'Saturday Night Live' Is Hot To Go Announcing Landmark 50th Season’s First 5 Hosts, Musical Guests
'Saturday Night Live' Is Hot To Go Announcing Landmark 50th Season’s First 5 Hosts, Musical Guests
Nate Bargatze, Ariana Grande, and Billie Eilish make quick returns, while John Mulaney comes back for a sixth hosting gig
Now this is a change for good. Saturday Night Live has officially summoned the hosts and musical guests for its first five episodes, a mix of what’s hot, some old friends, and some quick returnees.
Fresh off Hacks’s Emmy win for Outstanding Comedy Series and her own win for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series, Jean Smart will host the show for the first time on its season premiere on September 28. The musical guest will be country artist Jelly Roll, who did the tribute performance during the In Memoriam portion of the ceremony. He too is making his SNL debut.
On October 5, Nate Bargatze returns for a second gig less than a year after hosting the October 28 third episode of season 49 as his debut. While he had Foo Fighters as his musical guest last time, this time it’s Coldplay, who are making their eighth appearance, just one less than Foo Fighters. Co-founding lead vocalist and pianist Chris Martin made a solo appearance in the first At Home episode from April 2020.
October 12 sees Ariana Grande make her third headlining appearance, certainly in some way promoting her starring role as Galinda in part one of the film adaptation of Wicked, which will be released over Thanksgiving. Grande’s first appearance was as musical guest of the season 40 premiere with host Chris Pratt in September 2014. She then pulled double duty on the March 12, 2016 episode as host and musical guest before returning eight years later as musical guest for the Josh Brolin-hosted episode this past March 9. There, she still appeared in two sketches, including a movie musical piece with her Wicked co-star Bowen Yang. Her musical guest is twice-inducted Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Stevie Nicks, making her first appearance in over 40 years, not just as musical guest but in general since the season 9 episode on December 10, 1983 hosted by Flip Wilson. There’s a name I wasn’t expecting to come up.
October 19 sees Beetlejuice Beetlejuice star Michael Keaton return for the first time since his cameo playing Julian Assange in the cold open of the April 13, 2019 episode with host Emma Stone and musical guest BTS. His last hosting gig was season 40 on April 4, 2015 with musical guest Carly Rae Jepsen. This marks his first hosting gap of less than 10 years, having previously hosted on November 14, 1992 with musical guest Morrissey and a previous Halloween episode, October 30, 1982 with musical guest The New Joe Jackson Band. His musical guest this time is Billie Eilish, who had just been musical guest in former cast member Kate McKinnon’s hosting debut. She also pulled double duty in what ended up the last full-fledged episode of 2021 due to the Omicron COVID surge the following week. Her first appearance was the season 45 premiere September 28, 2019 with host Woody Harrelson, fresh off of “Bad Guy”.
Indeed, Saturday Night Live will be taking October 26 off, starting off with four consecutive episodes, a bit beyond the usual three at any typical point in a season, but more merciful than the monstrous six episodes that encompassed the last weeks of the 2020 presidential election race. However both times, the last host before both elections will have been former writer John Mulaney, who hosts for the sixth time on November 2. He last hosted on February 26, 2022, making Pokémon real for its 26th anniversary with musical guest LCD Soundsystem, most recently appearing in the Please Don’t Destroy short from last season’s premiere with host Pete Davidson. His previous episodes include that Halloween 2020 show with The Strokes, the Leap Day 2020 show with musical guest and Sack Lunch Bunch co-star David Byrne, March 2, 2019 with musical guest Thomas Rhett, and April 14, 2018 with musical guest Jack White. Now, he has 2024’s biggest star of the summer, Chappell Roan as musical guest, making her debut. On his socials, Mulaney joked that “This is the first I’m hearing of this.” Lord help us if they invite Dave Chappelle for the November 9 episode.
Saturday Night Live’s 50th season stars Yang, Michael Che, Mikey Day, Andrew Dismukes, Chloe Fineman, Heidi Gardner, Marcello Hernandez, James Austin Johnson, Colin Jost, Michael Longfellow, Ego Nwodim, Sarah Sherman, Kenan Thompson, Devon Walker, and newly-hired featured players Ashley Padilla, Emil Wakim and Jane Wickline. Former cast member Maya Rudolph will reprise her Kamala Harris impression over this stretch but hopefully we’ll have the good reason for more. The 50th anniversary special is set to air on February 16, 2025.
Sources: The Hollywood Reporter, SNL Archives, John Mulaney