Airport Sushi

As I've made clear the past year or so, I've become a big fan of John Mulaney, which is saying a lot because stand-up is not one of my favorite forms of comedy. But for my taste, his stand-up is so smart, low-key and weirdly funny, with an off-beat perspective that is remarkably is grounded in reality -- and he also is a terrific writer (formerly on staff at Saturday Night Live and periodically writing episodes of the series  Documentary Now), as well as a bone-dry and droll actor.

He's hosted Saturday Night Live three times now, including the past week. Each time he hosts, the show always does a big musical number that parodies Broadway musicals, which I suspect pretty strongly he writes, because (not only do they pop up when he hosts, but also) he wrote the brilliant Documentary Now parody of the classic documentary of the making of the cast album of Stephen Sondheim's Company.

This past Saturday, they did another musical sketch, called Airport Sushi.  Assuming he does write these, it's notable that he doesn't give himself a big role in them, but tends to play a bewildered person in the center of all the madness going on around him, in this case a clerk at a store in an airport.  There are, however, a couple of guest stars in the sketch -- one, David Byrne of Talking Heads, who was the show's musical guest that week, and another who shall remain nameless.  What didn't get mention on the show is the reason I'm sure they both appeared is because they were both in Mulaney's recent Netflix offbeat special, John Mulaney and the Sack Lunch Bunch.