‘Saturday Night’: Read The Screenplay That Sketches Out The 90 Minutes Before ‘SNL’ Debut That Changed Late-Night TV Forever

Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series that shines a spotlight on the scripts for this year’s buzziest films is now pointing the viewfinder on Saturday Night, the Jason Reitman-directed film that tells the origin story of NBC’s venerable late-night franchise by focusing on the 90 minutes leading up to its TV debut.

The flick written by Reitman and Gil Kenan takes place on October 11, 1975, when an ambitious troupe of young comedians and writers would go on to change television forever. Formerly titled SNL 1975 (that’s the title on the script), the film tells the true story of what happened behind the scenes that night leading up to the first-ever broadcast of SNL.

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The movie stars Gabriel LaBelle as SNL honcho Lorne Michaels, Dylan O’Brien (as Dan Aykroyd), Cory Michael Smith (Chevy Chase), Rachel Sennott (Rosie Shuster), Lamorne Morris (Garrett Morris), Nicholas Braun (Jim Henson), Finn Wolfhard (NBC page), Jon Batiste (Billy Preston), Ella Hunt (Gilda Radner), Cooper Hoffman (Dick Ebersol), Andrew Barth Feldman (Neil Levy), Naomi McPherson (Janis Ian), Willem Dafoe (David Tebet), J.K. Simmons (Milton Berle) and Kaia Gerber (Jacqueline Carlin) among others.

The Columbia Pictures movie debuted at the Telluride Film Festival and hit U.S,. theaters September 27, timed around the start of SNL‘s 50th season.

This is what Deadline’s Awards Editor and Chief Film Critic Pete Hammond had to say about the film in his review: “Remarkably, there is such a wealth of pure gold comic situations inherent in this idea that Saturday Night becomes an even better movie than all of the comedies that were spawned by the talent honed on SNL — many produced by Michaels himself.”

The pic, which was praised by the real Akyroyd as “a propulsive, engaging, funny, beautifully cast and acted, suspenseful, adventurous, music-filled ride,” is produced by Jason Blumenfeld, Peter Rice, Reitman and Kenan. EPs are Erica Mills and JoAnn Perritano.

Check out the script below.

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