Who's Hosting Saturday Night Live This Week?

SNL is new this Saturday, May 11th.

By Nicole Drum

There are just two episodes left of Saturday Night Live this season, and this week will see the return of one of the sketch comedy show's alums for their third hosting appearance. This week, Saturday, May 11th, Maya Rudolph will return to host Saturday Night Live for the penultimate episode of Season 49. To mark the occasion, SNL released a promo teasing that Rudolph's return was a long time coming — specifically joking that she's been hiding in a Studio 8H closet for 17 years, alluding to her departure from the series in 2007. You can check it out for yourself below.

"Why would I leave? I have everything I need here," Rudolph says in the clip before pointing to the various things she has in the closet, including her "dear friend Kenny" who turns out to be just a mop with googly eyes.

Joining Rudolph for her third time hosting this week will be musical guest Vampire Weekend.  Next week, host Jake Gyllenhaal will close out Season 49 with musical guest Sabrina Carpenter before the series breaks for the summer.

Ryan Gosling's Recent SNL Episode Drew High Ratings

Saturday Night Live returned with new episodes last week after a few weeks off, but prior to that Ryan Gosling hosted back on April 13th with musical guest Chris Stapleton and it turned out, that episode was very popular with audiences. The episode drew in almost 9 million viewers in the week after it aired. The episode had 1.7 million live viewers and a live+7 number of 8.9 million across various platforms, making it the best seven-day viewership since December 2021, which saw Billie Eilish serve as both host and musical guest. Gosling's appearance saw some notable moments, including a performance of a Taylor Swift-inspired song during his monologue and a viral Beavis and Butt-Head sketch.

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Who is in the Saturday Night Live cast?

Cast members for Saturday Night Live season 49 include almost the entire cast from season 48 of SNL. Returning stars include Michael Che, Mikey Day, Andrew Dismukes, Chloe Fineman, Heidi Gardner, James Austin Johnson, Punkie Johnson, Colin Jost, Ego Nwodim, Sarah Sherman, Kenan Thompson, and Bowen Yang. Featured players that are part of the cast include returning stars Marcello Hernandez, Molly Kearney, Michael Longfellow, and Devon Walker, plus the show's only fully new cast member for the year, newcomer Chloe Troast. The comedy troupe Please Don't Destroy, made up of Ben Marshall, John Higgins, and Martin Herlihy, are also a recurring part of the series.

Saturday Night Live Season 49 is ongoing now with new episodes airing on both NBC and Peacock, starting Saturdays at 11:30 p.m. ET. All 48 seasons of Saturday Night Live are also now streaming on Peacock.    

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