Lazy Sunday
Encyclopedia
"Lazy Sunday" is a song and short video by American comedy troupe The Lonely Island
, released on December 17, 2005, broadcast on Saturday Night Live
as the second Digital Short
. Primarily performed by Andy Samberg
and fellow cast member Chris Parnell
, the song and accompanying music video follow the two comedians on a Sunday afternoon matinee viewing of the film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
, while eating cupcake
s from the Magnolia Bakery
.
The song was written by Samberg and Parnell, as well as Lonely Island members Akiva Schaffer
and Jorma Taccone
, in one night. Recorded the following night in the comedy troupe's office of the GE Building
on Taccone's laptop he bought from Craigslist
, the music video was shot around Manhattan
the next morning using a borrowed camera. After being quickly mixed and edited by Schaffer, the short was approved for broadcast on the next evening's telecast of Saturday Night Live by producer Lorne Michaels
.
Although the writers initially worried the studio audience would respond to the short negatively, the video received a positive reception and enjoyed Internet
stardom overnight, with multiple bootleg copies surfacing on video-sharing website YouTube
. The song and video brought forth positive critical reception, with many regarding it as drawing relevance to the dormant series. In retrospect, commentators have named "Lazy Sunday" as one of the best Saturday Night Live moments of the 2000s.
or searching for travel directions on MapQuest
. Samberg described the lyrics as "two guys rapping about very lame, sensitive stuff."
Schaffer and Taccone had been on the writing staff for nearly three months, and had only two live sketches that survived the dress rehearsal process and actually made it on air.
Parnell, Samberg, Schaffer, and Taccone wrote "Lazy Sunday" on the evening of December 12, 2005. They recorded the following night in the office The Lonely Island occupied together, using a laptop Taccone bought on Craigslist
. Whilst colleagues were rehearsing and rewriting that Saturday's show, the group spent the morning of December 15 shooting their video with a borrowed camera. The video used the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater in Chelsea
to stand in for a multiplex cinema and Taccone's girlfriend's sister to play a convenience-store clerk. Schaffer spent the entire next night (into the morning) editing the video and working with technicians to bring it up to broadcast standards. In the moments preceding the show's live performance and broadcast, the team learned from Michaels that "Lazy Sunday" would be shown on that night's show. The three comedians were very worried about how the video would be received by the studio audience.
.
By the following morning, the video was a national cultural sensation. Schaffer and Taccone also were contacted by friends who heard the track played on radio stations and in bars. "Lazy Sunday" inspired a line of T-shirts, released during the initial boom of popularity in the weeks after its release.
The short was initially available after its broadcast through the iTunes Store
(then known as the iTunes Music Store), made free for subscribers. Additionally, it was posted to several web sites and shared via e-mail. The film was viewed more than five million times at YouTube
before NBC Universal
asked the site to remove it, along with several other copyright
ed NBC
video clips, in February 2006. NBC later placed the short on its SNL site and Hulu
.
put it on its end-of-the-decade, "best-of" list, saying, "The hallowed genre of 'white dudes rapping about mundane stuff' reached new heights of hilarity with Andy Samberg and Chris Parnell's 2005 ode to an afternoon viewing of The Chronic—what!—cles of Narnia."
's success, as it spawned dozens of 'response videos'. These included a West Coast response by actor Mark Feuerstein
, an English response by comedian Sam Baron
, an Australian response about lawn bowls, as well as Lazy Muncie (which defended the honor of the Midwest) and Lazy Ramadi
by two US Army SSGs based in Ramadi
, Iraq
.
In "The Merger", an episode of the television series The Office, Michael Scott makes an orientation film called "Lazy Scranton" for the Stamford employees who were transferred to Scranton. Starring Michael and Dwight, the video uses the same music, rap style, and camera effects used in the "Lazy Sunday" video.
In the feature film Epic Movie
, the character Captain Jack Swallows (a reference to Jack Sparrow from the Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
film franchise) breaks out in a rap called "Lazy Pirate Day"; the song is reminiscent of "Lazy Sunday" both visually and musically. Swallows is played by Darrell Hammond
, a long-time performer on Saturday Night Live.
The Lonely Island
The Lonely Island is an American comedy troupe composed of Akiva "Kiv" Schaffer, Jorma "Jorm" Taccone, and David Andrew "Andy" Samberg, best known for their comedic music. Originally from Berkeley, California, the group is currently based in New York City. The group broke out due to their...
, released on December 17, 2005, broadcast on Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live is a live American late-night television sketch comedy and variety show developed by Lorne Michaels and Dick Ebersol. The show premiered on NBC on October 11, 1975, under the original title of NBC's Saturday Night.The show's sketches often parody contemporary American culture...
as the second Digital Short
SNL Digital Shorts
An SNL Digital Short is one in a series of comedic and often musical video shorts created for airing on NBC's Saturday Night Live, generally produced and written by The Lonely Island , though originated by Adam McKay, in collaboration with SNL hosts, writers, and cast members...
. Primarily performed by Andy Samberg
Andy Samberg
David Andrew "Andy" Samberg is an American actor, comedian, rapper and writer best known as a member of the comedy group The Lonely Island and as a cast member on Saturday Night Live...
and fellow cast member Chris Parnell
Chris Parnell
Thomas Christopher "Chris" Parnell is an American comic actor best known as a cast member on Saturday Night Live from 1998–2006 and currently for his recurring role as Dr. Leo Spaceman on NBC's Emmy Award-winning comedy series 30 Rock. Parnell also voices Cyril Figgis on the FX animated comedy...
, the song and accompanying music video follow the two comedians on a Sunday afternoon matinee viewing of the film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is a 2005 epic fantasy adventure film directed by Andrew Adamson and based on The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the first published and second chronological novel in C. S. Lewis's children's epic fantasy series, The Chronicles of...
, while eating cupcake
Cupcake
A cupcake is a small cake designed to serve one person, frequently baked in a small, thin paper or aluminum cup...
s from the Magnolia Bakery
Magnolia Bakery
Magnolia Bakery is a bakery opened in 1996 at 401 Bleecker Street, on the corner of West 11th Street in the West Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. An uptown shop opened at 200 Columbus Avenue, on the corner of West 69th Street on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, in January 2008...
.
The song was written by Samberg and Parnell, as well as Lonely Island members Akiva Schaffer
Akiva Schaffer
Akiva Schaffer is an American writer for Saturday Night Live, a film director, songwriter, and a member of The Lonely Island, a sketch-comedy troupe that first found success on the Internet, which includes SNL cast member Andy Samberg and SNL writer Jorma Taccone...
and Jorma Taccone
Jorma Taccone
Jorma Christopher Taccone is an American comedy writer-actor-director. Taccone is one third of the sketch comedy troupe The Lonely Island along with childhood friends Andy Samberg and Akiva Schaffer...
, in one night. Recorded the following night in the comedy troupe's office of the GE Building
GE Building
The GE Building is an Art Deco skyscraper that forms the centerpiece of Rockefeller Center in the midtown Manhattan section of New York City. Known as the RCA Building until 1988, it is most famous for housing the headquarters of the television network NBC...
on Taccone's laptop he bought from Craigslist
Craigslist
Craigslist is a centralized network of online communities featuring free online classified advertisements, with sections devoted to jobs, housing, personals, for sale, services, community, gigs, résumés, and discussion forums....
, the music video was shot around Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
the next morning using a borrowed camera. After being quickly mixed and edited by Schaffer, the short was approved for broadcast on the next evening's telecast of Saturday Night Live by producer Lorne Michaels
Lorne Michaels
Lorne Michaels, CM is a Canadian-American television producer, writer, and comedian best known for creating and producing Saturday Night Live and producing the various film and TV projects that spun off from it.-Early life:...
.
Although the writers initially worried the studio audience would respond to the short negatively, the video received a positive reception and enjoyed Internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
stardom overnight, with multiple bootleg copies surfacing on video-sharing website YouTube
YouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
. The song and video brought forth positive critical reception, with many regarding it as drawing relevance to the dormant series. In retrospect, commentators have named "Lazy Sunday" as one of the best Saturday Night Live moments of the 2000s.
Background
The track "Lazy Sunday" and its accompanying music video follow the two cast members (Parnell and Samberg), who adopt the brash personas of hardcore rappers. The song follows their quest to achieve their "ultimate goal" of attending a matinee of the fantasy film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. The lyrics involve subjects that are "anything but hardcore," such as eating cupcakes from the Magnolia BakeryMagnolia Bakery
Magnolia Bakery is a bakery opened in 1996 at 401 Bleecker Street, on the corner of West 11th Street in the West Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. An uptown shop opened at 200 Columbus Avenue, on the corner of West 69th Street on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, in January 2008...
or searching for travel directions on MapQuest
MapQuest
MapQuest is an American free online web mapping service owned by AOL. The company was founded in 1967 as Cartographic Services, a division of R.R. Donnelley & Sons in Chicago, Illinois, United States. It moved to Lancaster, Pennsylvania in 1969. When it became an independent company in 1994, it was...
. Samberg described the lyrics as "two guys rapping about very lame, sensitive stuff."
Schaffer and Taccone had been on the writing staff for nearly three months, and had only two live sketches that survived the dress rehearsal process and actually made it on air.
Recording and production
Craigslist
Craigslist is a centralized network of online communities featuring free online classified advertisements, with sections devoted to jobs, housing, personals, for sale, services, community, gigs, résumés, and discussion forums....
. Whilst colleagues were rehearsing and rewriting that Saturday's show, the group spent the morning of December 15 shooting their video with a borrowed camera. The video used the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater in Chelsea
Chelsea, Manhattan
Chelsea is a neighborhood on the West Side of the borough of Manhattan in New York City. The district's boundaries are roughly 14th Street to the south, 30th Street to the north, the western boundary of the Ladies' Mile Historic District – which lies between the Avenue of the Americas and...
to stand in for a multiplex cinema and Taccone's girlfriend's sister to play a convenience-store clerk. Schaffer spent the entire next night (into the morning) editing the video and working with technicians to bring it up to broadcast standards. In the moments preceding the show's live performance and broadcast, the team learned from Michaels that "Lazy Sunday" would be shown on that night's show. The three comedians were very worried about how the video would be received by the studio audience.
Release
The short had its premiere on the December 17, 2005 episode of Saturday Night Live, and received a positive response. "It played really well, and we were just super happy about that," said Samberg. When the video first aired, the comedy troupe and Samberg were basically unknown to even the show's most devout fans. "It captures a certain scrappiness about the show. There's an unpolished realness to it that I think people can instantly relate to," said Saturday Night Live veteran Amy PoehlerAmy Poehler
Amy Meredith Poehler is an American comedian, actress and voice actress. She was a cast member on the NBC television entertainment show Saturday Night Live from 2001 to 2008. In 2004, she starred in the film Mean Girls with Tina Fey, with whom she worked again in Baby Mama in 2008. She is...
.
By the following morning, the video was a national cultural sensation. Schaffer and Taccone also were contacted by friends who heard the track played on radio stations and in bars. "Lazy Sunday" inspired a line of T-shirts, released during the initial boom of popularity in the weeks after its release.
The short was initially available after its broadcast through the iTunes Store
ITunes Store
The iTunes Store is a software-based online digital media store operated by Apple. Opening as the iTunes Music Store on April 28, 2003, with over 200,000 items to purchase, it is, as of April 2008, the number-one music vendor in the United States...
(then known as the iTunes Music Store), made free for subscribers. Additionally, it was posted to several web sites and shared via e-mail. The film was viewed more than five million times at YouTube
YouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
before NBC Universal
NBC Universal
NBCUniversal Media, LLC is a media and entertainment company engaged in the production and marketing of entertainment, news, and information products and services to a global customer base...
asked the site to remove it, along with several other copyright
Copyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
ed NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
video clips, in February 2006. NBC later placed the short on its SNL site and Hulu
Hulu
Hulu is a website and over-the-top subscription service offering ad-supported on-demand streaming video of TV shows, movies, webisodes and other new media, trailers, clips, and behind-the-scenes footage from NBC, Fox, ABC, and Obstacle on October 20th 2011 Nickelodeon and CBS and many other...
.
Reception
Entertainment WeeklyEntertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
put it on its end-of-the-decade, "best-of" list, saying, "The hallowed genre of 'white dudes rapping about mundane stuff' reached new heights of hilarity with Andy Samberg and Chris Parnell's 2005 ode to an afternoon viewing of The Chronic—what!—cles of Narnia."
Cultural impact
Thanks to "Lazy Sunday" initial iTunes success, Apple announced they had licensed several archived Saturday Night Live skits to offer for download in January 2006. The success of "Lazy Sunday" encouraged Michaels to trust the troupe more and push their material onto the show. The viral success of the video is widely credited as having been the tipping-point for YouTubeYouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
's success, as it spawned dozens of 'response videos'. These included a West Coast response by actor Mark Feuerstein
Mark Feuerstein
-Career:Feuerstein got his break-through on television as a recurring character on the daytime soap opera Loving. When director Nancy Meyers was casting What Women Want, her daughter recognized Feuerstein from Practical Magic and insisted that her mother cast him...
, an English response by comedian Sam Baron
Sam Baron
Sam Baron is a comedian and film-maker from Cambridge, England.His first feature film, Can You Survive a Week in Paradise?, was screened at the Cambridge Arts Picture House in 2004. In December of that year, his documentary Family Rights Group was screened at the Barbican Cinema in London,...
, an Australian response about lawn bowls, as well as Lazy Muncie (which defended the honor of the Midwest) and Lazy Ramadi
Lazy Ramadi
Lazy Ramadi is a spoof of the Saturday Night Live Lazy Sunday video, inspired by 'Lazy Muncie' and produced and played by SSG Josh Dobbs and SSG Matt Wright. Also appearing is SPC Adam Foster with music and sound by SPC Andre Franklin...
by two US Army SSGs based in Ramadi
Ramadi
Ramadi is a city in central Iraq, about west of Baghdad. It is the capital of Al Anbar Governorate.-History:Ramadi is located in a fertile, irrigated, alluvial plain.The Ottoman Empire founded Ramadi in 1869...
, Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
.
In "The Merger", an episode of the television series The Office, Michael Scott makes an orientation film called "Lazy Scranton" for the Stamford employees who were transferred to Scranton. Starring Michael and Dwight, the video uses the same music, rap style, and camera effects used in the "Lazy Sunday" video.
In the feature film Epic Movie
Epic Movie
Epic Movie is a 2007 American parody film directed and written by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer and produced by Paul Schiff. It was made in a similar style to Date Movie, Friedberg and Seltzer's previous film. The film mostly references The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the...
, the character Captain Jack Swallows (a reference to Jack Sparrow from the Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl is a 2003 adventure fantasy film based on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disney theme parks. It was directed by Gore Verbinski and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer...
film franchise) breaks out in a rap called "Lazy Pirate Day"; the song is reminiscent of "Lazy Sunday" both visually and musically. Swallows is played by Darrell Hammond
Darrell Hammond
Darrell Hammond is an American actor, stand-up comedian and impressionist. He was a regular on Saturday Night Live from 1995 until 2009, the longest tenure of any cast member. Upon his departure, Hammond, at age 53, was the oldest cast member in the show's history...
, a long-time performer on Saturday Night Live.
External links
- "Lazy Sunday" on NBC
- "Lazy Sunday" at SNL Transcripts