The first five years of SNL are my favorite, even though I wasn't born when the show first premiered. I grew up on the 30-minute BEST OF SNL shows that ran on Nick at Nite and VH1 in the 80s (all 100 + episodes whittled down to about 25 minutes or so, without commercials); Warner Home Video released several complete eps. (or almost complete, as some were edited due to music rights) during this time, and I collected most of them. Now I proudly own all five, uncut seasons on DVD, thanks to Universal.

Season 3 of SNL is generally considered the smoothest, most "perfect" year of the first five. Season 1 was the show getting off the ground; season 2 lost Chevy Chase midway, and gained Bill Murray, but Murray was clearly nervous in his first several episodes, and even wrote a sketch called "The New Kid," in which he directly addressed the audience, explaining he really *is* a funny guy, if only SNL and the audience would give him a chance (this was in the Broderick Crawford episode); the show reached its peak in season 4, when a whole new audience began tuning in every week, mostly due to the success of ANIMAL HOUSE; and season 5 lost Belushi and Aykroyd. Although Harry Shearer was brought in, it seemed as if the remaining performers (especially Bill Murray, who was now pretty much the star of the show) were burnt out. Still, there is a lot of great stuff in the 5th season, but Belushi and Aykroyd are sorely missed (Belushi, along with former writer Michael O'Donoghue, made a cameo in SNL's 100th episode).

Many agree season 3 was the most consistently funny and inspired of the first five years. Some of the memorable hosts of the season included Hugh Hefner, Charles Grodin (in a very funny show, in which the actor, seemingly unprepared for live television would constantly "break character" in the middle of sketches), Ray Charles, Miskel Spillman (an 80-year-old grandmother who won SNL's "anyone can host" contest; the musical guest was Elvis Costello), Robert Klein, Chevy Chase (the highest-rated SNL up to that point), Steve Martin (who beat Chase's record in terms of ratings) and Richard Dreyfuss.

The Lee show isn't bad, IMO. Hey, it has Meat Loaf as the musical guest! The trailers for horror films Lee supposedly turned down, including Belushi as "The Thing That Wouldn't Leave" and Aykroyd as "Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Rogers" is classic; the vampire hunters/Nixon memoirs sketch is fun, as is the aforementioned "Mr. Death" sketch with Lee and Laraine Newman. This particular bit caused some controversy during the week of rehearsals. Originally, Gilda Radner was slated to play the little girl, but Newman, a fan of horror films, requested that she play the girl instead. Eventually Gilda gave in, but it caused some bad blood between Laraine and a few cast members, who thought Newman was trying to take a role away from Gilda. While this isn't a bad episode by any means (again IMO), there are others from this season I would put before it as examples of SNL at its best.

I too think Vincent Price would have made an excellent host, especially with the original cast. He'd definitely get into the spirit of the show; it looked like he had a ball on THE MUPPET SHOW.

I believe Lee told the writers at the outset he wouldn't do any Dracula sketches or references.

From the moment I picked up your book until I laid it down, I was convulsed with laughter.  Someday I intend reading it -- Groucho Marx