Before They Were Stars: Peter Dinklage in “The State’s 43rd Annual All-Star Halloween Special”

Peter Dinklage may be the most successful dwarf actor of all time, but given his size, it was probably inevitable that he would have to spend the early portion of his career accepting some less-than-dignified bit parts. Case in point: The State’s 43rd Annual All-Star Halloween Special. The State was sketch comedy show which aired on MTV during the mid-nineties until CBS gave them their own television special in 1995. The gag was that The State would stage a mock anniversary Halloween special containing “clips” of the previous 42 specials they’d produced over the past four decades. Alas, the show was a ratings disaster and pretty much killed any chance of The State ever being picked up by CBS. So it’s quite prophetic that the 1:40 mark of this clip features a self-referential line in a musical number about how they’ve got a better chance of building a snowman in Hell than being picked up as a series. After that line, they immediately cut to poor Peter Dinklage building a snowman while dressed in a devil costume.