Mad TV

(pictured) and television producer David Salzman executive produced Mad TV after buying the rights to its namesake magazine in 1995. William Gaines, who owned EC Comics and published the American humor magazine Mad from 1950 until his death in 1992, refused to sell the rights to the magazine as he disliked television. In 1995, three years after Gaines's death, EC Comics sold the rights to Mad to record producer Quincy Jones and TV producer David Salzman. Fax Bahr and Adam Small were hired as the showrunners of Mad TV alongside Salzman. They had previously worked as staff writers on the sketch comedy television series In Living Color since 1992. The two left the show in its third season. Animated segments of Spy vs. Spy, a wordless comic strip originally featured in Mad and created by Antonio Prohías, appeared on the first four seasons of Mad TV. The show's theme song was created by American hip hop group Heavy D & the Boyz, who had previously created the theme song for In Living Color, and composed by Greg O'Connor and Blake Aaron, the latter of whom was Mad TV's guitarist. Filming took place in Hollywood at Hollywood Center Studios and later at Sunset Bronson Studios. The series satirized popular culture, with sketches parodying film, television and music. Bruce Leddy became the show's director and supervising producer starting in 2000. After Mad TVs first season, Fox rarely promoted the series and frequently made budget cuts, with cast and crew members such as Debra Wilson and Bahr referring to the series as the "redheaded stepchild" of Fox. However, SNL quickly bounced back and Mad TV typically trailed behind the show in ratings. In early 2009, the show was briefly moved to air after Talkshow with Spike Feresten, the show that normally followed MADtv, before being moved back. The series finale aired on May 16, 2009. It featured both new and old sketches and revolved around a fictional telethon called "Mad TV Gives Back". Reunion special Mad TV had a one-hour-long 20th anniversary reunion special, titled MADtv 20th Anniversary Reunion. It was executive produced by Salzman, directed by Bruce Leddy, and produced by Telepictures and Epicenter Ventures. It aired on The CW on January 12, 2016, at 8 p.m. and garnered 1.7 million viewers. == Cast and characters ==

, Nicole Sullivan, Phil LaMarr, Debra Wilson, Artie Lange, Orlando Jones, Mary Scheer, and Bryan Callen Mad TVs cast was considered diverse by critics, especially compared to that of SNL. According to casting director Nicole Garcia, the showrunners sought a diverse cast from the beginning of the series. Wilson was the first cast member hired for Mad TV. Sullivan was added to the cast because, according to her, Bahr and Small wanted someone on the show who "the audience would like to have dinner with". Herman starred in the short-lived Fox sketch comedy series ''House of Buggin' before appearing on Mad TV, while Jones had written for the Fox series Roc. Other popular cast members included Alex Borstein, who starred on the show for five seasons from 1997 to 2002; Ike Barinholtz, who joined in 2002 and left in 2007; Mo Collins, who joined in 1998 and left in 2004; Nicole Parker, who appeared on six seasons of the show; and Bobby Lee, who appeared on eight seasons of the show from 2001 to 2009. found fame after brief tenures on Mad TV. Comedians Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key met after being cast on Mad TV in 2004 for its ninth season, and the two would later star together in the Comedy Central sketch comedy series Key & Peele''. Peele left the series in 2008, while Key stayed until the show's final season. Borstein and Peele were both kept from leaving Mad TV to pursue other roles due to their contracts, with Borstein having to turn down a role as Sookie on the CW series Gilmore Girls and Peele turning down a role playing Barack Obama for SNL. an overgrown, spoiled child with a bowl cut, bright red cheeks, and a rainbow plaid shirt. Sketches with Stuart often involve him and his mother visiting various businesses where he frustrates the employees with his antics. Stuart appeared in 38 sketches in nine seasons from 1998 to 2008. Alex Borstein appeared in 44 sketches as the popular recurring character of Bunny Swan, with a strong, exaggerated accent who annoys others by not being able to answer simple questions. Borstein briefly reprised the role outside of Mad TV for a parody of the trailer for the 2010 film Black Swan and for a video about the 2016 United States presidential election. Johnson has frequently reprised the character since, releasing the album Gold Plated Dreams as the character in 2015 through Warner Records. Many of the show's recurring characters were parodies of celebrities such as Will Sasso's portrayal of singer Randy Newman and Aries Spears's portrayal of Bill Cosby. Along with her impression of Houston, Wilson also earned fame and acclaim for her impression of Oprah Winfrey on the show, with Vanity Fairs Yohana Desta describing Wilson's impression of Winfrey as "the gold standard" and HuffPosts Pollo Del Mar writing that Wilson's impressions of Winfrey and Houston were "as iconic as they were scathing". Wilson went on to play Winfrey on the animated sitcom The Proud Family and in the 2006 parody film Scary Movie 4. Other frequent celebrity impressions included Sasso's impressions of actors Robert De Niro and James Gandolfini, Lee's impression of newscaster Connie Chung, and Frank Caliendo's impressions of John Madden and George W. Bush. == Release ==

Episodes Broadcast and syndication Mad TV was owned by Warner Bros. and broadcast every Saturday at 11 p.m. on Fox until its final episode in 2009. Reruns also aired on Fox during prime time starting in 1999. It was reviewed positively by Chris Hicks of the Deseret News, who said that it "demonstrates that the show is frequently very funny, in its own subversive way." Warner Bros. also released a "best of" DVD for seasons eight, nine, and ten on October 25, 2005. Episodes of the series were also made available to stream on The WB's website, TheWB.com, after its launch in 2008, and on The CW's streaming service, CW Seed, after the announcement of the show's 2016 reboot. The series was also available to stream on HBO Max when it premiered in 2020, though the only episodes shown were the FOX episodes, and a lot of episodes weren't shown due to music licensing and copyright issues involving the musical guests and celebrities who cameoed on the show, with seasons 11, 13, and 14 as the only seasons with every episode present and accounted for (the revival season from 2016 were available on streaming, but were only shown on Hulu). As of 2025, HBO Max no longer streams MADtv, but it is currently available on the Roku streaming service, Howdy, using the same version from HBO Max. ==Reception==

Viewership Mad TV was particularly popular among teenage viewers, who, according to Fox executives, watched the show more than SNL by 2001. Another review of Mad TVs pilot in the Hartford Courant by James Endrst stated that Mad TV was "only occasionally terrible". A review of the pilot episode by Tom Shales in The Roanoke Times wrote that Mad TV was "bad TV", criticizing it as tasteless and unintelligent. For People, Craig Tomashoff gave the pilot a C−, stating that it was "pretending to be daring and irreverent" despite being "just unimaginative". In 1996, Mad TV was reviewed favorably by Steve Johnson of the Chicago Tribune, who wrote that it "looked consistently fresh, with more energy, imagination and edge [than SNL]" and "rewards the effort of tuning it in". Ginia Bellafante of Time also wrote in 1996 that "it has steadily improved since its unpromising early episodes", but that many of its politically incorrect sketches were "so heavy-handed" that they were "virtually unwatchable". Entertainment Weeklys Alynda Wheat was critical of the show's finale, writing that "maybe it was time for Mad TV to go" due to "how thin its material has grown". The Detroit Free Presss Julie Hinds wrote that the show "wasn't the most consistent vehicle", and that it "sometimes went too far with a joke but could still crack you up regularly". In a retrospective review of the show, Carleton Atwater of Vulture criticized it as "so lazy and unambitious" and wrote that it "appeals to the lowest common denominator". Saturday Night Live comparisons Mad TV has frequently been compared to Saturday Night Live. Rolling Stone described Mad TV as a "more cultish weekend cousin to Saturday Night Live aimed squarely at teens", while the Detroit Free Presss Julie Hinds called it "a boisterous second cousin" of SNL. Slates Aisha Harris called Mad TV "a scrappy, less sophisticated cousin of SNL", and IGN called Mad TV "the young, scrappy upstart to SNLs elder statesman brand of sketch comedy". Luke Winkie of Vulture wrote that, despite not having the "live kinetic energy" or "the all-star glitz" of SNL, "most children of the '90s have a special place in our hearts for MADtv". Terry Kelleher of People wrote, "It would be easy to dismiss [Mad TV]... as the poor man's Saturday Night Live. But basically Mad TV has everything SNL has—the virtues and the defects." Salzman stated that Mad TVs racially diverse cast and "urban sensibility" set it apart from SNL. Mad TVs former video researcher Asterios Kokkinos, who was fired in 2007 after helping to shut down a Mad TV shoot as part of the Writers Guild of America Strike, wrote for Paste that the show was "a cheaper copy of [SNL]" that "nobody seemed to care about". Controversies Some celebrities and organizations have spoken out against parodies of themselves on Mad TV. Bobby Brown said in 2022 that the show's parodies of him and Whitney Houston "really offended" him, while Rosie O'Donnell shared on her self-titled talk show that she was offended by the show's parody of her, in which Borstein portrayed her as a closeted lesbian. The Postal Service's then-vice president of public affairs, Azeezaly S. Jaffer, called the sketch "ugly", "untrue", and "an insult to every man and woman in the Postal Service". as an example of yellowface. The character was protested by Aoki's organization Media Action Network for Asian Americans (MANAA). In 2019, the Washington Posts Elahe Izadi called Ms. Swan an example of "the kind of 'problematic' stuff TV networks used to air" and edgy' comedy from the early aughts that more overtly trafficked in racial stereotypes". Mad TV also featured two instances of blackface: one in which Bobby Lee plays George Foreman's fictional half-Asian son, and another wherein Michael McDonald plays a magical busboy from a foreign island. Accolades Rotten Tomatoes, Rolling Stone, and Screen Rant all placed Mad TV on their lists of the greatest sketch comedy TV series of all time, with Rolling Stone writing that it was "beholden to no one and often about as subtle as Artie Lange laughing at a fart" and a "ceaseless roast". The Black Spy and the White Spy from Mad TVs animated Spy vs. Spy sketches were listed as two of the best TV spies of all time by Entertainment Weekly in 2014. It won the Emmys for Outstanding Hairstyling for a Series in 2001, for Outstanding Costumes for a Variety or Music Program in 2005 and in 2006, for Outstanding Music and Lyrics for the song "A Wonderfully Normal Day" in 2006, and for Non-Prosthetic Makeup for a Multi-Camera Series in 2009. In 2007, Mad TVs Emmys campaign, VoteMadTV.com, allowed Emmys voters to view clips of the series online rather than being shipped DVD screeners in an attempt to be more eco-friendly. Anjelah Johnson was nominated for an ALMA Award for her performance on Mad TV in 2008. ==2016 reboot==

A reboot of Mad TV, which was produced by Telepictures, created by Salzman, and executive produced by him, John R. Montgomery, and Mark Teitelbaum, premiered on The CW on July 26, 2016. Cast members from the original series such as Sullivan, Sasso, Collins, Lee, Barinholtz, and Wilson, hosted. The reboot placed a greater emphasis on political comedy than its predecessor and included parodies of former U.S. Presidents such as then-candidate Donald Trump and Bill Clinton, the latter of whom had been spoofed in the original series several times during the late 1990s. The reboot received mostly negative reviews from critics. Ray Rahman of Entertainment Weekly wrote that it was "inconsistent and lack[ed] any urgency" while "fail[ing] to justify its existence", calling its humor "not just lame, but also stale". Aisha Harris of Slate similarly wrote, "In its new, blander incarnation, it's hard to imagine why MadTV needs to exist at all." The Guardians Brian Moylan praised the diversity of the new cast but wrote that it was mostly not funny, while Common Sense Media's Melissa Camacho gave it three out of five stars and wrote, "Fans of the original show will find it funny, but its irreverent humor isn't for everyone." ==See also==