So this weekend Peeled Skinny got tickets from an old friend who works as a writer on Saturday Night Live and schlepped up to 30 Rock for, ahem, one BLAST of an evening.  Guest host Gabourey Sidibe stepped up nicely to the plate, and if some sketches were more clever than funny, plenty KILLED (like the Steve Harvey Sketch, OMG!).  But the best came AFTER the show, as Peeled Skinny got a back-stage tour of THE live-TV icon of the last 35 years!

So here's the secret thing: Peeled Snacks has been supplying the writers and staff of Saturday Night Live with fruit Picks for their Tuesday night writing sessions for a while now.  We figure, great comedy deserves great energy, and you never know when somebody hysterically funny will make a Peeled Snacks plug (see above photo of personal favorite Kristen Wiig eating Peeled Snacks' Much Ado About Mango LIVE on Saturday Night Live!).

I grew up with Saturday Night Live, first lured in by the joy of watching Mr. Bill get ripped apart, then watching Joe Piscopo and Eddie Murphy riff, to watching Billy Crystal and Christopher Guest out-ouch each other.  I even tuned in to watch Robert Downey Jr. and Anthony Michael Hall tank in the 85-86 season.  But my heart truly belongs to Dennis Miller, Jon Lovitz, Jan hooks, and Phil Hartman, may he rest in peace.

So I've watched a lot of SNL, but it's WEIRD to see it live, right there.  The stage is so much smaller than you'd think, and the crew is constantly changing and re-arranging everything.  The actors are constantly hamming it up (Seth Meyers clearly has a good time up there even when not on camera), but the man in charge, Mr. Lorne Michaels, was there the whole time, on set and watching over everything.  You'd think he's got enough clout to sit back and let other people do everything, but I guess he wants to be there (and I suppose he too is having a good time.  Nice, that).

Our back-stage tour left me a little star-struck.  I mean, there's the hallway down which, during the famous "Killer Bees" sketch, Lorne strutted to go fire his (fictional) drunken father.  There's the stage where G.E. Smith jammed and King Tut tutted.  Oh, and there's Will Forte' offering me gum, talking about how much he loves Peeled Snacks' Mango.  Yes, Macgruber offered me gum.  Far out.  I didn't take any because I figured it was just gonna explode.

My friend Bryan Tucker (a writer at SNL, and star of the internet's infamous "Tucker Song") toured us to the writer's hall where we met  John Lutz (of 30 Rock fame, also a Mango fan and a very cool guy)and Sue Galloway (so funny yet under-used in 30 Rock) John Mulaney hot off his Girl-Scout-mocking debut, and Hannibal Buress who joined us afterward for a drink.  On the way to that drink we ran into a very cheery Andy Samberg and his, I'm sorry, drop-dead-gorgeous girlfriend, and he too turns out to be a Mango fan.  I guess we need to send more Mango next time.

My one quibble: the musical guests, MGMT are clearly going through a sophomore shake-up.  Their first album rocked, and their second album seems designed to spurn that first album's many successes (like Greenday's "Insomniac" or Fleetwood Mac's "Tusk").  I get it, but that doesn't mean that I want to hear it.

A great night though, and thanks again to my buddy for the tickets.  Now go watch that Steve Harvey Who Wants To Be A Millionaire clip again.  Happy Snacking,

Peeled Skinny