A series of tweets from the Saturday Night Live alumnus revealed a story about how Eddie Murphy chose not to impersonate embattled comedian Bill Cosby.
One of the major appeals of Saturday Night Live‘s 40th anniversary show is that it allowed for cast members of different eras to interact with each other through the medium of comedy. Eddie Murphy was a supernova during the show’s lean years in the early 1980s. Norm Macdonald was a snarky part of the tail end of the show’s revival during the mid-1990s.
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The 40th anniversary special allowed them to interact with each other on the screen. It also allows fans to get glimpses of how these stars communicate off-screen and backstage.
Macdonald and Murphy were supposed to appear together in a Celebrity Jeopardy sketch, where Macdonald was supposed to play Burt Reynolds while Murphy portrays Bill Cosby. Cosby has been caught up in rape allegations that surfaced earlier last year.
Macdonald went to Twitter to tell the story of how the proposal went backstage.
This totally changes the perception people have of Eddie Murphy as the washed up comic actor eager enough to get into a fat suit for some cheap laughs.
The charisma he displayed both as a young star on Saturday Night Live and as a major film icon in the 1980s still eminates from him. He comes off as having a supreme confidence rather than the neurotic energy of other comics.
Norm Macdonald has shown before that he can use personal anecdotes to perfectly distill the essence of someone we believe we know.
After Robin Williams passed away in August, Macdonald went to Twitter to tell a story about meeting Williams backstage before doing a set on the Late Show with David Letterman. The story portrayed the manic improv audiences knew Williams for, but in private, showing readers the graciousness and desire he had to make people happy.
Whether or not you believe Bill Cosby is guilty, Murphy should be commended for sticking to his principles of not drawing comedy from a vulnerable person’s misfortunes. This includes the alleged victims themselves. The story gives us a deeper and more well rounded view on someone who many people saw as an icon fallen from the limelight.
[H/T: Vulture]
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