Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda: The Pre-SNL Years of the Lonely Island (Part 2: "Regarding Ardy")

PILOT #2: The Lonely Island ("Pilot" AKA "Regarding Ardy") (Feb. 2003)  

The Lonely Island's website (a website whose banner is gonna be prominent in the screencaps for this pilot!) labels this "episode 2" of The Lonely Island. That's a bit of a mislabel - this is more a second attempt at a similar type of show than a direct follow up - but I see how in many ways it does feel like a continuation of their short from just a year prior. Once again, we're casting the boys in loosely autobiographical roles (with Andy once again being named 'Ardy' for some reason) with a comedic focus on casual absurdity and occasional pauses for obvious music cues (here we get "Dust in the Wind", "Tiny Dancer", The Doors' "The End", and the Lord of the Rings theme). The opening scene (well, following a short introduction we'll get to in just a sec) especially is reminiscent of the scene that introduced the guys in the previous pilot: Andy and Akiva sit around and make innocuous conversation that's greeted with uproarious laughter from a fake studio audience (there they were discussing whether or not to whiten their teeth, here they play Mad Libs), and then Jorma enters to canned applause. In both cases the fake studio audience gag plays kind of awkwardly and they abandon it almost instantly. 

We can definitely chart an evolution from the previous pilot, however. For one, they were able to fill out things to a proper 23 minutes, a necessary step in the progression from "shooting something just to have it shot" to "genuine attempt at creating something they could sell". The group's website says as much: the previous short was shot more as something to show potential agents and such around town, while this was made upon request for Comedy Central, who eventually bought it to show at a pilot presentation (and then proceeded to do nothing with it beyond that). All of that isn't to say they totally betray the sensibility of the previous short here to make something more mainstream, the two pilots are definitely very much of a piece. But they've just added a little more polish here: the difference between making something to make your friends laugh and making something that could possibly make other people laugh. 

Take, for instance, the introduction scene. The only other major co-stars in the last short were the boys' other two roommates at the time, Chester Tran and Matt Bettinelli-Olpin (I didn't really have space to mention his involvement but he popped up as a version of himself that's very affable, only to get shit on by the other four guys. Don't feel too bad for him though, he ended up co-directing the two most recent Scream movies.) Here, we kick things off with an appearance from gen-u-wine (not to be confused with Ginuwine) famous person Brooke Shields. It's hard to find anything online about Brooke's involvement with the short, or much about its formation at all. I know the last short was successful in getting the guys agents, so I'm guessing Brooke's cameo - as well as a small role from another familiar face we'll get to in a bit - were favors being called in. 

The best thing one can say about Brooke's actual scene is ... well, she's certainly game. She cheerfully performs a lengthy monologue about how she was brought onto the project as a director, only to end up doing drugs with all the boys and sleeping with them in the process, getting pregnant as a result, then she forced them to blow each other, then they played Scrabble, then they blew each other again and then got matching tattoos on their underpants parts. If that sentence read to you as sort of a jumbled mess that just kept adding on juvenile details without circling around to a point -- well then you get why this intro doesn't really work for me. As mentioned earlier, this predilection towards the extremely crass and juvenile isn't something the boys would ever entirely flush out of the system, as evident from an number of future Digital Shorts, ranging from James Franco worrying about the size of his ding dong (complete with a very 2008 trans joke ending) to their entire 100th Short being a celebration of them blowing themselves. Yes, all those years later, and they were still doing jokes about blowing themselves. Truly admirable, it its way. The thing is, I actually do like that 100th short, silly and obvious as it is. However, I also hate the Franco short, so there's certainly a fine line to walk with this kind of thing. This open falls more towards the Franco end of things (always a damning sentiment). To put it another way, I don't mind their humor falling below the belt, just not below their intelligence (golf claps, please).

The actual premise for this one is a similar sort of graphing of a benign thing onto a more serious situation. This time, instead of teeth whitener standing in for hardcore drugs, a broken pinky acts as a stand-in for a more debilitating injury. The broken pinky in question belong to Andy (Ardy), whose finger gets stomped on by accident by Jorma after a particularly jubilant entrance. 

This injury leaves Andy/Ardy wheelchair bound for the majority of the remainder of the pilot (I tried to get a fully body shot of Andy in the chair but the only available rip of this pilot online is so grainy that if one of the guys backs up even a little it just becomes a sea of pixels). It's a joke that's more cute than funny, though it does at least feel a little more unique than "innocent thing is treated as if it were drugs", which is about as well-worn a comedic trope as "one person is talking about something mundane while another person perceives them to be talking about some sexual". An interesting touch we get early on that wasn't present in the last short is that the absurdity of the situation is actually called out here, a possible concession on the way to a more mainstream audience. The doctor treating Andy/Ardy's finger is quick to tell the boys it's just a minor injury, but they won't hear it, with Andy (I'm just calling him that going forward, this Ardy thing is dumb. Sorry -- durb.) insisting on using a wheelchair and asking to be placed on a list for a "pinky transplant" (a turn of phrase that earned a chuckle). Part of this runs the risk of explaining the joke away in the style of your worst SNL sketches, but it's such an inherently dumb premise they're putting forth here that I think it's actually amusing to immediately undercut it. Especially as they don't play their hand too heavily there, which is surprising coming from the boys who just opened the show off with Brooke Shields saying they all blew each other (twice). Oh and speaking of hand-play, we do also get a scene of a prostitute trying to bring the feeling back to Andy's finger. So that's something.

The frustrations of living as a pinky-plegic (no apologies) lead Andy to work with a physical therapist to try and restore his finger's feeling. Unfortunately, there's very little info available about this pilot online, so I don't actually know who's playing Andy's physical therapist, Clarence, here. He's certainly up for the part though, mirroring the unthreatening warmth of the mentor roles in these inspirational "one man overcomes physical adversity" dramas this plot is parodying. It's especially clever to have him lay out exactly how the plot will go in his introductory scene, mocking how predictable these movies can be. The problem of course after that, though, is you've just laid out for the audience exactly how the plot will go. That makes us watching along disregard the plot, which could maybe still work if they stuffed those following scenes with gags, but we don't get much in the way of those either. The scene more just ape the beats of the types of scenes they had already just laid out. Similarly, the end of this plot doesn't cover much new ground comedically, with the characters parting ways by adding to the long series of parodies of the end of Harry & the Hendersons. The biggest thing these scenes are coasting on is the charisma of Samberg, and it is here more than anywhere in the previous pilot where we can see how he just has "it" in a way that Jorma & Akiva just don't really. That's not to call them untalented by any means, but it's just clear which of the three has the most ease on camera. Samberg manages to make a montage pretty much entirely consisting of him dancing and trying to re-learn how to high five affable in a way that, based on these pilots, I don't know the other guys are necessarily capable of. 

Again, this isn't to say either are especially incapable as comic performers. I like them fine enough in their appearances in the group's two films, Hot Rod & Popstar, with Jorma especially coming off as charming in the former. When they know their limitations and play into their own awkwardness on camera, they can be quite funny, as we'll see in a segment in the next pilot. Here though, there are moments with them where it's impossible not to think of how much more they'd soar in better hands. Take for instance: the doctor is calmly explaining to the guys how Andy just needs to wear a splint for his finger to heal, and that the "pinky transplant" they want isn't a real thing. Akiva, refusing to listen, threatens to blow his brains out right then and there so they can have a fresh pinky for a transplant, only for him to immediately then regress into a state of fear. Think of how a seasoned performer, or even just one with a little more inherent juice to them, could kill this scene. It's amusing enough with Akiva, but he just doesn't commit enough to the intensity of either mood shift for the bit to hit as hard as it could.

Luckily the guys don't go too long in Andy's absence without another more charismatic familiar face to help smooth things along, as we get an appearance from a pre Harold and Kumar (but post his awkward stereotype role in National Lampoon's Van Wilder) Kal Penn. Again, there just isn't much about this pilot online, so I'm not sure how his involvement came to pass. It's possible these guys were running in similar comedy circles, or again this could have just been agent shenanigans. Either way, his presence here is welcome. He plays an acquaintance of the guys that Jorma & Akiva kidnap so that they can murder him and steal his pinky. Now first off, that's certainly an admirably dark premise to throw out in the pilot of your proposed goofy hangout show. Additionally, he plays his part of the would-be victim well, though again this plot speaks to Jorma and Avika's inability to fully get over comic beats in the way they'd like. The underlying joke of the plot is Jorma & Akiva's characters becoming increasingly more sinister while their performances remain at the same level of affable doofus, but they just don't bring the level of commitment necessary here for that to play in the way you'd want it to. That's not to say there aren't any laughs in this plot; I enjoyed the runner where Kal's character's OCD causes him to keep cleaning the boys' items, inadvertently delaying his own murder ("I really wanna kill Fred, but he's so helpful"). Again, that feels like a bit that doesn't quite get the commitment it deserves, though this time in the writing, not performing. Just felt like it needed another escalation. Going back to those obvious music cues, Akiva searching for a song to play on the radio while he cut off Kal's pinky and purposefully skipping past "Stuck in the Middle With You" is also a cute way to get around a reference. Also cute (and also playing with an obvious music cue) is the guys getting so into the song Akiva does settle on, "Tiny Dancer", that they once again forget their plot to murder Kal's character and instead start singing with him. See, Comedy Central, these knuckleheads that would star in  your proposed new series aren't murderers, just a couple of silly Billys! 

I bring up the specter of Comedy Central again there for a reason. There's a charm to these two Lonely Island pilots, but a lot of it is a primitive, pre-Youtube internet kind of charm. In many ways, this pilot feels less made for Comedy Central and more made for ebaumsworld. It speaks to the guys still being at a crossroads at this point where their stuff is too online to make the transition to the mainstream, which isn't inherently a bad thing. For them to hit as big as they ultimately did, obviously it would be necessary for them to adapt their sensibility into something a little less insular, but again there's a charm in seeing the group in this crude form. There's something so pure to them here; every joke so deeply mired in their own personal brand of humor or the specific rhythms or early 00's internet culture. Like the last pilot it doesn't fully work (though we're definitely getting closer), but it does again point to the group's potential. Which isn't me rewriting history, I don't think you'd watch this in 2003 and go "these boys will single handedly revive public interest in SNL!" But I do think if you showed this to most comedy-minded people at that time, they'd be able to spot there's at least something there with these guys. They wouldn't be jumping for joy, but they'd likely spot that this carries the charm of a lot of similar internet content from around that time, just done a little more cleverly and charismatically. Just, ya know, not enough that you'd go "gimme that Comedy Central series now". 

CONSENSUS? Has its charms, but the boys are still a little too stuck in their own world to make the transition to the mainstream.

UP NEXT: We wrap up this look back on The Lonely Island's early work by checking out their sketch pilot created for FOX, "Awesometown". Come back next Sunday to see just how awesome this town really is!