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"Saturday Night Live" skit puts YouTube on map

Posted on: Tuesday, 21 March 2006, 02:31 CST

By Andrew Wallenstein

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - It took a "Saturday Night Live" skit featuring a rap about cupcakes and "The Chronicles of Narnia" to put YouTube on Hollywood's radar.

Not long after "SNL" aired the segment December 17, the clever lyrics to what was known as "Lazy Sunday" made its way to the Internet. YouTube in particular saw its traffic shoot up, with 5 million streams over 45 days -- making it the most-watched clip on the site for a time.

Nearly two months went by before NBC Universal's legal department began reaching out to viral video sites including http://www.YouTube requesting that the clip be removed, along with hundreds of other clips culled from its airwaves. NBC had already posted "Sunday" on http://www.NBC.com at no charge; the skit also is available for $1.99 on Apple's iTunes along with other NBC programs.

Since then, NBC has made a steady stream of "SNL" product available on new platforms, but YouTube hasn't left the picture. A skit featuring Natalie Portman this month drew another demand of removal from NBC.

And what would an Internet phenomenon be without spawning countless parodies. "Sunday" has generated more than a few versions of "Lazy Monday," picking up on the theme of hopelessly white kids trying to rap. Two standouts are "Lazy Muncie," in which two denizens of the titular Indiana town give shout-outs to Midwest franchises like Bob Evans, and "Lazy Monday: Middle East Coast," which runs subtitles under Al-Jazeera footage featuring Osama bin Laden and Ayman Al-Zawahiri ("Let's go down to the village/and mac on some goat milk").

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter

Source: REUTERS

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