Just A Quick Reminder That SNL Is Paying Its Audience To Be There
Normal pandemic stuff.
Tonight in New York City, one hundred or so people will file into Rockefeller Center in groups of up to nine. There they will receive staggered Covid-19 rapid tests and slowly make their way into Studio 8H, each group seated in its own section, separated from other sections by at least six feet. When the show begins, they’ll laugh and cheer and applaud through their masks. Given this episode’s host and musical guest, Nick Jonas, they’ll likely even let out a few screams. When the show ends, they’ll slowly file out of the studio. As they leave, each person will receive a check for $150.
Saturday Night Live’s peculiar adaptation to New York’s reopening guidelines has mostly faded into the background since it was first announced. As so often happens when SNL makes headlines, they quickly revert to the same old conversations: who’s hosting, who’s doing which impression, what a funny digital short that was, how pitch-perfect was that musical sketch, blah blah blah. The simple fact of the show’s production, in studio, with a live audience, during a pandemic, has become an unremarkable part of life instead of what it should be: some bonkers dystopian bullshit happening every Saturday night for the whole world to see.
This is very lucky for SNL, because the whole scheme withers under a little sunlight.
