In what would become an historic night in New York City, on October 11th 1975, Saturday Night Live (SNL), a topical sketch show featuring Chevy Chase, John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Gilda Radner,  Garrett Morris, Jane Curtin and Lorraine Newman made its debut on NBC.   

 

The 90-minute program, which from its inception has been broadcast live from Studio H at Rockefeller Center, includes a different guest host and musical act each week, with the opening sketch of each show ending with an actor, breaking character, saying “Live from New York, it’s Saturday Night!”

 

But wait a minute, a few days earlier I had just landed a job in publicity at Paramount Pictures’ New York offices, when someone at the office handed me a few tickets to a late night show at NBC.

 

Figuring what do I have to lose, George Carlin was hosting the show and Billy Preston was going to play.

I grabbed a few Eastern Airlines flight attendant friends in a cab in the rain and headed to Rockefeller Center. 

 

They were still handing out free tickets on the street an hour before the show, so I guess they had empty seats to fill.

 

You could feel chaos in the air.  When I saw the recent film Saturday Night, a fictional recreation of the 90 minutes leading up to that first episode, it was hard to hide the panic in the air.  

 

Carlin definitely came out wired and blew through his monologue, but no one in the audience, would have any idea that this would become the hottest show on television. 

 

 

Andy Kaufman and the Muppets were silly, while the future “Not Ready for Prime Time Players” were trying to find their pace. 

 

Lorne Michaels, a Canadian comedy writer who created the the show and has been producing it for 50 years, recruited most of the talent from the National Lampoon’s Radio Hour and Chicago’s Second City.

 

The cast was initially paid $750 each per episode and essentially lived at the offices.

 

The show quickly developed a cult following with its iconic sketches: Belushi’s samurai, Aykroyd and Newman’s Coneheads, Radner’s Roseanna Danna, or Chevy Chase making fun of the top news stories on Weekend Update.  

 

It grew from the Killer Bees, to “More Cowbells”, to The Blues Brothers, to Barbara Wawa, to Wayne’s World, and Belushi’s Joe Cocker routine.

 

It had became a breeding ground for comedy superstars such as Will Ferrell, Eddie Murphy, Adam Sandler, Bill Murray, Mike Myers, Phil Hartman, Dana Carvey, David Spade,  Molly Shannon, Jason Sudeikis, Billy Crystal, Robert Downey Jr, Norm Macdonald, Tina Fey, Dennis Miller, Tracy Morgan, Kevin Nealon, Rob Schneider, Chris Rock and more.

 

I somehow slipped backstage, it wasn’t too hard amongst the hell raising and partying going on, with marijuana in the air and seeing several faces with powdered noses, good times for all. 

 

In my first big night in the city that never sleeps, I made it home like a vampire, cringing to the sun coming up,  never realizing what I had witnessed would continue for another five decades.  

 

Today, fifty years ago, off Route 1 in Manhattan.