Roseanne Roseannadanna is one of several recurring characters created by Gilda Radner….who appeared on Weekend Update in the early seasons of Saturday Night Live (SNL)…..where she was the segment’s consumer affairs reporter….who, like an earlier Radner character Emily Litella…. editorialized on current issues….only to go off-topic before interrupted by the anchor. Unlike Litella’s meek and apologetic character, Roseannadanna was brash and tactless…..as the character was based on Rose Ann Scamardella, a former anchorwoman on WABC-TV’s Eyewitness News in New York City….who was the character also appeared later in Radner’s live one-woman shows.
Radner’s character had a tendency to refer to herself by her full name whenever possible….like “Mr. Feder, I know what you’re talkin’ about, because, I, Roseanne Roseannadanna, once had the same thing happen to me.”….when she often exaggerated her tribulations by saying things like “I thought I was gonna die!”….for example like in this video herewith….where she narrated a story about eating a hamburger in a restaurant and feeling something hard in it. She spat it out and found it was white and looked like a toenail, and she said “I thought I was gonna die. I mean, what was a toenail doing in my hamburger?”. Then she went to the restroom and, on the way, she saw Princess Lee Radziwill whom she described as the “classy lady that no one knows where she’s the princess of.” However, what the Princess didn’t know was that she had a tiny piece of toilet paper hanging off her shoe…. and she was walking around and the toilet paper hadn’t fallen off…..saying “I thought I was gonna be sick. So I said to her, ‘Hey Princess Lee — what are ya tryin’ to do, make me sick?’. Jane Curtin then asked her what this had to do with anything, and Roseannadanna replied….“Well it just goes to show you, it’s always something, you either got a toenail in your hamburger or toilet paper clinging to your shoe.”
This is classic stuff folks…..for Roseanne Roseannadana was a comedic character unlike any other….and we are “tickled pink” to have so much of Gilda’s and The Not Ready For Prime Time Players content in our comedy section….cuz each one is another “nugget of gold” in our treasure chest of memories here at ImaSportsphile.
