Who is Hosting Saturday Night Live Tonight: November 28, 2020

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Saturday Night Live will be back live next week, but tonight we get a repeat SNL hosted by Golden Globe and Emmy Award nominee, Issa Rae!

Only one more week until Saturday Night Live returns from its post-election break with new live shows. According to an NBC press release, SNL will be back live on Saturday, December 5th with host Jason Bateman and musical guest Morgan Wallen who was originally scheduled to play SNL when Bill Burr hosted earlier in the season, but was replaced when he broke strict NBC Covid protocols. December 5, 2020 will be Jason Bateman’s second time hosting SNL.

Looking further into the schedule, on Saturday, December 12th, Academy Award nominee and star of “Call Me By Your Name” Timothée Chalamet will make his Saturday Night Live hosting debut. His musical guest will be the ratings boosting Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. This will be the Boss and his band’s third time on SNL as the musical guest.

Then to finish up the year, former cast member Kristen Wiig who co-stars as “The Cheetah” in the new “Wonder Woman 1984” action comic book movie (in theaters December 25th) will be back to host Saturday Night Live for her 4th time on Saturday, December 19th. Kristen Wiig’s musical guest for the SNL Christmas show on the 19th will be Dua Lipa.

Now that we’re all caught up on the upcoming SNL shows, let’s get back to tonight’s repeat.

If you’re a fan of HBO comedy programming, we’re sure you’re also a fan of the very talented Issa Rae. She is the star and co-creator (along with Larry Wilmore) of the Golden Globe and Primetime Emmy Award nominated HBO comedy series, “Insecure“. Her series was based on her web series “The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl.” After wrapping up another season of “Insecure” this past summer, she was a natural pick to host Saturday Night Live in its new season and that’s the SNL rerun airing tonight on NBC. Tonight’s Saturday Night Live encore is originally from October 17, 2020.

Before Issa Rae gets on stage tonight, Saturday Night Live opens this evening’s show in the thick of the Presidential campaign season. The SNL Cold Open takes us back to October when the two nominees, then-Vice President Joe Biden and President Donald Trump had competing town halls on different networks on the same night.

This would be the third episode where Jim Carrey plays Joe Biden, with Alec Baldwin back on SNL to once again play #DiaperDonald Trump who threw such a presidential-sized tantrum about the debate format, he ended up with his own town hall separate from Joe Biden’s. Along for the cold open ride are cast members Mikey Day as ABC’s George George Stephanopoulos and Kate McKinnon as NBC’s Savannah Guthrie.

Tonight’s opener takes us back and forth between “Dueling Town Halls“. Carrey’s Joe Biden is portrayed as elderly and confused, sometimes taking on the personas of Mister Rogers and artist Bob Ross. Meanwhile, Baldwin’s Trump is mean and evasive and gets a visit by Biden running mate Senator Kamala Harris played once again by visiting former cast member Maya Rudolph.

Like every other cold open in SNL – Season 46, this opening sketch runs way too long as well. However, one thing SNL does get very right in this sketch is how they capture all the real-life weirdos who were at Donald Trump’s actual town hall. Featured cast member Chloe Fineman again nails another impression in the cold opener, playing the South Florida woman enamored by Donald Trump.

Issa Rae’s SNL monologue was kept to a shorter length like with all SNL hosts who aren’t working stand up comedians. The first-time SNL host was so happy and so scared all at the same time and at one point she thinks she might puke from the excitement of hosting Saturday Night Live for the first time. In her monologue, she also talks about breaking a glass ceiling that was already broken when she got there.

Tonight’s host also explained that she was originally scheduled to host last season during this past March, but then, yep, Covid happened. And speaking of which, Issa Rae was actually a little embarrassed getting to host Saturday Night Live along with all her other accolades. Only because her life was going so great while the world was bowing to a pandemic and the country was in the grips of a racial upheaval. Let’s face it. That is an awkward position to be in. As Issa Rae says tonight, “It was rude to be peaking right when democracy was collapsing.”

The opening sketch heading into the bulk of the tonight’s show is a Montreal local morning talk show sketch featuring whichever SNL cast members could do a French-Canadian accent and sound like they’re speaking French even though they’re obviously not. Issa Rae plays a correspondent who’s constantly hoping to have a Drake sighting. She must have brought up her ability to do a French accent when she sat down with the writers earlier in the week for this sketch to make it on the air.

There’s a great restaurant sketch that features a couple out on a date for the first time since the pandemic struck. The woman played by Issa Rae keeps running into her exes. It’s a great chance for the cast members to play some insane characters. Some of them more than others. Watch for featured cast member Bowen Yang as “Robot” along with his dog Astro.

In the second morning TV talk show sketch of the night, host Issa Rae plays a pundit on “Your Voice Chicago” a Sunday morning political issues show. Issa’s character knows who she’s voting for in the upcoming local elections. It’s everybody who’s black. A decision she may not be able to stick with at the polls. Watch for Maya Rudolph to join in on this sketch.

And if you were a fan of the Michigan ring-wing militia’s plot to kidnap the governor of that state, you’ll love the final sketch of the night, and you may be the only ones that do. In this weird sketch, a commercial for “Jack Flatts” restaurants is interrupted by a militia who demand that the restaurant chain be reopened during the pandemic shutdown. It’s one of the shyest militias you’ll ever want to meet. Like most, they’re a lot of talk, but their love of Jack Flatts is sincere.

The first of the SNL Shorts tonight is a parody spot that stars cast member Beck Bennett as someone who is overwhelmed by all the injustice in the world, but he can’t relate to it. But there’s a new product that helps with that called “5 Hour Empathy.” He’s just reluctant to try that because after all he’s not a racist. Honestly. He’s not!

Cast member Kyle Mooney stars in the second SNL Short of the night. He tries to impress host Issa Rae so that she’ll recommend him to musical guest Justin Bieber to be one of his backup dancers. Little does Kyle know that Issa has dance ambitions of her own. Chance the Rapper makes a cameo in this short to throw his hat in the dance ring too.

The final short of the night is a parody spot for eBay. It’s the place to sell all that brand new junk you bought during the early days of the lockdown to better yourself, but never even touched. From the guitar you were going to learn to play to the embroidery equipment that you just ignored, there’s a place for all of it on eBay.

Colin Jost and Michael Che kick off tonight’s edition of Weekend Update talking about President Trump’s packed campaign rallies which Jost refers to as “Coronavirus giveaways” which are part of his “Herd Immunity Tour.” The Weekend Update news team also get into some clips from Trump’s rallies where he’s really starting to panic about losing the election.

Michael Che makes a joke tonight about NBC hosting the Donald Trump town hall earlier in the week which again, elicits moans from the live studio audience. It’s one of the best jokes of this new SNL season and may go down as joke of the year. Don’t miss it.

Other topics covered tonight on this repeat edition of Weekend Update include a C-SPAN host getting suspended, a Russian plot involving Rudy Giuliani, Trump denying any knowledge of QAnon, the top Halloween costumes for 2020, a stolen lemur, the new Fisher-Price toy museum, a study about men with deeper voices cheating on their wives, a new chicken sandwich, a pastor peeing on a fellow airline passenger, and Che has a story about a statue which looks like a homeless man sleeping on bench which exasperates the Update anchor when the audience turns on him once again.

Visiting the Weekend Update desk tonight are First Sons, Donald Jr. and Eric Trump played by cast members Mikey Day and Alex Moffat respectively. The Trump boys with the Eddie Munster hairstyles are speaking with Colin Jost in order to dispel the rumor that their dad is scared about losing to Joe Biden.

Donald Jr. and Eric also introduce to us to the latest member of the Trump family to receive the SNL treatment, half-sister Tiffany Trump who is played by featured player Chloe Fineman, complete with captain’s hat and champagne bottle. The sweet part of this is seeing Tiffany and Eric also meet each other for the first time.

We also get a new segment on tonight’s Weekend Update called “Aidy in America” featuring SNL‘s own Lil Baby Aidy Bryant out in the country looking for undecided voters. She’s not having a lot of luck. She is finding American cows though. Aidy Bryant was actually in Portland finishing up filming on the new season of her Hulu series, “Shrill.” Hurry home soon Aidy!

And Weekend Update wraps this evening with a visit from cast member Heidi Gardner as “Famous 80s Cocaine Wife, Carla.” She’s trying to find her way into the Saturday Night Live after-party even though it’s been cancelled due to the Covid virus. When you see Carla powder her nose, you’ll know why she wants into the SNL party so badly. Maybe she should look for an SNL party with the 1976 cast.

We have the SNL promos from back in October for this repeat episode for you to enjoy all over again. In the first one, it’s Jim Carrey transforming himself through makeup and wardrobe into becoming candidate Joe Biden for tonight’s repeat SNL Cold Open.

In the second promo for tonight’s SNL encore, host Issa Rae is joined by musical guest Justin Bieber who claims to have a “big ol’ smile” hiding underneath his face mask. That’s great. Just as long as it’s not that hideous middle school mustache he tried to grow.

Issa Rae, the star of HBO’s “Insecure” hosts tonight’s repeat episode of Saturday Night Live with musical guest Justin Bieber at 11:30pm et on NBC.

Saturday Night Live returns next Saturday, December 5th with a brand new show hosted by Jason Bateman!

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Ernie Tripper

Ernie Tripper