Ellen Cleghorne's tenure on SNL was a mixed bag, ranging from hilarious to absent/under-utilized. She pokes fun at that fact by joking that her pay checks from the show were made out to "the black girl." Cleghorne jokes about lowering standards ("I used to want a man who would read the Bible, now I just want a man who can read anything!"), wax jobs ("who can withstand that kind of pain?"), and black TV ("we can report the news and wear the handcuffs, but we can't host a game show; what do they think we will say").
Mermaid is a great showcase for
Ellen Cleghorne, and demonstrates that SNL missed out by not using her wit and sharp observations more. ~ JT Griffith