Naomi Girson | opinions editor

It might have been a Friday in Pittsburgh, but as Duquesne hosted seven comedians in the Student Union Ballroom, it felt more like a Saturday Night Live in New York City. Writers, comedians and two members of the cast came to campus last week to put on a show for the students.

The Duquesne Program Council (DPC) hosted the event, with Ashley Kane, director of student programming and first year experience at Duquesne helping to organize and put it all together.

The seven comedians took the stage in the ballroom, ready to humor the students with crowd work, improv and even scripts of cut sketches that never saw the light of day at 30 Rock.

Over 400 students RSVPed for the event, according to Kane, and more than 250 were in attendance before the start of the show.

Throughout the roughly hour and a half performance, the comedians did crowd work, asking students to share obscure clubs on campus nearby bars and grievances about construction. They then performed improv based on the picture students painted about Pittsburgh.

Ceara O’Sullivan, a writer on SNL, brought a handful of scripts from sketches that never made it to air, and invited students come up to perform parts with the rest of the cast.

Sao Mai Nguyen, a junior bio-chemistry major said she was a big fan of the show and jumped at the chance to see a little bit of SNL righton campus. She spoke highly of the show, especially the political commentary.

“I love SNL because I feel like their pieces are always so timely, and I feel like they really helped me make light out of things that are going on that are low-key horrific,” Nguyen said.

Nguyen said she was surprised to see a show like SNL come to Duquesne.

“I feel like, generally, especially with the writers and comedians that they have, [SNL] leans more liberal in my perspective. And, I was just surprised that they [Duquesne] would host something like this and make it like a big event,” Nguyen said.

Sabrina Paules, executive director of DPC, said that she and Kane began plotting the event last spring, upon the discovery of photos from the 90s, when Jimmy Fallon performed on campus before he rose in the world of comedy at SNL and beyond.

“I tried looking back at old stuff that Duquesne used to do. DPC, way back when, used to be this big, major thing, so I would just like to be able to bring it back up,” Paules said.

In addition to their stroll down memory lane, surveys went out to students last year asking what kind of events they wanted to see more of, and many students requested comedians and performers on the bluff, so DPC got to work.

“We need[ed] something with a bang, and Saturday Night Live seems to be relatable to many generations. It transcends,” Kane said. “So when we were looking at things at our price range, and we saw that seven [comedians] could come to campus and that they are the writers and comedians of some of the most memorable sketches. It was a no-brainer to try to push this forward.”

They were allowed to perform with little restriction or censorship. The comedians talked about marijuana, drinking and even made jokes about Duquesne’s English fraternity Sigma Tau Delta (STD).

During the show however, the comedians just had to ask what “Duquesnable” meant, a term they had overheard earlier in the day.

One student that was a part of the event staff got on the mic to tell them that being “Duquesnable” meant doing anything that was fit to do in church, which was not how she would categorize their show that evening. However, the whole crowd seemed to enjoy the show, which was clear by howling laughter at the performers’ best bits. Duquesne rounded out the event with a mocktail bar, Dippin’ Dots and a raffle for students.

One of the cut sketches the group performed was written by Tommy Brennan, the only current cast member in the group, and Ben Marshall, another cast member at SNL, for Ariana Grande when she hosted shortly before Christmas.

He said the sketch made it all the way to dress rehearsal on Saturday but bombed, atomically, before being cut. The sketch required a secret Santa exchange, in which Brennan and Marshall (playing mailmen) got their boss, Grande stunning ball gowns that were way over their budget for the gifts.

Brennan stepped into the world of comedy about three years ago, on the run from the life he had found himself in.

“I fell in love with stand up and SNL, specifically, when I was in 5th, 6th grade and then as I was an adult, as I was leaving school, I was like I gotta try doing this,” Brennan said. “I fell in love with it again and never looked back.”

Naomi Girson can be reached at girsonn@duq.edu