Sarah Silverman was a featured player and writer for “Saturday Night Live” for only one season in the early 1990s, but she was there long enough to violently assault a future senator of the United States.
The comedienne, who hosts the NBC staple this weekend, recreated for Seth Meyers on “Late Night” how she came to stab a pencil into Al Franken‘s head.
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It was in the writers’ room, while they were working on the show. She recalled that it was winter because Franken “had a really big Jewfro,” she explained, turning to the audience to add with a smile, “They grow them for the winter.”
She found herself mesmerized by his hair. “In my mind, I just thought, I’m gonna stab this through his hair,” she said of the pencil. “But what everyone saw — because this is what happened — was I just went and stabbed him.” She held the pencil directly to her temple.
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After the random assault, she said that Franken just screamed “Why?”
“I would have answered that question but I couldn’t because I was laughing so hard and crying from laughing, which looked even crazier I think,” she recalled. “And I somehow wasn’t asked back the next season.”
Only two decades later she has been asked back. Sarah Silverman hosts NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” with musical guest Maroon 5 this Saturday at 11:30 p.m. ET on NBC.
