Saturday Night Live - Season 7
Description: Saturday Night Live aired its seventh season during the 1981–1982 television season on NBC. The seventh season started on October 3, 1981 and ended on May 22, 1982. A total of 20 episodes were broadcast.
Following the dismissal of producer Jean Doumanian and most of her cast members, the show was shut down due to the commencement of the 1981 WGA strike.
Dick Ebersol, the program's developer, was hired as Doumanian's replacement. The new cast of Saturday Night Live for this season were the same ones from the episode Ebersol produced on the April 11, 1981 episode: Robin Duke, Tim Kazurinsky and Tony Rosato along with the Doumanian era's sole survivors Eddie Murphy and Joe Piscopo. Denny Dillon and Gail Matthius were fired following the April 1981 episode while Laurie Metcalf and unseen castmember Emily Prager weren't asked back to be cast members on the show.
Ebersol then hired two new cast members: Mary Gross and Christine Ebersole. Both were hired to fill the gap left by Metcalf and Prager.
Wanting to distance the show from its first five seasons, Ebersol cut the popular opening line Live from New York, It's Saturday Night! from the cold openings. In fact, sometimes cold openings weren't even shown and the monologues were skipped over almost entirely. These changes were not permanent, as Ebersol decided to reverse them for the eighth season.
Episodes
(no host)/Rod Stewart
Aired: Oct 3, 1981
Sketches include ""Our Age is Showing,"" ""The Little Richard Simmons Show,"" ""...
Susan Saint James/The Kinks
Aired: Oct 10, 1981
Sketches include ""McDonald & Wife,"" ""The Bizarro World,"" ""Buckwheat Sings,"...
George Kennedy/Miles Davis
Aired: Oct 17, 1981
Sketches include ""To Tell the Truth Gone Awry,"" ""Mister Robinson's Neighborho...
Donald Pleasence/Fear
Aired: Oct 31, 1981
Sketches include ""Vomiting for Luck,"" ""Jogger Motel,"" ""Profiles in British ...
Lauren Hutton/Rick James
Aired: Nov 7, 1981
Sketches Include: "Here's 'Cos", "Dressing Room", "Hail To The Chief", "Transeas...
Bernadette Peters/The Go-Go's, Billy Joel
Aired: Nov 14, 1981
Tim Curry/Meat Loaf
Aired: Dec 5, 1981
Bill Murray/The Spinners, Yale Whiffenpoofs
Aired: Dec 12, 1981
Sketches include ""The Phone Company,"" ""Tales of the Unlikely,"" ""Washed-Up T...
Robert Conrad/The Allman Brothers Band
Aired: Jan 23, 1982
John Madden/Jennifer Holliday
Aired: Jan 30, 1982
James Coburn/Lindsey Buckingham
Aired: Feb 6, 1982
Bruce Dern/Luther Vandross
Aired: Feb 20, 1982
Elizabeth Ashley/Hall and Oates
Aired: Feb 27, 1982
Robert Urich/Mink DeVille
Aired: Mar 20, 1982
Sketches include ""He's No Burt Reynolds,"" ""Paul Harvey Radio News,"" ""Golden...
Blythe Danner/Rickie Lee Jones
Aired: Mar 27, 1982
Sketches include ""Lorne Greene,"" ""The New Celibacy,"" ""20/20,"" ""The Uncle ...
Daniel J. Travanti/John Cougar
Aired: Apr 10, 1982
Sketches include ""Save Larry the Lobster,"" ""Whiners' Anniversary,"" ""Hill St...
Johnny Cash/Elton John
Aired: Apr 17, 1982
Elton John performs the John Lennon tribute ""Empty Garden."" Sketches include ...
Robert Culp/The Charlie Daniels Band
Aired: Apr 24, 1982
Danny DeVito/Sparks
Aired: May 15, 1982
Sketches include ""Louis DePalma's Revenge,"" ""The Executive Test,"" ""The Whin...
Olivia Newton-John
Aired: May 22, 1982
Sketches include ""Ebony & Ivory,"" ""I Married a Monkey,"" Grease, ""Hitler In ...