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Highlights
- Jane Curtin had a tough time getting along with John Belushi during their time on Saturday Night Live due to his substance abuse issues.
- Curtin spoke to Lorne Michaels about Belushi’s behavior, but the conversation did not go well and she felt there was no communication between them.
- While Curtin faced sexism on SNL, she still considers her time on the show to be a valuable part of her career and had great experiences with the rest of the cast, particularly Laraine Newman and Gilda Radner.
In 1975, Jane Curtin was part of the inaugural Saturday Night Live cast that included Gilda Radner, Laraine Newman, Chevy Chase, John Belushi, Garrett Morris, and Dan Aykroyd. It’s amazing to think of all the talent that was on that one late-night TV stage. After Curtin quit SNL in 1980, she was cast on the ’90s sitcom 3rd Rock From The Sun as smart and quirky teacher Mary Albright. But no matter what career accomplishments she has had, Jane Curtin’s years on Saturday Night Live are some of her most impressive.
Jane Curtin hosted Weekend Update on SNL for a while, and she often riffed and joked around alongside John Belushi. According to an interview that Curtin recently gave, however, she didn’t have the best co-working relationship with the actor, who sadly passed away in 1982.
What Did Jane Curtin Say About Her Saturday Night Live Co-Star John Belushi?
SNL cast members were paid very little when the show was just getting off the ground, at least compared to what their salaries are like now. For comedians like Jane Curtin, though, being cast on the brand-new late-night series must have still been thrilling. It was an amazing opportunity that allowed her to show the world her great comedic timing and acting.
Jane Curtin has often shared stories about Saturday Night Live, and sometimes, she goes into detail about certain cast members. Curtin talked about John Belushi in an interview with People and shared that she had a tough time getting along with the actor when they were both early cast members.
The actress said that she had settled down with Patrick Lynch, who she married in 1975. She didn’t hang out after hours with the SNL cast because she was in a different life stage. Curtin said, “I had a life — a dog, a husband, an apartment with a little garden. It was a life I really enjoyed.”
She explained of John Belushi, “John, obviously, he could party with the best of them, but the next day these guys were just so miserable. Plus, the 90 minutes on the show were so exciting and adrenaline-pumping, I felt all the other stuff was self-indulgent and seemed hard.”
Jane Curtin described starring on Saturday Night Live alongside John Belushi and said that there was one reason why it was hard to work with him: his substance abuse issues.
Curtin told People, “I got along with everyone. But I did have problems with John. But that was because John wasn’t John. He was an addict.”
The more that Curtin observed Belushi, the more she realized that she couldn’t stay quiet and that she had to try to help. While she was very honest about how it was hard to work alongside Belushi, it’s clear that she made these comments from a place of concern. According to Decider.com, the actress and comedian told Lorne Michaels what was going on in season 3 of SNL. But as Curtin said, that conversation didn’t go so well.
Curtin told the story on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen and said, “When John was misbehaving terribly, I approached Lorne and said, ‘You’ve got to do something. This guy is going to die. You’ve got to do something.”
Curtin said that Michaels asked “What can I do?” She continued, “So I stopped talking to him because there was no point in communicating. And so what happened was, if he wanted me to do something, he would tell Gilda. And Gilda would ask me to do it and I’d say, ‘Sure.’ And she would say, ‘Sure.’ So that was our relationship. There was nothing there. There was no communication.”
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In the same appearance on Watch What Happens Live, Curtin said that she faced awful sexism on SNL and Belushi didn’t think that women could be hilarious.
She said, “There were a few people that just out-and-out believe that women should not have been there and they believe that women were not innately funny. So those were the experiences that I had that were sexist. The rest of the group was fabulous.”
What Did Jane Curtin Say About Her Time On Saturday Night Live?
Jane Curtin was always one of the most memorable Saturday Night Live cast members, and she has said a lot about the working environment on set.
While she described some hard moments with John Belushi, she otherwise thinks of the show as a very valuable part of her career.
In an interview with The A.V. Club, Curtin looked back on SNL and explained, “Oh, I’ve always felt the same way about my experience there. It was a wonderful learning experience. I had some great times, and the actual 90 minutes of that show was just so exciting and so fun. You had the orchestra, and you had the energy and the adrenaline and the guest host, and it was awesome.”
Curtin said that there were other challenging moments on SNL. She focused on the work instead of spending time with the writing staff after hours, and she said, “They didn’t trust me because they didn’t know me.”
Curtin continued to The A.V. Club that things improved with SNL’s writers: “Eventually we got a relationship, maybe around the third year, which was fine. And then I got a little bit more comfortable being there because I had more stuff to do, but it was still a difficult place to be because it was evolving.”
According to Closer Weekly, Jane Curtin shared a bit more about John Belushi’s behavior behind the scenes at SNL. She said, “John [Belushi] would go in my dressing room and go through my purse, and [producer] Lorne [Michaels] didn’t do anything about it.”
However, while at times it was tricky to star on the show, she explained that she was close with Laraine Newman and Gilda Radner, along with the women who wrote for SNL.
