Music : Questlove on Why His ‘SNL’ Music Doc Couldn’t Get a Clearance From Pavarotti, but How Eminem Saved the Day

Since its beginning in 1975, “Saturday Night Live” made a point of showcasing as many music superstars and rising talents as possible made it inside Studio 8H.

The Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney, Tupac, Rihanna, Mariah Carey, Alicia Keys, Jack White, Radiohead, Lenny Kravitz, Tom Waits, Coldplay, Bon Jovi, Taylor Swift, Mary J. Blige, Donald Glover, U2, Miley Cyrus, Billie Eilish, Billy Joel, No Doubt, Tom Petty, Elton John, Olivia Rodrigo, Bruno Mars and Prince are just a few of the artists who have appeared on the show. And that’s why they’re all also seen at some point in the three-hour music doc “Ladies & Gentlemen…50 Years of SNL Music.”

“The Roots” superstar Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, who in recent years has also become a prolific and award-winning documentarian, was the co-director mastermind behind the three-hour documentary. The special will perhaps be best remembered for an epic intro montage mixing in performances from the show’s 50-year history.we would not tell them the same way. Just because we're so different, we're so evolved and mature in our storytelling, you know, because like the way we made this movie very much reflects like our current state of mind where we're at our last now.

He and music montage editor John MacDonald put together a master list of every song that had ever been on “Saturday Night Live.” Says Questlove: “We watched every episode and compartmentalized it.”

He pulls out his phone to show that list: fast songs, slow songs, jazz songs, gospel songs. The list goes on, as does the scroll – it’s long and comprehensive. “We were like a Michelin star restaurant, and we just analyzed each song,” he tells Variety’s Awards Circuit Podcast. “This is in E minor, and the bridge is in G. So then that could connect to this song.” Their vision board looked like an episode of “CSI” breaking down how a Hanson song could fit into eight other songs.

His other challenge was clearing songs. Sometimes it was a matter of making a call, but there was one he couldn’t get. “It was the end of Mariah Carey’s ‘Vision of Love,’ with Christina Aguilera’s ‘Beautiful’ with [Luciano] Pavarotti doing the same thing, all these singers hitting the same note. I couldn’t clear the Pavarotti song because I would have to physically go over there [to Italy] just to beg for two seconds of a clearance and show them like what I’m trying to do, and it just wasn’t worth the fight. So I had to lose the Pavarotti moment.”

His challenge didn’t end there, at the last minute, he got clearance from Marshall Mathers and Paul Rosenberg to include Eminem’s “Stan.” That clearance allowed him to seamlessly connect “Stan” to Destiny Child’s “Survivor” and *NSYNC’s “Bye Bye Bye.” He laughs as he recalls the challenge: “You don’t know how hard and how difficult those 12 seconds were!” Ultimately, that whole montage took 11 months to put together.

Questlove could find himself landing two Emmy nominations; his other show, “Sly Lives! (aka The Burden of Black Genius),” also earned a Gotham TV nomination.

He recalls a moment shortly after winning his BAFTA for 2021’s “Summer of Soul” when he went back to North London, and the Kentish Town apartment he lived in as a starving artist decades earlier, to look around and reflect. “I made my driver go so that 50-year-old me could look at the 24-year-old disparaged, very discouraged version of myself in his apartment window, wondering if he had a future or not.” That younger version of himself was broke, but full of dreams. He wanted to show himself symbolically that he had made it.

Ironically, the cops pulled up and wondered why this person was loitering outside an apartment. But dressed in a tux, holding a BAFTA, Questlove explained himself and the officer told him it was a nice story and went about their way.

It’s a great story. It’s one he’s proud to tell this fellow Londoner. Questlove has indeed made it. He won an Oscar and that BAFTA award for the 2022 documentary,

Later, Questlove talks about how Spike Lee got him where he is today. The two have a mutual admiration for one another, but if it weren’t for Lee’s commercial, he might not be here. “My best friend in high school saw a commercial one day by Spike Lee with a busking drummer on the street corner, and we looked at each other like, ‘Hey, let’s do that.’” Sure enough, they grabbed a white bucket and some drumsticks. The pact was to make at least $110 in three hours – and as cliched as it sounds, they did, and the rest is history. “That led to a record deal, it led to living in London and it led to his first Grammy, and it led to this moment,” he says.

So, what’s next for the star? “I’m a walking example of not knowing what’s going to happen next. But I’m going to just take this next step.”

Questlove is working on two undisclosed projects, and he says he’s 80% done on his Earth, Wind and Fire documentary. “I’m not making promises, but if this film does not come out on the 21st day of September, then I don’t know what I’m doing,” he chuckles.

On the roundtable, the new Oscar rules are discussed. And the lead actress drama race is examined.