Saturday Night Live
Jack White Comes to the Rescue as Last-Minute SNL Musical Guest
Saturday Night Live has found a last-minute replacement to fill in as musical guest for this weekend’s episode: Jack White will take the stage at Studio 8H for his first live performance in nearly a year. White is replacing country singer Morgan Wallen, whose appearance was canceled after he violated COVID-19 safety protocols. As SNL head Lorne Michaels explained, due to the last minute nature of the booking, “It has to be somebody who is ready to go,” and Jack answered the call. Comedian Bill Burr will host the episode. It’ll mark White’s fourth appearance on SNL and third as a solo artist. He most recently served as musical guest in 2018 in support of his most recent solo album, Boarding House Reach. Earlier this week, The White Stripes announced their first-ever greatest-hits compilatio...
Jack White Reworks “Ball and Biscuit”, Plays Eddie Van Halen Guitar on SNL: Watch
Not all heroes wear capes; some rock out on guitar. After this weekend’s original musical guest, country singer Morgan Wallen, violated COVID-19 safety protocol, Saturday Night Live found itself in need of a last-minute replacement. Jack White answered the call. Accompanied by drummer Daru Jones and bassist Dominic John Davis, White ripped through some of his greatest hits with a few unexpected twists. For his first performance of the evening, White played a bit of his Beyoncé collaboration, “Don’t Hurt Yourself”, before transitioning into “Ball and Biscuit”. The Elephant track was reworked to feature lyrics from “Jesus is Coming Soon”, a traditional gospel song about the 1918 Spanish Flu that was famously performed by Blind Willie Johnson. The lyrics are just as relevant to...
Morgan Wallen Drops Out of Oct. 9 Rome River Jam Appearance
“My actions this past weekend were pretty short-sighted and they have obviously affected my long-term goals and my dreams,” he said in the emotional video, adding that he had not tested positive for COVID-19 The festival, which allows fans to gather in their own socially-distanced, open-air pods under heavy safety guidelines, is the largest non-drive in event planned so far for country fans since the COVID-19 pandemic caused a shut down of the concert industry in March. Tonight, several hours after Wallen’s video, the Rome River Jam updated its Instagram to present a new lineup for Friday night, now featuring Lee Brice as the headliner and with Travis Denning also added to the bill featuring Hardy and Ashland Craft. The festival stated “Morgan Wallen’s performance at Rome River Jam w...
SNL Cancels Morgan Wallen as Musical Guest After He Was Seen Partying Without Mask
Saturday Night Live has pulled Morgan Wallen as this weekend’s musical guest after the country singer was seen partying without a face mask As The Washington Post points out, Wallen traveled to Tuscaloosa last weekend to attend a University of Alabama football game. He was later spotted partying with a large group of people inside of a bar. He was also seen posing for photos without a face mask, and kissed several women. In an Instagram video posted Wednesday, Wallen revealed that his appearance on SNL has since been canceled. “I got a call from the show letting me know that I will no longer be able to play and that’s because of COVID protocols, which I understand,” he said. “My actions from this past weekend were pretty short-sighted, and have obviously affected my long-term goals and my ...
That Time Eddie Van Halen Became an ‘SNL’ Musical Guest Just Because He Was in the Building
Eddie Van Halen was a musical guest on Saturday Night Live in the late 1980s because he just happened to be in the building that evening. The legendary rocker, who died Tuesday at the age of 65, was accompanying his then-wife Valerie Bertinelli to Studio 8H because she was hosting on Feb. 28, 1987. He had zero plans to appear on TV himself — but then house band guitarist G.E. Smith worked his magic. “He doesn’t want to follow his wife around like a puppy dog,” Smith remembered in an interview years ago. “So he finds out about the music office, and he comes in and hangs out — because you can do whatever you want in the music office. We’re in there drinking, smoking, whatever. He was comfortable there. It was his people, band guys. He got that. He could relax.” ...
Saturday Night Live Audience Members Are Being Paid to Attend
Saturday Night Live tickets are traditionally hard to come by, but these days the TV show is literally paying people to sit in the crowd. Due to reopening guidelines implemented by the state of New York, live television shows are prohibited from having in-person audiences unless they pay the crowd as they would cast members, and SNL happily obliged, reports The New York Times. Tickets to SNL have long been a coveted item for fans of comedy, musicians, and entertainment at large, but technically they’ve always been offered for free by NBC. The ongoing coronavirus pandemic is throwing a wrench into that plan, however, as indoor events are deemed “high-risk” scenarios by the CDC and social distancing is encouraged, forcing the show to “cast” an audience and pay them for their time. Sean Ludwi...
Chris Rock & Megan Thee Stallion ‘SNL’ Most Watched Season Premiere In 4 Years, Issa Rae To Host
Source: NBC / Getty Things have started out great for Saturday Night Live. This past weekend’s episode, hosted by Chris Rock and with musical guest Megan Thee Stallion, was the most-watched season premiere in for years. [embedded content] According to Deadline, SNL‘s season premiere drew and 7.765 million total viewers which besides earned it a spot as the second-most-watched episode in three years, just behind Eddie Murphy’s return on Dec. 21, 2019. Not too shabby. Interestingly, Murphy’s episode was also a comedian/rapper combo with Lizzo as the musical guest. Clearly, it works. Megan Thee Stallion’s performance of “Savage” has been receiving rave reviews as she used her time on stage to advocate for Black women while dragging Kentuck Attorney General Daniel Cameron for the lack of justi...
Megan Thee Stallion Uses SNL Debut to Demand Justice for Breonna Taylor: Watch
Megan Thee Stallion used her Saturday Night Live debut to demand justice for Breonna Taylor and publicly rebuke Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron over his handling of Taylor’s murder case. Midway through her performance of “Savage”, Megan played audio of Malcolm X’s “Who Taught You To Hate?” speech in addition to recent comments made by activist Tamika Mallory, who accused Cameron of being “no different than the sellout negroes that sold our people into slavery.” Megan herself then proclaimed, “We need to protect our Black women and love our Black women, because at the end of the day, we need our Black women.”. At the end of the performance, Megan and her dancers raised their fists, and the message “Protect Black Women” was displayed on the video screens in the background. Last...
Jim Carrey Makes His Saturday Night Live Debut as Joe Biden: Watch
Saturday Night Live kicked off its 46th season with a cold opening parodying this week’s presidential debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, with Jim Carrey making his debut as the former vice president. Appropriately, the cold opening began by acknowledging that Tuesday’s debate feels like “it was already one hundred days ago” (in the time since then, Trump has been hospitalized for coronavirus.) Even so, “We thought it was important to see it again since it might be the only presidential debate, and it was pretty fun to watch — as long as you don’t live in America” the narrator explained. Carrey walked on stage wearing Biden’s signature aviator glasses and with fingers guns a-blazin’. He then pulled out a tape measure to check distance between the two candidates’ podiums. ...
Saturday Night Live: 20 of Biggest Breakthrough Musical Performances Since 2000
Saturday Night Live is back! The late-night sketch comedy returns to NBC for the start of its 46th season on Saturday. After spending half of last season shooting at-home episodes due to the pandemic, promos for the show have revealed the cast is back at 30 Rock’s Studio H8 and ready to put on a show. Former SNL cast member Chris Rock (’90-’93) will host the season premiere, which also features the debut performance of hip-hop’s woman of the moment – Megan Thee Stallion. Over the years, the long-running late-night series has featured some iconic performances, usually bringing in artists at a pivotal moment in their career and giving them a legendary platform to transfix America. And so, in that spirit (and because it’s 2020), SPIN looks back at some of the biggest breakthrough pe...
John Belushi’s Legendary Career Chronicled in New Showtime Documentary: Watch Trailer
John Belushi’s lasting influence hasn’t faded even as we approach the 40th anniversary of his passing. This fall, his legacy will be further cemented and celebrated in R.J. Cutler’s new Showtime documentary, Belushi. The film’s first trailer presents a candid portrait of the comedian and actor via unheard audiotapes, career-spanning clips, and interviews with his friends and family. The doc covers Belushi’s early years growing up in Wheaton, Illinois through his continued impact on the comedy world long after his tragic 1982 death at the age of 33. To help recount Belushi’s life story, audio from the late star is interspersed with interviews from his wife, Judy Belushi; fellow Blues Brother Dan Aykroyd; actual brother Jim Belushi; and Saturday Night Live head Lorne Michaels. Other collabor...
All 45 Seasons of Saturday Night Live Coming to Peacock Next Week
Streaming from NBCUniversal’s Peacock, it’s Saturday Night Live! All 45 seasons of the sketch comedy series are coming to the streaming service on October 1st, marking the first time the full library has been available in one place in years. When Peacock launched over the summer, only the most recent five seasons were included alongside some “Best of” collections. Hulu, meanwhile, has continued to host Seasons 1-5 and 30-45, but episodes from 1981 to 2004 have been nowhere to be found. In fact, the last place the full SNL library could be seen was on NBCU’s comedy app Seeso, which only survived for about a year and a half between 2016 and 2017. Netflix and Hulu both held the complete catalog in the early 2010s, while a later deal put it on Yahoo for a brief period. The short-lived SNL...
