‘Saturday Night’ TIFF Premiere Keeps ‘SNL’ Pic’s Awards Season Momentum Humming

TIFF isn’t a festival known for its standing ovations, but it’s arguable that tonight’s Canadian premiere of Sony’s behind-the-scenes SNL movie Saturday Night came close with arguably the most rapturous response here at the 49th edition, which included the audience clapping rhythmically through the end-credits.

Said one industry insider not connected to the pic, “I won’t be surprised if it wins the Audience Award” –a historical bellwether for Oscar winners.

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A multitude of the cast from the Jason Reitman-directed pic were in tow at the Royal Alexandra Theatre including Nicholas Braun (who plays Andy Kaufman and Jim Henson), J.K. Simmons (Milton Berle), Willem Dafoe (NBC exec David Tebet), Matt Wood (John Belushi), Gabriel LaBelle (Lorne Michaels), Lamorne Morris (Garrett Morris), Dylan O’Brien (Dan Aykroyd), Cory Michael Smith (Chevy Chase), Ella Hunt (Gilda Radner) and Rachel Sennott (Rosie Shuster) as well as the pic’s co-scribe and producer Gil Kenan.

While the film’s Telluride world premiere had SNL vet Bill Murray (whose character isn’t portrayed in Saturday Night) introducing it, there weren’t any vets from the NBC late-night sketch show in attendance, despite some of their connections to Toronto, including Michaels, a hometown native. Word is the SNL creator is quite busy on the upcoming 50th season.

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During the post-screening Q&A, Reitman told TIFF boss Cameron Bailey that Michaels “reminded me a lot about being a film director — someone who has a vision, and it’s almost impossible to articulate that idea until you can actually see it onscreen. Every time I heard about him trying to describe SNL to people while he was trying to create it, “Oh, that’s what’s it like to be a movie director.'”

Reitman gave a shout-out to his casting director, John Papsidera, in assembling the murderer’s row ensemble of actors and actresses.

“He introduced me to a lot of you, and for the ones I already knew, he introduced me to a whole new side of you,” said the four-time Oscar-nominated filmmaker.

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Said LaBelle about filming the movie, which follows the agita that took place before the first SNL broadcast on October 11, 1975: “Lorne is a young man in this film, and he has a vision, one that him and an entire generation of artists share, but they haven’t been seeing it on television. He believes in it so much, he spends his entire life trying to make something. He believes in it with his entire heart. And I think we just wanted to catch that love when we make something. Whenever it was that happened, it was just a testament to Jason. All of us were in our heads, we were nervous and we had a lot to do, and a lot of ground to cover, and Jason clamed us the f*ck down, and he told us to chill.”

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Morris told the packed venue about meeting the real Garrett Morris, who isn’t related to him: “I presented him an award at the AVFF. … This old dude gets up on stage and tells everyone he’s my father!”

He added: “He told me millions of stories of the time back then. My journey mirrored his journey in a lot of ways. A lot of times, I’m the only Black guy in the show, in the thing. For him, it was the exact same.”

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The older Morris told the younger Morris, “‘I want the audience to know I never gave up. I tried my best.'”

Morris then said: “Hopefully he saw it. Hopefully he was crying.”

Saturday Night is getting a platform release by Sony starting on September 27 in LA, NYC and Toronto, then limited on October 4 before breaking wide on October 11.

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