SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE — Episode 1879 — Pictured: Musical guest Morgan Wallen, host Mikey Madison, and … More Chloe Fineman during Promos in Studio 8H on Thursday, March 27, 2025
Rosalind O’Connor/NBC via Getty Images
Anora’s Mikey Madison hosted Saturday Night Live for the first time with musical guest Morgan Wallen. The country star has been the musical guest once before, in December of 2020 (after his original October 2020 debut was delayed after it surfaced that he wasn’t social distancing.)
While it was Madison’s first time on the show, earlier this season, Heidi Gardner impersonated the Oscar winner in a sketch about Wicked Auditions. SNL Season 50 has largely seen returning hosts, and having a fresh, new face added some excitement and risk to the night.
Cold Open
In this cold open, a high school girls’ (Madison, Ego Nwodim and Sarah Sherman) gossip sesh in the group chat is interrupted by Andrew Dismukes as Pete Hegseth. It can be hard to parody a situation as unbelievable as this week’s Signal Chat Scandal. However, this sketch does a pretty good job. The girls and the defense secretary are joined by JD Vance (Bowen Yang) and Marco Rubio (Marcello Hernández.) Hernández especially seems to be having fun with the role to hilarious results. This is one of the shorter cold open of the season, which makes it feel punchy and tight. The host seldom is in the cold open, which is another fun switch-up this week.
Monologue
This monologue has a lot of cutaways. Some work better than others. Madison introduces her real-life relaxed vibe before a montage of her intense film performances. She shows childhood photos of her on a horse on Halloween. She introduces her twin brother in a lineup and even ‘shows off’ some striping moves. A lot is going on, which makes it feel fairly disjointed. While the monologue doesn’t really all come together, Madison does come off as deeply charming. Is it the funniest? No. But hosting is hard, especially as a first-timer. While she seems nervous and not all the jokes work, she also comes off as very likable.
Acting Teacher 2
While we probably didn’t need a sequel to Hernández’s acting teacher sketch, he really sells the performance. He first did the character on Charli XCX’s November episode. This permutation doesn’t break any new ground, but it is an enjoyable enough sketch with an energetic performance at its center.
Big Dumb Line
This Euro-pop-inspired song is about standing in long lines for viral foods in New York. It’s fun and pretty catchy, but maybe the most notable part of the sketch is a Joe Jonas cameo. While it’s unclear why he’s there, it’s a fun little surprise.
Jury Duty
Nwodim plays a judge who is met with a cast of wacky characters while trying to select a jury. This kind of sketch is nothing new, but there is something nice about sketches that have these rapid-fire characters. If a singular joke/impression doesn’t work, it immediately cuts to the next one. Not all of the characters in the sketch are great, but it keeps you engaged and allows for many cast members to get some screen time. Highlights include Yang as a man who is from the future, Emil Wakim as Luigi Mangione, Kenan Thompson and Michael Longfellow.
Spring Break
Chloe Fineman and Hernández have a heart-to-heart on spring break while chaos unfolds right out their window. This is a sequel to a Jenna Ortega-led sketch where she has to talk to Hernández outside of a Waffle House. The game of this sketch is pretty fun; however, the sequel didn’t really go anywhere the original didn’t.
Morgan Wallen Performs
After high-concept performances from Lady Gaga in the last episode, Wallen’s low-key country performances seem like a bit of a letdown. It isn’t a fair comparison and Wallen does well. It just lacks a little bit of excitement. Wallen performed his songs ‘If I’m The Problem’ and ‘Just in Case.’
Weekend Update
Weekend Update started with jokes about Signal-gate before he had a full crash out about Paddington. Overall, it was a fun Update that was really elevated by Devon Walker and Ashley Padilla.
Walker stopped by to share his rise and grind schedule a la fitness influencer Ashton Hall. Walker brings a video, which feels fresh for Update. It comes complete with a cameos from Jost and Lorne Michaels and, of course, about 100 bottles of Saratoga Water.
Padilla brought a more traditional update character segment as Joann from Joann Fabrics. While it is more conventional, it gets a little comedically risky at moments. Padilla’s performance really anchors this character segment.
Pop’s Big Regret
When a mobster father is bleeding out, he has one big regret: that he never tried to do stand-up comedy. The premise is funny, but this sketch is never really more than that. The hack stand-up jokes are supposed to be bad, but they weigh this sketch down.
Barry the Midwife
Yang returns as Barry, the Midwife. He first played the character last year on Quinta Brunson’s April 2023 episode. This is another sequel with the same premise and beats as the first one. While it makes sense to bring back a good character, this sketch is almost a shot-for-shot remake of the first one until the very end. If you haven’t seen the original sketch, this may be funny. However, if you have, it leads to a weird sense of deja vu, and the word-for-word joke retellings don’t work.
Please Don’t Destroy – Mikey Madison Is Squidward
This is how you do a sequel to a sketch. While it is obviously inspired by the PDD short Bad Bunny is Shrek, it creates its own game and goes to new places. More importantly, it’s funny. For most of this episode, Madison does a good job but doesn’t feel creatively stretched. It’s fun to see her be really goofy in a sketch.
So Like… What Are We?
This feels like another sequel; however, this writer doesn’t believe it is. SNL does a lot of game show concepts, which may be why it feels familiar. However, it’s funny. In it, Madison questions Longfellow about the nature of their relationship.
Planning New York
It is wonderful to see an SNL animated short. The sketch follows two explorers in the 1600s as they make a plan for New York City. Some of the jokes are a little inside baseball for non-New Yorkers, but the animation style really elevates this sketch.
SNL returns on April 5, 2025, with host Jack Black and musical guests Elton John & Brandi Carlile. They also announced that their April 12 show will feature Jon Hamm and Lizzo.
