Saturday Night Live
(NBC, 1975—) live variety show
This long-running late-night live sketch comedy institution has taken a number of jabs at the Ocean State over the years.
From the March 22, 1997 show:
Linda Richman (Mike Meyers): Talk amongst yourselves. I'll give you a topic: Rhode Island, neither a road nor an Island. Discuss.
From the November 13, 2010 show:
Seth Meyers: Voters in Rhode Island rejected a proposition last week to change the state's official name from The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations to just Rhode Island, but I think people are just going to keep calling it "Connecticut's foreskin."
From the January 17, 2015 show:
Colin Jost: A new survey shows that the state with the most marijuana use is Rhode Island. Which explains Rhode Island's official state motto, "But if it's an island, where does the road go?"
From the April 14, 2018 show:
The establishing shot for the "drag brunch" segment, featuring host John Mulaney, is of Newport's Brick Alley Pub.
From the November 6, 2021 show:
A segment titled "Wake Up Rhode Island" features a meteoroloist who spent so much time preparing a silly, Thanksgiving Day-themed rap that he failed to predict a deadly nor-easter.
From the April 8, 2023 show:
A sketch about host Molly Shannon's Sally O'Malley character taking over as the Jonas Brothers' new choreographer is established with a still shot of a recognizable Providence cityscape: the Courtyard by Marriott Providence Downtown Hotel, the Omni Providence Hotel, and GTECH Center, as seen from the vicinity of Waterplace Park. The original photo is from the flickr photostream of a photographer named David Wilson, and is also used on GTECH's Wikipedia page.
Additionally, it should be noted that the 1980-'81 cast included Charles Rocket, a RISD alumnus who was a leading light in the early-1970s Providence arts and performance scene. He worked as a news reporter at WPRI Channel 12 for a time before joining SNL. He performed a number of impressions and characters on SNL, and hosted a recurring filmed segment called "The Rocket Report," but he is perhaps best remembered for dropping the F-bomb at the end of the February 21, 1981 show, for which he was dismissed.
