'Saturday Night Live' Sets December Hosts, Including The Return Of Kristen Wiig
Saturday Night Live made an epic run of six episodes in a row when they came back for the 46th season at the height of the 2020 election season. Now that all of that nonsense is behind us, it's time to look forward to December. The late night sketch series has announced the three hosts who will be hosting right up until the week before Christmas, and former cast member Kristen Wiig will be hosting the last episode of the year, just in time to promote the release of Wonder Woman 1984. But who else is hosting in December? Find out below.
Kicking off the trio of new episodes (via SNL on Instagram) will be Jason Bateman on December 5, hosting for the first time in 15 years. Though the actor doesn't have any immediate projects coming up, he's had a big year thanks to his shows The Outsider and Ozark. Both earned him Emmy nominations for acting while Ozark also earned him a nomination as an executive producer when the show was nominated for Outstanding Drama Series. In 2019, Bateman also won an Emmy for his work as a director on the series.
Though Bateman has really been digging into drama in recent years, he's still a sharp comedic actor too. He recently appeared in Game Night, and he will soon star in a new adaptation of the board game. He was originally meant to direct the movie as well, but that responsibility now falls upon James Bobin.
Bateman will be joined by musical guest Morgan Wallen, getting a second chance after his irresponsible partying during a pandemic resulted in him being removed as the musical guest on the episode that was hosted by Bill Burr. He was replaced with Jack White at the last minute after a TikTok video of him partying in a group without masks surfaced online, but Lorne Michaels said he would give him a second chance, so here it is.
On December 12, SNL will have Timothée Chalamet making hosting debut. The actor stars in the new adaptation of Dune, which was originally slated to arrive in theaters the week after this hosting stint, but it has since been pushed back to October 2021 so it can get a theatrical release. Though it would make sense for the hosting stint to be delayed to a weekend closer to the release of Dune, maybe Chalamet's schedule is too packed to risk not being able to bring the hot, young star to SNL.
Chalamet will be joined by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, who hasn't been on the show in almost five years. But Springsteen recently released a new album, so it's the perfect time for him to appear on the show.
Finally, Kristen Wiig is returning to her old stomping grounds to host the December 19 episode, which will be the Christmas episode. Wiig returned to host the final episode of SNL last season, but it was a bit weird since it was one of the three Saturday Night Live at Home episodes that was produced remotely with the cast members writing and creating sketches from home.
Wiig will be seen in theaters and on HBO Max this holiday season with the release of Wonder Woman 1984 on the big screen and the small screen simultaneously. She's playing the villain Cheetah, which could be a role that really changes the trajectory of her career. But no matter how far she strays from comedy, she'll always have a place to come back to at SNL, which turned her into a household name.
Joining Wiig as musical guest will be singer/songwriter Dua Lipa, who recently presented a pay-per-view streaming concert event called Studio 2054 where she performed songs from her first two albums, her self-titled debut and Future Nostalgia, The latter was released back in March just as the pandemic was beginning.
It's not clear when SNL will return for 2021, but we'll be sure to keep you posted. Stay tuned for our review and recap of all three of these new episodes in the coming weeks.