Jan Hooks and a Very Hearty ‘SNL’ Thanksgiving
Comedian Jan Hooks passed away at the age of 57 in New York City last night. The Georgia native was an essential part of the rollicking Saturday Night Live cast in the mid-‘80s, and although she is perhaps most famous for her Hillary Clinton sketches, her comic skills also shine in this homage to the overstuffed Thanksgiving holiday.
Like Gilda Radner before her and Amy Poehler and Tina Fey after her, Hooks was a glittering star in the constellation of female comics. Here, alongside Phil Hartman and Dana Carvey, she plays a bespectacled, apron-wearing Midwestern mom delighted to feed “my boys”—as she adoringly calls her sons, husband, and brother-in-law—right to the bursting point.
After devouring Hooks’s gigantic turkey dinner, the gents recline fatuously on their La-Z-Boys, belching fearlessly and gasping for air. But Hooks can’t stop feeding them: Next she’s bearing a platter of beers, which they can’t resist. Then she sends her daughter out with bowls of nuts. The men are unable to stop snacking. Hooks is unable to stop feeding them. It’s a sweet, strange little spin on a holiday that’s just around the corner, and Hooks is a delight to watch.
