Long-running comedic sketch show Saturday Night Live celebrated its 50th anniversary this year.

It’s quite the accomplishment, a rarity in the field of television. For better or worse, Saturday Night Live has maintained relevancy for half a century, the live-broadcast studio audience format continuing to produce notable comedic voices who ascend to a national and then international stage.

So, what better way to celebrate its success Stateside than to adapt the format to British television, and likely end up being laughed at, not with?

Recreating SNL for a UK audience makes sense on paper, and likely makes sense to executives on the top floor of Sky, but not much where else. The sketch comedy format is a cosier and less frightening prospect here than in the States, after all, and live sketch comedy shows have been tested before to varying success – and that is without the involvement and power backing of famed SNL producer Lorne Michaels. Older readers may remember Channel 4’s similarly named Saturday Live, which boosted Britain’s alternative comedy scene with a touch of in-vogue prominence in the 1980s and familiarised many of the comedic voices in UK television when it came to representing the ironic slacker 1990s after.

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© Herald Scotland