Seeing the cast in action was a sight I will not soon forget. I have a new respect for everyone involved, especially MacFarlane. Most of the time when Peter isn’t interacting with Lois, he’s in a scene with either Brian, or his sex-freak neighbor, Glenn Quagmire. The same goes for Brian. If he’s not in a scene with Stewie, he’s with Peter, and vice versa. Here’s the thing, MacFarlane voices all of these characters, and then some. Watching his face contort back and forth from Peter’s Archie Bunker-like “know it all” speech from the side of his mouth, to Glenn’s wide-eyed “giggity giggity,” to Brian’s deadpan omnipotence, was simply amazing. But it was Stewie, the eyebrow-cocked, purse-lipped nellie, that got the crowd the most. From the minute they first showed Stewie in the opening clip reel, it was quite clear that this was a Stewie crowd. One gets the feeling that there is a Stewie nation out there.

Mike Henry is the cast’s secret weapon. He barely had to glance up from his paper to make the crowd roar. His Cleveland drew thunderous applause with each line, but it was Herbert the pedophile (my, hands down, favorite Quahog resident) that really left them pissing, myself included. He has a way of subtly and precisely whistling each ‘s’ that damn near sounds like an effect done in post production. It is voice-talent gold, and exactly why you came to see it for yourself. Everybody was top notch, but it was MacFarlane and Henry who nabbed the most laughs.

Just when I thought I couldn’t possibly gain any more respect for MacFarlane and his team, they began their brief, but nothing short of fantastic, musical portion of the show. They started off with MacFarlane doing “I Need a Jew” from the controversial episode, “When You Wish Upon a Weinstein.” Seth sang as Peter, while the footage from the original episode played on the overhead screen. It was easy to just watch the original footage, forgetting that it was being sung live on the stage below. The sync was that close, and the vocals that dead on.

Afterwards, Peter and Lois did an X-rated version of “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” that included various call-and-response doozies like “you don’t cup my testes” and “you don’t tongue my asshole.” After which, at a good hour and a half into an already filthy show, they thought it a good time to remind us that if there are kids in the audience, it could get “a little blue” as this is the late show. Brilliant. Finally, they rounded out the musical portion with Herbert the pedophile’s rendition of The Little Shop of Horrors’ “Somewhere That’s Green.” This was a song sung to Chris in an earlier episode and, again, I was brought to body-trembling hysterics. This was the highlight of my night.