Saturday Night Live is returning to NBC for its 46th season this weekend and in a surprise move, the Lorne Michaels-led show has already announced its hosts and guests the next two weekends. For the second episode of the season next Saturday, comedian Bill Burr will play host as country music artist Morgan Wallen will join the live sketch comedy in his debut as musical guest.
Another week later on October 17th, Issa Rae (Insecure) makes her SNL hosting debut alongside Justin Bieber, the A-list artist returning to the show for his fourth appearance as musical guest. Burr and Wallen’s appearance are also their respective debuts on the weekly show.
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The next two shows! @billburr @MorganWallen @IssaRae @justinbieber pic.twitter.com/CBaublGtmi
— Saturday Night Live – SNL (@nbcsnl) October 2, 2020
The show’s latest season kicks off this Saturday, October 2nd with Chris Rock and Megan Thee Stallion as host and musical guest. The hosting gig will be Rock’s third outing at the show after previously serving as a castmate from 1990 to 1993. He’s made nine cameos through the years, including two sudden reappearances last year. Megan Thee Stallion’s appearance is her solo musical guest debut.
The Season 46 debut will also feature the highly anticipated debut of Jim Carrey as former vice president and current Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden. The debut will also include the return of Maya Rudolph’s acclaimed portrayal of vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
Despite filming the last few episodes of Seaon 45 remotely with Zoom-based episodes, Michaels himself has confirmed the show will film in front of a limited studio audience.
“We need the audience, obviously. With comedy, when you don’t hear the response, it’s just different. With the kind of comedy we do, which quite often is broad, timing gets thrown off without an audience,” Michaels explained. “And for me, what is most important is when you’re absolutely certain of some piece on Wednesday, and then the dress-rehearsal audience sees it on Saturday and tells you you’re wrong. . . .I think us coming back and accomplishing the show will lead to — I hate to use the word normalcy — but it’s a thing that is part of our lives coming back, in whatever form it ends up coming back. So the physical problems of doing it — number of people who can be in the studio, number of people who can be in the control room, how you separate the band so that they’re not in any jeopardy — all of those are part of the meetings we’ve been having”
Saturday Night Live returns October 2nd at 11:30 p.m. Eastern.
