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      How to Watch the ‘S.N.L.’ 50th Anniversary Special

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      The venerable sketch show is throwing itself a big star-studded party on Sunday night. Here’s everything you need to know about it.“Saturday Night Live” is celebrating its golden anniversary this weekend with a star-studded special in its Studio 8H at 30 Rock. You have questions? We have answers.When is the big ‘Saturday Night Live’ anniversary special?“SNL50: The Anniversary Special,” a three-hour event celebrating a half-century of comedy sketches, celebrity hosts, musical guests, standup monologues, fake commercials, performers losing it on national television, driving cats that get into car accidents and whatever the heck “Tiny Horse” is about, will be shown Sunday at 8 p.m. Eastern on NBC and Peacock. And yes, it is airing live.When did ‘S.N.L.’ broadcast its first episode?Back when it was simply called “Saturday Night” — because, at the time, ABC had a variety series called “Saturday Night Live” — the NBC show made its debut on Oct. 11, 1975.So ‘Saturday Night Live’ is celebrating its 50th anniversary on a Sunday months before its actual 50th anniversary?Well, it is currently the 50th season of “S.N.L.” Running the special on a Sunday night in February mirrors a strategy from 2015, when “S.N.L.” held its 40th anniversary show, and gives “SNL50” its own lane on a Presidents’ Day weekend following the hoopla of the Grammys and the Super Bowl, and ahead of the Oscars (March 2). Airing in prime time allows the special to reach a wider viewership and to wrap up in time for Tom Hanks to get his beauty rest.Who are some of the other celebrities scheduled to appear?You can expect venerated “S.N.L.” alums, veteran hosts and friends of the show including Adam Sandler, Eddie Murphy, Tina Fey, Will Ferrell, Chevy Chase, Amy Poehler, Steve Martin, Chris Rock, Maya Rudolph, Martin Short and Robert De Niro, according to NBC.Who were some of the guests who appeared in the 40th anniversary special?The 2015 celebration included sketches and tribute segments featuring Robert De Niro, Martin Short, Maya Rudolph, Chris Rock, Steve Martin, Amy Poehler, Chevy Chase, Will Ferrell, Tina Fey, Eddie Murphy and Adam Sandler.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      ‘S.N.L.’ Weekend Update: An Oral History of 50 Seasons

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      Roughly midway through the first “Saturday Night Live” broadcast, in October 1975, Chevy Chase, dressed in a suit and seated behind a simple desk with a telephone, read a joke about the new Detroit headquarters for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.The union’s president, Chase said, had remarked that Jimmy Hoffa would “always be a cornerstone in the organization.”Thus was born Weekend Update, the satirical news segment and institution-within-an-institution at “S.N.L.,” a fundamental part of the series for virtually all of its 50 years.While hardly the first TV news parody, Weekend Update is the most enduring franchise of its kind, giving “S.N.L.” its most direct platform to make fun of politics, presidents, global crises and daily oddities.Like “S.N.L.” itself, Weekend Update has been a launchpad for comedy careers. It has also been a crucible of controversy, particularly when its iconoclastic performers have come into conflict with NBC executives who weren’t laughing at their pointed routines.Weekend Update was designed to a satisfy a young audience that was craving topical commentary. “We were following Watergate, the end of the Vietnam War,” said Lorne Michaels, the “S.N.L.” creator and longtime executive producer. “There was a lot going on.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Tramell Tillman of ‘Severance’ Gives Himself a Performance Review

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      This interview contains spoilers from Season 2, Episode 5 of “Severance.”It’s hard to imagine Seth Milchick being late for anything.The manager of the “severed” floor in Apple TV+’s darkly satirical workplace thriller “Severance,” Mr. Milchick, as he is mostly known, is the consummate company man. He is a silky-voiced, coldhearted enforcer and is punctilious to the point of menace.Much less is known about the actor who plays him, Tramell Tillman. Before “Severance,” his résumé consisted mostly of minor TV roles and theater. So when he agreed to meet on a recent weekday afternoon at Manhattanville Coffee, near his apartment in Upper Manhattan, I couldn’t help but half expect him to be waiting for me there, hands folded on the table, wearing a mouth-only smile that barely cloaked his disappointment that I hadn’t shown up earlier.Instead something much more charming, less android-like, had happened: Tillman had gone to the wrong Washington Heights location of Manhattanville.He texted: “I’ll come to you.” Ten minutes later, he blew in the door, apologetic as he unwrapped himself from a thick scarf, ski cap and tan utility jacket. “My bad,” he said. “It’s been a crazy week.”One got the impression it had been a crazy few years for Tillman since the debut of his breakout role in “Severance,” a disturbingly allegorical sci-fi series that follows a group of workers who have had their consciousness “severed” into discrete work and home selves. The show was an instant cultural phenomenon, and a critical darling, when it premiered in 2022 — a particularly claustrophobic time for many, when distinctions between home and office life were rapidly collapsing.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      ‘Yellowjackets’ Season 3, Episode 2 Recap: New Friends

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      An unexpected visitor shows up on Adult Shauna’s doorstep, prompting Callie to get ideas. Young Shauna makes a new friend.Season 3, Episode 2: ‘Dislocation’I’ll admit: I had to Google the name of the blonde Yellowjacket (Jenna Burgess) who starts making out with Shauna in this week’s jaw-dropping “Yellowjackets” conclusion. It’s Melissa.Up until this point, Melissa has been one of those Yellowjackets whose presence seemed sort of pointless. She was almost a glorified extra, there just to fill out the scenes in the woods. (She also didn’t show up till Season 2, which we apparently weren’t supposed to notice — and mostly didn’t.)Even the show acknowledged her lack of character development in the premiere this season. After Melissa cracks a mean joke about Mari to Shauna, Shauna says, “Wait, do you, like, actually have a personality?”That’s just what we were all thinking.But Episode 2 confirms that Melissa not only has a personality but is also set to become a major part of the woodland (and likely the present-day) narrative. The final moments set it all up with a sequence in which both timelines collide.In the woods, Melissa follows Shauna with the aim of complimenting her on her resilience. Shauna’s reasonable response? To draw a knife on her. But instead of balking at that threat, Melissa goes in for a kiss. Shauna, shockingly, responds by kissing her back.This is all intercut with a scene of the present day Shauna on a phone call to the manager of the restaurant where she accompanied Jeff to a disastrous work dinner. During that evening, Shauna retreated to the bathroom where, in truly “Yellowjackets” form, something freaky happens. Someone entered, turned off the lights and left a phone in an adjoining stall. The background on the device features a picture of some very familiar looking mountains. And the when the phone rings from an unknown number, it plays the song “Queen of Hearts” by Juice Newton.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      ‘Yellowjackets’ Season 3 Premiere Recap: It’s All Fun and Games Until …

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      The teen Yellowjackets seem to be having fun when we first rejoin them. Taking bets now for which one gets eaten first.Season 3, Episode 1: ‘It Girl’Welcome back to the wilderness, darlings.“Yellowjackets” is back and we’re — wait, what is this? Are we having fun? Can that be possible in a show that ended its last season with multiple devastating deaths? With an adolescent’s heart being eaten? If Season 2 got bogged down in the dour, Season 3 is promising to bring some levity back into the proceedings — despite, you know, the cannibalism.Based on this first episode back, “Yellowjackets” seems to be trying to recapture the juicy magic of its breakout first season, which sucked us in with its tale of bloodthirsty would-be high school soccer stars. Right off the bat, this premiere is a little goofier, a little cattier and a little less self-serious.The very first images we see onscreen hint toward the reset. We get a mirror image of the opening scene from the pilot — one of the reasons we got hooked on this show. A dark-haired girl is being chased through the woods.But now it’s immediately clear who is running and who is pursuing. Teen Mari (Alexa Barajas), the team’s resident mean girl, is trying to escape Teen Shauna (Sophie Nélisse), who tackles her and bites her hand. This, however, is no creepy ritual. Rather, it’s a game of the poorly named “capture the bone,” a cannibal’s riff on “capture the flag.” Mari is a decoy, leading her team to victory. At the end of the chase, no one dies, and everyone cheers.The vibes in the forest are actually pretty good. This is shocking considering Season 2 ended with the girls’ being stranded without shelter because their cabin burned down. But now the snow has cleared, and the Yellowjackets have built new living spaces, artful looking huts. They have a garden with ducks and rabbits. Food is plentiful. Natalie (Sophie Thatcher), previously crowned the queen of their toxic group, rules benevolently. They talk of how their sacrifices led to miracles.For the most part everyone is pretty happy. Everyone except for Shauna, that is. Shauna is furious that her teammates are not wracked with guilt over their misdeeds. Her anger is understandable, of course. She is probably struggling with depression after having given birth to a son and lost him, and she isn’t into the kumbaya spirit that seems to be taking over. She is especially mad at Mari, who taunts her.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Theater to Watch at Home: ‘Uncle Vanya’ and an Alice Childress Revival

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      A bare-bones Chekhov, a critically acclaimed revival of “The Wedding Band” and the cult TV series “Smash” are all available for streaming.‘The Wedding Band’Stream it on Stratfest@Home.In 2022, Alice Childress’s play about love and hate, written in 1962, received its first major revival in 50 years, to much acclaim. The following year, “The Wedding Band,” was staged at the Stratford Festival in Ontario, making it a welcome second coming for our theater critic.The play about an interracial couple — a Black woman, played by Antonette Rudder, and a white man, Cyrus Lane — who, in 1918 South Carolina, can’t wed, is a searing examination of a miscegenation nation. Writing for The New York Times, Jesse Green called the 2023 Stratford production, directed by Sam White, a “revelation,” adding that the festival’s revival “confirms the play’s vitality.”From Green’s critic’s notebook:It’s a joyful thing when a great play that seemed to be lost is found. How much more so when its greatness is confirmed and the play takes root in the soil of a new time. That was my experience seeing Alice Childress’s “Wedding Band” … The director Sam White’s production unexpectedly adds another layer of tragedy. Her staging emphasizes the hard-won pleasures of the central relationship, so that something valuable is felt to be lost when the world intervenes. … We see how the tragedy of racism makes victims of everyone.‘Vanya on 42nd Street’Stream it on Amazon Prime, Pluto TV or the Roku Channel.New York is experiencing something of an explosion of Chekhov. “The Seagull” featured prominently in Theaterlab’s recent production of “Nina”; “The Cherry Orchard” is coming to St. Ann’s Warehouse next month, along with “Vanya,” an adaptation of “Uncle Vanya,” starring Andrew Scott, Andrew Scott and Andrew Scott (he plays every role). Its Off Broadway debut comes after a highly praised run in London. The one-man show, adapted by Simon Stephens and directed by Sam Yates, won last year’s Olivier Award — Britain’s equivalent of the Tonys.But you don’t have to be in a theater to take in Chekhov. If you’ve never seen “Vanya on 42nd Street,” the 1994 Louis Malle film of André Gregory’s production, now is a timely moment to watch.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Barbie Hsu, Taiwanese Actress and Star of ‘Meteor Garden,’ Dies at 48

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      Her role in the teen drama catapulted her to fame as a pop idol. She was also a TV host and appeared in films.Barbie Hsu, a Taiwanese actress, television host and pop star who catapulted to Pan-Asian popularity in 2001 as the star of the Cinderella-style teenage drama “Meteor Garden,” died on Feb. 2 in Tokyo. She was 48.Her death was announced to TVBS News in Taiwan by her sister Dee Hsu, who said the cause was complications of the flu. The family had been vacationing in Japan.In “Meteor Garden,” an adaptation of the Japanese manga “Boys Over Flowers,” Ms. Hsu played Dong Shan Cai, a naïve yet headstrong student from a poor family who is terrorized by a group of four handsome boys who call themselves F4 after she enrolls in the elite private school they attend. She reluctantly enters high society when F4’s leader, Dao Ming Si (played by Jerry Yan), falls for her.With her expressive eyes and elfin features, Ms. Hsu was a natural for the role, and she exploded in popularity across swaths of Asia, where she was known by the nickname Big S.Fans were particularly drawn to her character’s relatable and resilient nature. “I am like a blade of grass,” she said in one episode. “No matter how many times you cut me down, I will grow back and live again.”The four male stars used the series’ influence to promote their boy band, also called F4 — for “Flower Four” — making “Meteor Garden” an early example of the genre known as idol drama, formulaic but addictive love stories featuring pop stars. Ms. Hsu’s character became the genre’s classic protagonist.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Lorne Michaels Reflects on His ‘S.N.L.’ Legacy Ahead of the 50th Anniversary

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      Is it possible that Lorne Michaels is Lorne-ed out?Even for a man who enjoys being famous, all the hoopla surrounding the 50th anniversary of “Saturday Night Live,” all the extra attention it has brought him, has been a bit much.“I say this not with any sense of modesty — I was famous enough,” Michaels said recently at Orso, one of his favorite New York haunts. Someone who knew him once sardonically suggested Michaels would like to have “LEGENDARY” stitched into his underwear. And he is, after all, known in some circles by one name, like Beyoncé, Cher, Ichiro. But Michaels demurs.“Everybody who had to know me, knew me,” he said. “I wasn’t in the public eye. But now, walking over here, a young comedian came up and said, ‘How would I audition?’”I said I would have loved to have seen that encounter.“You would not love that,” he said in his bone-dry voice and signature cadence.Since the 50th season premiered last fall, the anniversary of “S.N.L.,” one of a fragmented America’s few remaining communal cultural events, has inspired a steady stream of tributes to the show and its creator. There was a Jason Reitman origin-story movie called “Saturday Night,” as well as hundreds of feature stories and listicles in the press. Last month there was a four-part docuseries on the show and another documentary on just the music. Friday night brings an “S.N.L” concert at Radio City Music Hall, livestreaming on Peacock. A 600-plus page biography of Michaels titled “Lorne,” by Susan Morrison, an editor at The New Yorker, comes out next week.It all culminates on Sunday with a live three-hour prime-time special looking back on “S.N.L.” and its singular legacy. Like a Veterans Day parade with troops from different wars marching by, “S.N.L.” stars from different decades, among many other celebrities young and old — guests include Paul McCartney, Robert De Niro, Steve Martin, Sabrina Carpenter, Tom Hanks, Kim Kardashian and Dave Chappelle — are swirling around New York, ready to help Michaels celebrate the golden anniversary.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More