Amy Goes 'Obama' on Parks and Rec

Zooey Deschanel hosts 'Saturday Night Live'

(NEWSER) - Zooey Deschanel hosted Saturday Night Live last night, but the show was really more memorable for a couple of cameos, reports the Hollywood Reporter . The Artist star Jean Dujardin stopped by to give a leg up to a French dance number featuring Deschanel, and Nicolas Cage dropped in on Weekend Update, joined by Andy Samberg (starring as none other than Nicolas Cage). Bill Hader also spoofed Clint Eastwood's much-maligned Super Bowl ad ... three times. Check out highlights in the gallery. More»

NBC musical dazzles critics... mostly

(NEWSER) - If you watched the Super Bowl, you just might have heard of Smash, NBC's new drama about the making of a Broadway musical. It premiered last night, and critics are (mostly) giving it a standing ovation:

• The buzz has gotten so intense that the conversation isn't even about whether it'll be good. "Good? Darling, it's great!" gushes Mary McNamara of the LA Times . The creators have "managed to capture the grand and sweeping gesture that is musical theater and inject it with the immediate intimacy of television," an impressive, unprecedented feat.

Kristen Wiig hams it up as Callista, Lana Del Rey; Bon Iver turns in solid showing

(NEWSER) - Newt Gingrich got his hat handed to him in Nevada last night, and Saturday Night Live heaped insult on injury. The show ribbed Gingrich's "moon shot" with a sketch envisioning him as "moon president" in the not-so-distant time of 2014, notes Mediaite . Highlights include a student-janitor telling Newt, “The people of South Carolina wanted you to be president." Responds Gingrich: “Not all of America is as forward-thinking as South Carolina." More»

Her fans get it, even if critics don't, she says

(NEWSER) - Lana Del Rey is back in the news with the release of her debut LP, Born to Die, and the singer tells Rolling Stone she's not a bit bothered by all the negative press she got for her recent Saturday Night Live appearance. (A video clip from the show is included in this file .) "I actually felt good about it," she says. "I thought I looked beautiful and sang fine." Lots of critics thought she was off-key and just plain awkward. "I know some people didn't like it, but that's just the way I perform, and my fans know that." More»

This field should be a gift from the comedy gods: Kera Bolonik

(NEWSER) - There was a time when Saturday Night Live could have had great fun with Mitt Romney's proclamation that he "liked to fire people." Instead we got this week's bland cold open (see video) in which Romney tried to (ha ha) fire his breakfast. "It's been that kind of year on Saturday Night Live," writes Kera Bolonik at Salon . "The Republican presidential field is an embarrassment of crazy-train riches. But the writers have been lazily broad-stroking caricatures." More»