Maya and Marty with Maya Rudolph, Martin Short and Kenan Thompson as the regulars is a full-on, live, prime time variety show. The show has sketches and musical numbers – the real thing.
I caught the first show on Saturday night, but their regular night will be Tuesday. The show was fun and funny and packed with great guests.
The first show included Tom Hanks, Miley Cyrus, Larry David, Jimmy Fallon, dancers from Shuffle Along with Savion Glover, Kate McKinnon – and Steve Martin who appeared in person for about 30 seconds to explain that he couldn’t be on the show because he was in Europe.
The sketches made me laugh, but I really loved the subtle things that didn’t actually get mentioned. I loved that Miley Cyrus started out her musical number in a tux singing “I’m Your Man.” Then she ripped off her trousers and sang “I’m a Woman” with Maya. I loved that when the cast of Shuffle Along finished their number and the ending credits were playing, Maya and Marty got on stage and danced with them. Maya danced with a woman and Marty danced with a man. One of the sketches involved Martin Short and Jimmy Fallon seemingly peeing all over the set.
You don’t have to come out and with a long speech about your opinion of all the gender nonsense going on in America today. You lead by example.
I like the way they didn’t spend any time doing introductions. They simply plunged into the sketches. There wasn’t a lot of talking head nonsense between things, they ran full out the whole time.
I grew up on variety shows, but I thought they were a thing of the past. Great shows like The Carol Burnett Show were such a part of life back in the day. I hope this attempt to bring back the genre succeeds. We need more hour long efforts to encourage good cheer in prime time.
Lorne Michaels of SNL is producing the show.
Images © NBC
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Okay, it looks like fun. We’ll watch for it. Never miss an opportunity to see Marty Short!