Dick Ebersol did not like Michael Keaton's performance during rehearsals so he brought in Michael Palin. Keaton appears in only three sketches.
Andy Kaufman is announced as a guest but does not appear. NBC planted a story to the press that Kaufman's appearance was cut by Ebersol at the last minute and a fight occurred between the two. This turned out to be a publicity stunt leading up to the viewer poll in the Drew Barrymore/Squeeze (1982) three weeks later.
Mid-term election coverage forced SNL out of Studio 8H for this show. The show was done from two adjacent studios.
In the "Snookie" sketch, Julia Louis-Dreyfus is wearing the same striped dress that would eventually be part of Ana Gasteyer's look for her Bobbi Mohan-Culp character.