couldn’t have known because she’s not a psychic.
Mostly, this whole thing made me sad that it isn’t the seventies anymore, and that there’s now one fewer piece of seventies Sissy Spacek footage left for me to discover.
