Editing Garrett Morris (section)

==''Saturday Night Live''==
Morris had written a play that [[Lorne Michaels]] read and liked, which got Morris hired on as a writer for a program he was developing for Saturday night. Morris was asked about bringing in black actors to potentially serve as cast members, such as asking [[Bill Duke]]. Duke wasn't cast, but a suggestion by ones who were cast led Michaels to view a film that had Morris in it, ''[[Cooley High]]'', which Morris later stated "played a hand" in getting him cast on ''[[Saturday Night Live]]'', as produced by Michaels.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.chicagomag.com/arts-culture/so-hard-to-say-goodbye-the-oral-history-of-cooley-high/ | title=So Hard to Say Goodbye: The Oral History of Cooley High }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/cast/garrett-morris-15131|title=Garrett Morris on Saturday Night Live |publisher=NBC|access-date=2019-12-17}}</ref> 

Periodically on ''SNL'' he sang classical music: once a [[Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart|Mozart]] [[aria]] "Dalla Sua Pace", Don Ottavio's aria from ''[[Don Giovanni]]'' when guest-host [[Walter Matthau]] designated him as a "musical guest...in place of the usual crap", and once a [[Franz Schubert|Schubert]] ''[[lied]]'' while the titles on the screen expressed his colleagues' purported displeasure at having to accommodate a misguided request by him. In February 1977, he sang [[Tchaikovsky|Tchaikovsky's]] ''[[None but the Lonely Heart (Tchaikovsky)|Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt]]'' barefoot in colorful Caribbean dress while subtitles explained he had just returned from Jamaica where he had picked up a girl by claiming to be [[Harry Belafonte]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Harris |first=Will |title=Garrett Morris on SNL, 2 Broke Girls, and singing arias for Walter Matthau |url=https://www.avclub.com/garrett-morris-on-snl-2-broke-girls-and-singing-arias-1798268909 |access-date=2025-02-06 |website=AV Club |language=en-US}}</ref>

One of Morris' best known characters on ''SNL'' was the [[People of the Dominican Republic|Dominican]] baseball player Chico Escuela. Chico spoke only limited and halting English, so the joke centered on his responding to almost any question with his catch phrase: "Baseball... been berra berra good... to me". Another recurring bit, used in the [[newscast]] segment ''[[Weekend Update]]'', involved Morris being presented as "Headmaster of the New York School for the [[hard of hearing]]" and assisting the newscaster by shouting the main headlines, in a parody of the then-common practice of providing [[sign language]] interpretation in an inset on the screen as an aid to the [[deaf]] viewer.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2024-10-10 |title=See Young Garrett Morris During His Saturday Night Live Years |url=https://www.nbc.com/nbc-insider/garrett-morris-young-saturday-night-live-photos |access-date=2025-02-06 |website=NBC Insider Official Site |language=en-US}}</ref>

According to the book ''Saturday Night: A Backstage History of Saturday Night Live'', Morris was frequently unhappy during his tenure on ''SNL'' from 1975 to 1980, and expressed the opinion that he was usually [[Typecasting (acting)|typecast]] in stereotypical roles.<ref name="Backstage" />  In 2024's ''[[Saturday Night (2024 film)|Saturday Night]]'', directed by [[Jason Reitman]], which dramatically details ''SNL'''s opening night, Morris's restless unhappiness is portrayed by actor [[Lamorne Morris]] (no relation).<ref name="IMDb">{{cite web |title=Saturday Night (2024) |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27657135/reference/ |website=imdb.com |publisher=IMDb.com, Inc. |access-date=10 December 2024}}</ref>

Black performers who have followed Morris on ''SNL'' have at times been publicly concerned with experiencing the same fate Morris did. [[Eddie Murphy]], for example, told ''[[TV Guide]]'' in the early 1980s that ''SNL'' producer [[Jean Doumanian]] "had tried to Garrett Morris me".<ref name="Backstage">{{cite book|last1=Hill|first1=Doug|first2=Jeff|last2=Weingrad|year=1986|title=Saturday Night: A Backstage History of Saturday Night Live|location=New York City|publisher=Beech Tree Books|isbn=0-688-05099-9}}</ref>

Morris, then at 38, was the eldest of the original cast members when SNL debuted in 1975.  As such, he is also the eldest surviving cast member.

===Recurring characters===
* [[Saturday Night Live characters appearing on Weekend Update#Chico Escuela|Chico Escuela]], a Dominican baseball player for the [[New York Mets]]
* Cliff, the streetwise friend to the Festrunk Brothers ([[Dan Aykroyd]] and [[Steve Martin]])
* Grant Robinson, Jr., one of [[The Nerds]]
* Hodo, one of Miles Cowperthwaite's cronies
* Merkon, the leader of the [[Coneheads]]
* ''Weekend Update''<nowiki/>'s "News for the Hard of Hearing" translator, who simply repeated each line while shouting with his hands cupped around his mouth.