Amy Adams took her princess responsibilities very seriously after she starred in Disney’s Enchanted in 2007. The film marked a breakthrough for the actress, ushering in a young demographic of viewers who only knew her as the girl who stumbled out of a fairytale. It also brought her new opportunities, like a hosting stint on Saturday Night Live in 2008. Not wanting to shatter the illusion for her audience, Adams declined a particularly raunchy Lonely Island skit on the show.
Andy Samberg, a cast member on SNL at the time, pitched Adams on the idea of a sketch that revolved around an elderly couple making some last-ditch sexual explorations before one of them dies. “It was a song that would have been a duet with me and Amy Adams, and it was very dirty,” Samberg said during a recent episode of The Lonely Island and Seth Meyers Podcast.
“It was basically like we were both really old, and we were having a picnic, old people couple, and one of us gets stung by a scorpion,” he added. “And then I’m dying or something, and the one lament on my deathbed is that we didn’t explore things more sexually in our life, and it’s this huge up anthem about that.”
Adams appreciated the comedy of the bit, but couldn’t subject her fans to something like that. “She was like, ‘That’s really funny. I can’t do that,’” Samberg said. “‘Little girls are so obsessed with ‘Enchanted’ right now. They will find this, and it will be scarring for them. I just can’t mix that right now.’”
Adams’ SNL debut featured the actress doing impressions of Ellen Pompeo and Heidi Klum, playing dumb in traffic school, and attempting to mend a marriage as a couples therapist. But the highlight of her episode was her team up with the Lonely Island. It wasn’t the song Samberg initially optioned to her, but it still reached a comedic peak.
In the sketch, Samberg played a character so disenchanted by the state of crime in New York that he attempted to become a Batman-like figure, trekking around the city and rescuing people from violence. His first chance arrived when he saw Adams being mugged. But when he attempted to step in, the perpetrator had no interest in hearing him sing his silly little superhero song. The mugger started punching Samberg repeatedly and continued for at least one entire minute. Adams, relieved that she was no longer the focus of this crime, was conflicted about whether she should walk away. Eventually, she made a break for it. The perp didn’t notice. He was too busy smashing a nearby mailbox over Samberg’s head.
While filming the sketch, Samberg came to understand exactly what Adams was preserving when she turned down his initial idea. “Within five minutes, a mother and her little girl walked up, and the look on the little girl’s face upon seeing Amy Adams, I was like, ‘Oh, she was so right,’” Samberg said. “And it was very instructive for me. It’s not something I even ever thought about in our line of work, you know what I mean? Like, she actually has an obligation and a responsibility to those kids, and she took it really seriously. And I remember being really impressed by that.”
Daniel D`Amico for SANREMO.FM
