Saturday Night Live returned online last weekend with at-home content
Written by Site Hub on April 19, 2020
On Saturday, April 11, past and present cast members of “Saturday Night Live” produced their first-ever remote, pre-recorded show. The episode was recorded over Zoom and linked to SNL’s Twitter and YouTube accounts. Content was created in cast members’ homes and featured Tom Hanks as the guest host and Coldplay’s Chris Martin as the guest musician. The “episode” started with both a name change to “Saturday Night Live At Home” and the statement “Live from Zoom, it’s sometime between March and August.”
Hanks performed his monologue from his kitchen while wearing a suit. He stated: “It is a strange time to try and be funny, but trying to be funny is ‘SNL’s’ whole thing, so what the heck, let’s give it a shot… This ‘Saturday Night Live’ is going to be a little different, for one thing it’s been filmed entirely by the ‘SNL’ cast who are currently quarantined in their homes… Also, there’s no such thing as Saturdays anymore… And we’re not really live, but we’re doing everything we can to make this feel like the ‘SNL’ you know and love.”
Chris Martin played “Shelter From The Storm” by Bob Dylan. Sketches included Alec Baldwin phoning in as President Donald Trump, Larry David as Senator Bernie Sanders, and Colin Jost and Michael Che as hosts for the “Weekend Update: Home Edition.”
Che’s appearance surprised many of his fans as he had recently lost his grandmother, Martha, to SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) complications. Che ended the news segment by saying “I’m Martha’s grandbaby” instead of his name to honor her.
https://tv.avclub.com/the-cast-and-tom-hanks-cobble-together-a-scattershot-bu-1842814009
https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/12/media/saturday-night-live-snl-coronavirus/index.html
