While Will Farrell is allowed to make mediocre comedy after mediocre comedy, Jan Hooks hasn't worked since 2004. Yes, SNL has launched the careers of countless male superstars, but what has it done for the women? Pretty much bubkas. There are a few notable exceptions—Tina Fey, Gilda Radner, Amy Poehler, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, for instance—but whither Ellen Cleghorne, Victoria Jackson, and Julia Sweeney? From the show's original cast, Jane Curtin may have gone on to several sitcoms, but Laraine Newman has been doing little more than guest spots and voice work for the better part of the decade.

Luckily Ana Gasteyer and Christine Ebersole went on to find steady work on Broadway, but that's kind of like being the chastest girl at a Sex-aholics Anonymous meeting. Why can Jimmy Fallon get his own late-night talk show, when Nora Dunn and Cheri Oteri are at home waiting by their phones? And for every Janeane Garofalo — who fled 30 Rock after one season, allowing her to escape with her career intact — a dozen Siobhan Fallones or Mary Grosses float out of sight. Maybe they should have taken the Maya Rudolph route and married a hipster director and done a drama. Now people are talking about how she's an "actress" instead of a comedian.

And it's not that these women aren't funny; they did scale to the very pinnacle of their trade by earning their places on the show. Hollywood doesn't know what to do with funny women. After all, it would rather have an attractive but bland actress playing the female lead on a sitcom rather than someone who has actual comedic timing. Look at who is starring in this season's romantic comedies: Amy Adams, Sandra Bullock and Jennifer Aniston, three ladies who never let themselves get pigeon-holed as "funny."

Don't worry, Casey and Michaela, just remember that there was a little girl named Sarah Silverman who got fired from SNL after one season too. She went out there and did her own thing, and in the end talent won out, and now she has her own show on basic cable! Look at how far you can go!

Sadly, our list cut off at eight, so the valuable, deadpan Jane Curtain and the acidic Nora Dunn were among the SNL casualties. Other alumnae — like Sarah Silverman and Janeane Garofalo — have had career success despite their ignoble stints on the variety show, and were therefore left out. Enjoy the clip above, then make a passionate case for the ignored Julia Sweeney down below. [SNL]

In today's installment: David Spade, Neil Patrick Harris, James Woods, Kathy Griffin, Jason Bateman, Samantha Ronson, Emma Stone, Lisa Bonet, George Foreman and more!

FRIDAY, JULY 4
· Saw LISA BONET (a.k.a. Lilakoi Moon? really?) eating breakfast in Boulder, Co on July 4th. She was wearing a gray (organically dyed, no doubt) cotton (or perhaps organic bamboo) dress, had long dreadlocks, and John Lennon-style round sunglasses. She and her boyfriend Jason Momoa were the picture of multicultural hippiedom. She also seemed cooly unfazed by the Madge-Rod C-Rod Lenny Kravitz clusterf*ck. She might have been high though. It's Boulder after all.

MONDAY, JULY 7
· Saw Lindsay's love-drug SAMANTHA RONSON going through security this morning at LAX. No sign of the Freckled One anywhere. Fine with me. As far as I'm concerned, Samantha's the hotness in that couple.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 9
· Saw GEORGE FOREMAN at LAX Wednesday. Didn't have his grill, but had two young men with him. I can only assume it was two of his sons George and George. I must admit, the George's were ridiculously good-looking. Wouldn't mind doing some grilling with them.

FRIDAY, JULY 11
· Spotted in the crowd at Ricky Gervais' sold out show at the Kodak Theater: JASON BATEMAN, KATHY GRIFFIN, JJ ABRAMS, CHERI OTERI and EMMA STONE.

SATURDAY, JULY 12
· NEIL PATRICK HARRIS is starting his workout @ Equinox WeHo right now.

MONDAY, JULY 14
· Stopped at a light in Sunset Plaza, glanced to the right and saw JAMES WOODS sitting at an outdoor table at Cafe Med. Unfortunately, he was with another guy and not engaged in any provocative James Woods behavior like canoodling with a twentysomething or holding up his I.Q. score or M.I.T. diploma....just behaving like a normal citizen, albeit one who sits where all the tourists, not to mention tetchy locals like me, will spot him.

UNDATED
· DAVID SPADE was at a movie theater, the one by the Grove, last week. He was with some girl who was all over him during the movie.

[Photo Credit: Getty Images]