As pointed out by a few people judging them just for their work on SNL is a very different thing from judging them for their contributions as comedians as a whole. Some people like Chris Rock were pretty terrible on SNL but have turned into great comedians after leaving. Others like Carvey or Lovitz are really defined by SNL more than anything else.

I'm glad to see Phil Hartman prominently mentioned by a few of the lists - I felt like he would be overlooked because of his death and mediocre renown - even when he was really funny on SNL he was oddly overlooked.

Oh, and I'm a big Will Ferrell hater outside of a few rare skits so there's that.

1. Phil Hartman
2. Eddie Murphy
3. Dana Carvey
4. Kristin Wiig
5. Chris Farley
6. John Belushi
7. Tina Fey
8. Adam Sandler
9. Bill Hader
10. Jon Lovitz

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Posted by Lsut81

Member since Jun 2005

83692 posts

Posted on 2/16/15 at 5:55 pm to OnCampusTiger

quote:
It's subjective to your age and your opinion. I was 9 in 94' when I started watching. Not gonna have many cast members before then.

So you've never seen any of the early episodes?

I'm not much older and didn't start watching until about the same time frame, but have seen TONS of the old stuff

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Posted by OnCampusTiger

Baton Rouge

Member since Aug 2007

692 posts

Posted on 2/16/15 at 6:04 pm to Lsut81

quote:
So you've never seen any of the early episodes? I'm not much older and didn't start watching until about the same time frame, but have seen TONS of the old stuff

Sure I've seen the Murphy's and other cast members highlights, but no, I haven't seen really any full shows from the late 80's and before.

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Posted by genuineLSUtiger

Nashville

Member since Sep 2005

77106 posts

Posted on 2/16/15 at 6:17 pm to OnCampusTiger

The 80's kind of sucked for SNL. It got revived in the late eighties and early nineties by Hartman, Lovitz, Carvey, Mike Myers (I forgot to put him on my list but he is top ten), Farley, Sandler, Spade.

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Posted by randomways

North Carolina

Member since Aug 2013

12988 posts

Posted on 2/16/15 at 7:13 pm to molsusports

quote:

I'm glad to see Phil Hartman prominently mentioned by a few of the lists - I felt like he would be overlooked because of his death and mediocre renown - even when he was really funny on SNL he was oddly overlooked.

Oh, and I'm a big Will Ferrell hater outside of a few rare skits so there's that.

Ditto on Hartman. He was quietly the most versatile member of that cast, able to slip into any number of different personae seamlessly. Most of the others had a few stock personalities they excelled at, but Hartman did it all (granted, his sleazy overbearing yuppie semi-yuppie persona was probably his best.)

I'm not a huge Ferrell fan. I've liked some of his stuff, but I never really warmed to him. In his defense, though, he had a certain Hartmanish quality as well, switching from over-the-top to classic straight man pretty deftly, so there is that.

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Posted by Mizz-SEC