Waffle House

After a game, Zach slips away from his friends when his girlfriend Casey finds him outside the Waffle House where the team usually hangs out. She tells him she is not joining him at State next year as they had planned; she has been accepted into a music program in New York City and wants more than their hometown. Played as a hushed teen drama, the couple, together since eighth grade, talk through heartbreak and growing up, while through the windows behind them a dog sits on the counter, a woman leaps across it, fights break out and a police officer holds a shirtless customer at taser point. They hug and part as each other’s first love, and when Zach offers Casey a ride home, she leaves with her dad: the shirtless troublemaker from inside.

The first installment of Saturday Night Live’s Background Chaos films, followed by Subway Platform in October 2023 and Varsity Valley: Spring Break in March 2025.