The final sketch of any SNL tends to be the loopiest — a sketch for any weirdos who made it all the way to 1am, certainly nothing that would get a prime slot. Adam Sandler’s return show played things a little different. The SNL alum-turned-movie god, who made for a very music-heavy episode, saved the most moving part for last, closing things out with a song about “my boy Chris Farley.”
It started off as just another Adam Sandler song, with him standing on stage with a guitar, singing a nice song that one knew would turn silly. Instead it went bittersweet, allowing him to sing a funny-emotional song about his early ’90s SNL colleague and great friend, who died of a drug overdose in 1997, at all of 33.
“On Saturday night, my man would always deliver/Whether he was a bumblebee girl or living in a van down by the river,” Sandler sang, alluding to two of Farley’s more famous bits.
Sandler didn’t away from the dark stuff, singing about how after every show “he’d drink a quart of Jack Daniels and stick it up his a*s.” (Though somehow, no matter how hungover, “that cat would always show up to Morning Mass.”) “We said, ‘Slow down, you’ll end up like Belushi and Candy,” he sang.
As the song wore on, it appeared Sandler was going to cry, but he kept it in, even as he sang about their “last big hang,” at Tim Meadows’ wedding party. “We laughed all night long, all because of Farley,” he sang, then sang about how they flew out to bury their friend on a few months later. “Nothing was harder than saying goodbye.”
