Lorne Film Review: Behind the Scenes at Saturday Night Live

Ken Burns may have American parks, presidents, and wars on lock, but Morgan Neville is arguably the documentary world’s most prolific chronicler of American pop culture. His films have covered children’s TV icon Fred Rogers (Won’t You Be My Neighbor?), global traveler Anthony Bourdain (Roadrunner), banjoing comedian Steve Martin (STEVE!), and a whole swath of rock and pop figures from Paul McCartney (Man on the Run) and Pharrell Williams (animated curio Piece by Piece) to the undersung artists singing backup on some of last century’s most enduring hits (2013 Oscar winner 20 Feet From Stardom). And yes, sure, Lorne Michaels – subject of Neville’s latest documentary – is technically Canadian, but the show he created, Saturday Night Life, is inarguably an American institution, the comedy sketch juggernaut now chugging along in its 51st season on air.

If your appetite for Saturday Night Live lore wasn’t exhausted by last year’s medley of 50th anniversary docu-content on Peacock (including the SNL50: Beyond Saturday Night miniseries, which credit Neville as an exec producer), or by Jason Reitman’s recent fictionalized reproduction of the show’s premiere episode in 1975, then Lorne adds even more to the buffet. Michaels grants Neville behind-the-scenes access, the camera roving through rehearsals, celebrity-studded dinners, and Michaels’ Maine retreat, as the film peeks behind the curtain of the weekly production cycle while verily galloping through decades of history. But the über-producer, on camera at least, is also openly resistant to the project, and the public introspection it demands. “Elusive,” one colleague calls him. “A very undocumentable man,” summarizes another. At one point, the documentary crew catches him taking a corner to avoid crossing paths. In another scene, he glares directly into the frame. Cue the laughs. 

Lorne can feel a little sweaty, like its proximity to so many funny people makes it want to prove it’s in on the joke, borne out in an onscreen ID for “Lorne’s fish guy,” say, or shots edited to land like punchlines – amusing at first, flirting with tiresome as they accumulate. Darian Sahanaja’s score is so spritely, it can grate; at times, I felt manhandled with whimsy. And while animated sequences – done in the same style as Robert Smigel’s TV Funhouse cartoons of yore – get a laugh for their light lampooning of Michaels’ wealth and standoffish persona, they also reinforce the feeling that Lorne is all soft edges, no sharp elbows. I longed for a single disgruntled ex-employee to sit for the camera and let ’er rip.

This is sounding spoilsportish. Any SNL fan, and I am one, is still going to get a kick out of the close access and cavalcade of stars like Tina Fey, Chris Rock, John Mulaney, Paula Pell, and Paul Simon giving testimony. By dint of that access, Lorne is by definition revealing. Revelatory? Not as much. 

Lorne

2026, R, 101 min. Directed by Morgan Neville.

⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 3 out of 5.

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