From left, moderator Ron Bennington discusses the early years of Saturday Night Live with originators Alan Zweibel, Laraine Newman and Dan Aykroyd. Discussions ensued Thursday night at the Reg Lenna Center for the Arts about the cultural phenomenon SNL became. P-J photo by Eric Zavinski

“It’s like we got a very unique box of crayons we couldn’t get anywhere else,” said Laraine Newman, one of the original cast members of Saturday Night Live.

She joined fellow cast member Dan Aykroyd and original writer Alan Zweibel on the Reg Lenna Center for the Arts stage Thursday to share reflections on the early seasons of the variety comedy show that would become a cultural touchstone.

Ron Bennington of Sirius XM interviewed the trio of originators and asked audience-driven questions that inquired about favorite sketches, characters and moments from SNL’s beginning years.

Clips from SNL in the late 1970s were shown before the originators took the stage. The audience reacted with cheers and shouts with every recognizable sketch that appeared on screen.

“It just feels great that we were a part of this at the beginning,” Zweibel said.

Zweibel marveled at the permutations of writers and cast members who have appeared on SNL since 1975, the show’s opening year. Bennington also commented on the legacy of the show, stating the format has barely changed since the early years.

Aykroyd said SNL is “more necessary than ever.” As a man who impersonated both Richard Nixon, who Aykroyd described as a “wonderful caricature of a human being,” and Jimmy Carter, Aykroyd was aware of the social and political impact the show had. The originators joked that Washington, D.C. has been watching SNL since.

The cast brought up that creator Lorne Michaels wanted SNL to be a show with a variety of comedy styles, combining talents of multiple writers from various backgrounds.

“I loved everybody’s style,” Newman said.

“Do you realize how much America loves you?” Bennington later said to her, with a load of applause that followed.

Zweibel recalled always looking at the work of other writers and being impressed with their work. He remembered fondly other original cast members, including Gilda Radner and John Belushi. He realized there were other ways to write comedy working for SNL.

“The only rule that we had is ‘let’s make each other laugh,'” Zweibel said of Michaels’ idea for the show.

Bennington said that SNL was both the popular and the cool thing when it started, something he described as rare. While people record or watch clips of SNL on YouTube these days, Aykroyd said, people used to cancel weekend parties to stay at home and watch SNL.

Cast members eventually became so popular that early talks began as whether or not to trash the idea of having a host. Michaels eventually refused to get rid of hosts and said that the audience needed a focal point to pay attention to.

Remembering Chevy Chase as the first original cast member to leave the show and “Samurai Delicatessen” as the first reoccurring sketch, Aykroyd also joked about the introduction of the famous Coneheads. He said he noticed on TV there was room for people’s heads to be longer, but the idea for the alien family was actually conceived in an improv session with Michaels.

The originators agreed that being on SNL so young gave them somewhat of a false perception of what the rest of show business would be like. They agreed that nothing ended up having the rush of live television. Broadcasts of SNL would start production on Monday with the pitching of ideas, and Zweibel said it was amazing to see jokes he wrote that week show up on air the following Saturday.

“There’s something so exciting about live (TV),” Newman said.

Newman also called the crew of SNL heroes for being so efficient and speedy in putting together the physical aspects of each show like costumes and sets.

“We produced our own sketches,” said Aykroyd, who can remember the freeing sense of autonomy as a writer in being able to work directly with the crew to shape appearances of characters and settings for sketches.

In remembrance of the late Radner, Zweibel said he pictured her as the next Lucille Ball in a sense. He thought she shared Ball’s physicality and sensibilities as a performer.

Bennington said the great thing about comedy is that people with nothing in common could laugh at the same things. Newman said they had no idea if they were being watched or liked in the first season of SNL. Only later would it become apparent that the originators of SNL were beloved for their work.