Quinta Brunson / Benson Boone S50E18 - Dress Rehearsal Report

I was at the dress rehearsal for the Quinta Brunson episode last night (via standby) and can summarize what what was changed/cut to the best of my memory. If anyone else was at dress, feel free to correct or add anything I missed :)

Trump Executive Order Cold Open

• The sketch originally opened with Trump in a Pope hat and a couple of lines about him wanting to be the pope, and then the hat is put away.

• I don't recall the opening crawl about FDR being at dress.

• For the Bellichick law, there was a walk on gag with Ashley as a young girlfriend to an old man extra.

• Andrew had a part as a crypto bro who is promoting his new cryptocurrency doo doo coin (along with wearing a shirt with a logo). Trump questions this until he is told it will make him a lot of money.

• Marcello and the other cast members who were cut from the cold open also participated in the Live From New York.

• There was a group of extras playing reporters on stage right that I feel like were never shown on camera during dress (and of course we didn't see them at live either).

Quinta Brunson Monologue

• I may have missed it at dress, but I don't recall Quinta pushing Dwayne Wade to crouch down at the end during dress.

Will and Todd's Radical Experience

• The ending to this was different at dress. Kenan and Quinta did go into the time machine with every one at the end, but then the time machine rematerializes with just Kenan and Quinta, now joined by Ego as Harriet Tubman's cousin Janet. Devon reacts to this from the side.

OnlySeniors Pretape

• No changes I noticed.

Leadership Summit

• No changes I noticed

Ferry Parking

• Colin was wearing a hat at dress.

Forever 31 Pretape

• No changes I noticed.

Two Bitches vs. a Gorilla

• No changes I noticed.

Weekend Update - Colin Jost and Michael Che

• I'm pretty sure the "Oh Hell No" segment had a slightly different name at dress.

• The punchline to the Pope from Africa joke was very different. Something along the lines of "There is speculation that the next pope could come from Africa, or at least will cum from the sight of a ten-year-old boy."

• After the RFK smallpox joke, Colin added "I'll try to avoid blanket statements in the future"

• After the Osama Bin Laden joke, Che commented that he didn't even know he was in the ocean, to which Colin replied "Don't you watch the news?"

• After the Vietnam anniversary joke reaction, Che defended it for being historically accurate.

• Cut joke (Che): The set up had something to do with the Kentucky Derby, and the punchline was something like "or as the horse like to call it [something to do with "midgets" racing]". After the audience had a weak reaction, Che responded "the horses call it that".

• Cut joke (Che): "A town in Belgium is hosting their fifth annual competition to see who can do the best seagull screech" and the punchline was a jab at Katy Perry.

• Cut joke (Che): Paraphrased "A study has shown that drinking white wine can reduce the risk of heart attack, but it increases the risk of getting a little slutty at brunch"

• At one point between jokes, Che imitated Colin's "Oh Hell No" segment voice.

Weekend Update - Michael Longfellow

• Towards the end Michael brought up the news story about the planes touching wings on the tarmac and called it cute. There was a graphic like it was a regular Weekend Update joke.

Weekend Update - Applebees barflies

• I don't remember the joke, but there was a punchline that involved Bowen and Sarah having sex in an alley.

• Benson Boone was really not holding the food upright and there was some liquid spilling out of it.

Addicts Anonymous

• No changes I noticed.

The Greats

• No changes I noticed.

Goodnights

• Just in case anyone was wondering, Sabrina Carpenter was also not at goodnights at dress.

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Cut for Time

\1. Please Don't Destroy - Dream (Pretape)

• Ben and Quinta play a couple that is solemnly breaking up because Ben has to move for a job. Quinta tells him about her dreams for a future they have together, but her dreams keep involving this recurring demon figure (Martin Herlihy) who is also just there because he is in all her dreams. The joke escalates with Jon Higgins appearing as the demon’s son. I won’t go into much more detail because I am sure they will post this on YouTube.

\2. Halo 3 Hospital (live sketch)

• Ego and Devon are visiting their elderly mom (Quinta) in the hospital who just had an injury. Devon mentions that he brought all their mom’s things from home, a list which includes her Xbox 360. As Ego starts to say a bunch of heartfelt things to Quinta, Quinta boots up the Xbox and launches Halo 3 on the TV behind Ego. She starts a Team Slayer game on the Standoff map and starts to shoot and kill people while Ego is still talking and you can hear the Halo 3 announcer voice throughout. Ego keeps asking Quinta to stop playing or turn down the volume and also calls her out for teabagging someone. Later Quinta is on the Warthog turret and in response to another Ego complaint, says “but the Warthog turret has unlimited ammo!”. At another point you hear a clear “Running Riot!” from the Halo 3 announcer (which means a 15 kill streak). After reaching peak frustration, Devon unplugs the Xbox, but it turns out it was Quinta’s life support and she flatlines. We here “Game Over” in the Halo 3 announcer voice and see it is JAJ (all the previous announcer lines seemed straight from the game and only this was JAJ).

• I really liked this one, but it may just be because it appealed to my interests. The dress audience didn't seem that into it.

\3. Plane to NYC (live sketch)

• Ego is a flight attendant on a flight to NYC and announces it is a passenger’s birthday (Devon or the female cast member he was sitting with). Another passenger (Heidi, done up as what I can only describe as “Kirsten Gillibrand-esque”) stands up and says she has something to announce too. She is going to NYC for a callback for the play “The Clockmaker’s Daughter” directed by James Franco and produced by Walmart, going for the role of “Detestable/Deplorable(?) Hag”. Ego humors her and then tells her to sit down. Across the aisle, another passenger dressed similarly to Heidi (Quinta) stands up and we find out she also got a callback for the same role. Another passenger (Kenan, in a short hair straight black wig, glasses and some facial hair) announces he is going to cheat on his wife in NYC. A sleeping passenger (JAJ) complains that this is a red eye and everyone needs to stop talking. The plane starts to shake, and Ego comes out from the cockpit, saying she asked the pilot to “find some turbulence”. A passenger in the back row (Bowen) stands up and he turns out to be James Franco, the writer/director of the play. He says he will cast both Heidi and Quinta to share the role for half the pay. At some point it also comes up that this is just a NJ regional production. Although the ending is a cut to a graphic saying a broadway production of “The Clockmaker’s Daughter” went on to get 11 Tony nominations/wins including Best Original Score by Morgan Wallen and Best Actress for a real famous actress whose name I don’t remember.

• I didn't hate this one, but it was definitely one of the weaker sketches so the cut makes sense.

\4. R&B Life Coach (live sketch)

• Ashley and Chloe(?) are at a rooftop bar sitting together at a table. They are approached by Devon and JAJ who are wearing these big baggy suits, colored shades, and fedoras. They start introducing themselves by singing in unison in an R&B style. They introduce themselves as Seth and LeMarcus. The ladies are not interested but the two of them keep singing, now separate parts where JAJ specifies that he’s LeMarcus and Devon is Seth. They put down business cards on the table one-by-one singing “Here’s my number, here’s my email, etc.”. Chloe holds up the top card from JAJ and says “this is a Dave and Busters card” and Ashley holds up the top card from Devon “and this is a Charizard” (it’s a holographic OG Charizard pokemon card). They ask the ladies for their numbers or emails. Quinta comes out in a similar get-up and joins Devon and JAJ, explaining in song that she is their life coach teaching them how to meet people. Eventually, they all move on to the next table over, which is Ego and another female cast member. They start introducing themselves again, but Ego says they already heard it when they did it to the last table. Devon and JAJ try to exchange emails again, with Devon saying his email is just “Seth”. Ego calls over the bouncer (Kenan) who then also puts on a fedora and starts singing.

• This one I thought was fun and silly, but also not a totally surprising cut based on the dress audience reaction.

\5. Weekend Update - Dianne, Mom visiting NYC for the first time (Heidi)

• On Colin’s side of the desk, Heidi plays a mom tourist is who very stereotypically uncomfortable with being in NYC. Every time Colin asks about a different aspect of her trip, she explains some super paranoid thing she is doing and how it’s because she knows a of another “women from the same church, about my age, white [insert a very funny IMO Heidi pausing and mugging to the audience], who did [XYZ normal tourist thing] and then [really over-the-top negative thing happened to her].” This structure repeats three or four times, with the group (church, school district), race (mixed, whatever the girl from Moana is), tourist activity, and consequence changing. One I remember is she says she is keeping her Lion King tickets in her butt and Colin asks why she doesn’t just keep them on her phone and she says someone she knew had to download an app for this that turned out to be a Chinese porn app. Or when Colin asks about souvenirs, Heidi tells of a woman who bought a pair of sunglasses that just had porn images on the inside of the lenses and then all the woman could do was talk about porn. At the end, Colin asks while she even came to NYC, and Heidi says so she could look up the Statue of Liberty’s skirt and see if she’s really a woman.

• I really liked this, but out of the three WU correspondents, this felt like the correct cut. I hope they try this again though. Heidi really sold it for me.

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Stray observations

• During the countdown for his second musical performance, Benson Boone repeated the lady who shouted "1 minute!" and then also vocalized for a moment during the countdown.

• It seemed to me like there was less room for standby folks than usual. The dress audience seemed way more full than usual when we got up there.

• When we were leaving and passing the people waiting to go up for the live show, we ended up walking past Sheryl Lee Ralph, who I was able to get an excited wave and thumbs up to as a big Abbott Elementary fan and she gave a very nice "Thank you!"