Like all of us, Saturday Night Live is just trying to make the best of quarantine life. Earlier in the month, the show took a bold leap by attempting its first “At Home” episode, which, on top of a socially-distanced assortment of sketches, featured a monologue from Tom Hanks, a musical performance from Chris Martin, and surprise cameos from celebrities trapped indoors.
SNL notably didn’t return the next week, because God only knows how difficult these episodes are to arrange, but according to a new Twitter video, a second “At Home” episode is arriving this Saturday.
You can watch the new promo spot below:
‼️ We're back this Saturday ‼️#SNLAtHome pic.twitter.com/fMBqBL0fqa
— Saturday Night Live – SNL (@nbcsnl) April 23, 2020
Like the first episode, SNL is playing things very close to its chest. There’s no official word on musical guests or who will be delivering the opening monologue, but that just adds to the spontaneity of the episodes as castmembers are forced to come up with apartment-bound material while everyone works remotely. We’ve all been on a Zoom call. Now imagine trying to turn one into an elaborate comedy sketch.
Remarkably, SNL still managed to deliver some impressive sketches under the unusual conditions. Its maiden voyage into “At Home” comedy featured riffs on Tiger King star Carole Baskin, Pete Davidson’s version of a Drake video, a struggling Twitch streamer, and a look at the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles coping with middle age. Curb Your Enthusiam‘s Larry David also popped in to reprise his classic Bernie Sanders impression, and Alec Baldwin was also back as Donald Trump to check in on the quarantined SNL proceedings.
With two weeks to prepare, it’ll be interesting (and hopefully entertaining) to see what rabbits the SNL crew can pull out of its hat this Saturday, and how long the show will keep the “At Home” comedy coming as America debates on when to reopen.
