NEW YORK — Fresh off her Emmy win, Jean Smart is taking her comedy to a new audience — she’ll kick off “Saturday Night Live’s” landmark 50th season.
NBC announced Thursday the lineup of hosts for the season, which premieres Sept. 28. Jelly Roll will join Smart in the first show as a musical act. He was also at the Emmys and sang during the ceremony’s in memoriam segment.
It will be Smart’s first time hosting “SNL” and Jelly Roll’s first appearance on the show. Smart shared the news Instagramand wrote that hosting was a “bucket list” item for her.
The rest of the hosts and musical guests – save breakout sensation Chappell Roan, who will make his musical guest debut in November – return to the series. Comedian Nate Bargatze, who hosted last October to great success, thanks to a sketch in which he played George Washington, will host again on October 5, with Coldplay as the musical guest. Coldplay has previously performed on the show seven times and will ring in the eighth right after the band’s latest album, “Moon Music,” is released.
Ariana Grande – who stars in the upcoming “Wicked” film adaptation – will host for the second time on October 12. She has previously been a musical guest twice, but Fleetwood Mac icon Stevie Nicks will perform for Grande’s episode. Nicks was the musical guest once before, in 1983.
“Beetlejuice” star Michael Keaton will host Oct. 19, the last show before Halloween, for his fourth time on the show, and Billie Eilish will be that night’s musical guest, also marking her fourth time on “SNL.”
“SNL” alum John Mulaney will return to the show as host for the sixth time on Nov. 2, with Roan as the musical guest. Mulaney, who worked as a writer on the show before making it big as a stand-up comedian, is behind some of “SNL’s” most recognizable bits, such as Bill Hader as Stefana regular “Weekend Update”.
The 50th season has been highly anticipated during the show’s summer hiatus, with fans calling for Maya Rudolph to reprise her role as Kamala Harris and clamoring for Tim Walz lookalike Steve Martin to make an appearance as the vice presidential candidate, a role he’s held ever since. declined.