On Thursday evening at the Norman Lear Center in Los Angeles, a collection of television shows will be hailed for their ability to “inform, educate and motivate viewers to make choices for healthier and safer lives.”
Original Saturday Night Live cast member Laraine Newman will host the Lear Center’s Hollywood, Health & Society’s Sentinel Awards show.
Honored this year will be ABC’s Abbott Elementary and Grey’s Anatomy; HBO’s The Morning Show and Hacks; Fox’s The Simpsons; Apple TV+’s Expats and The Big Cigar; Prime Video’s Gen V; FX’s Feud; AMC’s Dark Winds; and NBC’s Lopez Vs. Lopez.
“I love the idea of shows that deal with the conversation of the most pressing issues that we’re dealing with in our culture,” Newman tells ABC Audio. “And all of these shows present it in a way that is the most palatable way imaginable, which is comedy, which is also exactly what Norman Lear did.”
The performer is also celebrating dual 50th anniversaries this year: The Groundlings comedy troupe in which she was an original member and Saturday Night Live, which had its first show on Oct. 11, 1975.
Newman was on the show until 1980’s season. She said it took some time to realize SNL‘s significance: “I think subsequent years, when it was clear that it was going to be an institution and that each year, with each successive cast … it always moved the tone and voice and style of comedy forward.”
The show’s first-ever episode is the basis of Jason Reitman‘s film Saturday Night, for which she was extensively interviewed. Emily Fairn plays Newman. “I loved the movie,” Newman gushes, calling it “incredibly entertaining and exciting.”
The movie plays out in real time, ending with Cory Michael Smith, playing Chevy Chase, saying, “Live from New York: It’s Saturday Night!” — which Newman said brought her to tears.
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