Since comedy sketches are designed to run for about three minutes, they might not seem like great fodder for feature-length adaptations. And while that is the case, for the most part, a few of the greatest comedies ever made have been adapted from Saturday Night Live sketches.
From Coneheads and The Ladies Man to A Night at the Roxbury, there are a bunch of lackluster comedies that stretched out a one-note premise from an SNL sketch across an hour and a half. But, with movies like The Blues Brothers and Wayne’s World, there are also a bunch of great ones with some hilarious scenes.
Doug And Steve’s Nightclub Pitch (A Night At The Roxbury)
For the most part, many in the audience felt that A Night at the Roxbury drags out a very thin premise about two guys who enjoy clubbing and gets very few laughs out of it. But the lead characters, Doug and Steve, have a ridiculous idea for a nightclub that they want to pitch to Mr. Zadir, the owner of the famous Roxbury club played by Chazz Palminteri.
Their idea is for a nightclub whose exterior looks like the interior and whose interior looks like a street. Despite the absurdity of the idea, Mr. Zadir still steals it.
“If You Book Them, They Will Come.” (Wayne’s World 2)
When Wayne finds himself in need of some quick cash in Wayne’s World 2, he sees the late Doors frontman, Jim Morrison, in a dream. Morrison tells Wayne to put on his own music festival, Waynestock.
Wayne isn’t sure if major acts will perform at his festival, but Morrison reassures him by paraphrasing Field of Dreams’ most iconic quote: “If you book them, they will come.”
“No ‘Stairway’! Denied!” (Wayne’s World)
In a scene in Wayne’s World, Wayne goes to a guitar store and tries out a guitar he really likes. Like pretty much everybody who’s ever tested out a guitar, he starts playing Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven.”
However, he only gets through a couple of notes before an employee of the store refers him to a sign that reads: “NO STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN.” Wayne tells the camera, “No ‘Stairway’! Denied!”
Jake Is Attacked By His Jilted Ex-Fiancée (The Blues Brothers)
Throughout The Blues Brothers, Jake is constantly attacked by a mysterious woman played by Carrie Fisher. After spending the movie coming after Jake with assault rifles and flamethrowers, it’s finally revealed that she’s his ex-fiancée who he left at the altar.
When she confronts Jake in the service tunnel, he has a string of terrible excuses:
“I ran out of gas. I had a flat tire. I didn’t have enough money for cab fare. My tux didn’t come back from the cleaners. An old friend came in from out of town. Someone stole my car. There was an earthquake. A terrible flood. Locusts! It wasn’t my fault, I swear to God!”
Bohemian Rhapsody (Wayne’s World)
The studio wanted Mike Myers to use a more current song for the singalong scene in Wayne’s World, but he insisted that it had to be Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.”
Of course, this turned out to be the perfect choice for the scene, and one of the best movie scenes to feature a Queen song, and the success of the movie led to the renewed public interest in the song – and, by extension, Queen themselves.
Charlton Heston’s Cameo (Wayne’s World 2)
After the success of Wayne’s World, the producers secured a bunch of high-profile cameos for the sequel: Aerosmith, Heather Locklear, Drew Barrymore, Jay Leno, the list goes on. Arguably Wayne’s World 2’s most memorable cameo appearance is Charlton Heston.
Wayne encounters a gas station attendant giving a labored performance and says, “Can’t we get a better actor? I know it’s a small part, but I think we can do better than this.” Suddenly, Heston takes over the role and delivers a powerful monologue about Gordon Street.
The Sex Scene (MacGruber)
Of all the SNL characters, Will Forte’s MacGruber is one of the best-suited to a feature-length adaptation. As a parody of MacGyver, his spin-off movie directed by The Lonely Island’s Jorma Taccone had plenty of opportunities for action.
There’s a hilariously subversive sex scene in the movie that starts off like a cheesy, romantic love scene found in ‘80s actioners like Top Gun before it suddenly cuts to a more awkward, realistic performance.
The Chez Paul Restaurant Scene (The Blues Brothers)
When Jake and Elwood Blues resolve to get their band back together to save the orphanage they grew up in, they find that all their old bandmates have moved on. They find one of them working as the head maître d’hôtel at Chicago’s fancy Chez Paul restaurant. He makes a comfortable living, so he doesn’t want to give it up to join the band.
So, Jake and Elwood post up at a table and start acting boorishly until the maître d’ is so desperate to get rid of them that he agrees to join the band.
Product Placement (Wayne’s World)
From talking directly to the camera to trying out a few different endings, Wayne’s World is a delightfully self-aware movie. When the producers adapting Wayne and Garth’s public access show for regular TV ask them to advertise their sponsors’ products on the air, they take a stance against product placement.
But while they’re telling the producers that they refuse to sell out, they enjoy a bunch of corporate products like Doritos, Pepsi, and Reebok with the logos facing out.
The Climactic Car Chase (The Blues Brothers)
The delirious anarchy of The Blues Brothers’ climactic car chase is cinema at its finest and one of the best car chases in movie history. On their way back to Chicago to save the orphanage, Jake and Elwood are relentlessly pursued by dozens of police squad cars, as well as the neo-Nazis they ran into a river and the country band whose spot they stole.
Director John Landis and his crew destroyed a record-breaking 103 cars in the creation of this set piece, a record that wasn’t broken for another 18 years when 112 cars were destroyed for G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.