Lorne Michaels stresses about SNL premiere in resurfaced 1975 interview

Lorne Michaels is having a cultural moment. He's been the anchor of Saturday Night Live since its inception in 1975. The fact that the show is on the cusp of its 50th anniversary, though, has fans taking time out to appreciate his monumental career.

The careers of so many beloved comedians would not have been possible were it not for Michaels. The SNL creator's hard work is seemingly the focus of the new film Saturday Night, which depicts the chaos that went into producing the very first SNL episode.

Lorne Michaels' struggles will be dramatized in a new film

The trailer makes it clear that Michaels was strapped for time, inexperienced, and basically set up to fail ahead of the landmark 1975 premiere. Still, he managed to pull it off. Gabriel LaBelle plays a young Michaels in Saturday Night, but the renewed interest in the show's origin has led to a clip of the actual Michaels making the rounds online.

The showrunner went on The Tomorrow Show with Tom Snyder on October 4, 1975. Exactly a week before Saturday Night Live's premiere. He brought the cast, who managed to keep the banter light, but the most fascinating aspect of the interview is how stressed Michaels appears.

Michaels told SNL viewers to expect "anxiety" in the pilot

"We've got 8," Michaels said, with regards to the number of comedians in the cast. "And we're hoping for 2 to work." He then tempered expectations even further, by noting that "not all of these people will become stars." When the host quipped that the rest of the cast were just spinning their wheels, Michaels responded with a blunt: "Essentially, yes."

The best exchange in the interview, though, has to be when Tom Snyder asks Michaels what to look for in the first episode of Saturday Night Live. Without missing a beat, the showrunner said: "anxiety."

Michaels proceeded to stumble through some of his words when explaining the lineup of guests that will appear on the show, which included musicians Janis Ian and Billy Preston, as well as the Muppets. It's a fascinating interview with regards to SNL history, and one that will no doubt be validated by the upcoming Saturday Night film.