Saturday Night Live and Philosophy

Is Weekend Update fake news? How can we tell the difference between satire, smart-assery, and seriousness? What is the benefit of jokes that cause outrage? The Church Lady has a bad case of moral superiority. How about you? What can Wayne and Garth teach us about living a happy life? Live from New York for over forty years, Saturday Night Live is seriously funny, and through decades of sketches, monologues, commercials, music acts, and a huge cast of recurring characters, NBC's original late-night comedy sketch show has brought a touch of levity to everything that is laughable about modern life. Many of the greatest minds in modern comedy--Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy, Steve Martin, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Chris Rock, Kate McKinnon and more--have honed their craft at SNL , finding fresh ways to highlight the ridiculous and absurd in our boardrooms, newsrooms, mailrooms, sorority houses, music studios, churches, schools, and everywhere in between. Politicians from Gerald Ford to Donald Trump have had their faults and foibles lampooned by SNL's election sketches and satirical news segments, and all the while, Weekend Update has shown us that the medium is the message. Of course, comedian-philosophers from Socrates to Sartre have always prodded and provoked us, critiquing our most sacred institutions and urging us to examine ourselves in the process. In Saturday Night Live and Philosophy , a star-studded ensemble cast of philosophers takes a close look at the "deep thoughts" beneath the surface of the award-winning late-night variety show and its hosts' hijinks. In this book, philosophy and comedy join forces with the strength of the Ambiguously Gay Duo to explore the meaning of life itself through the riffs and beats of the subversive parody that gives the show its razor-sharp wit and undeniable cultural and political significance.