Twerk Alert: Retooling 'SNL' Gives Miley Cyrus Her Own Show
Saturday Night Live is hoping that the great American Miley Cyrus debate will still matter next month, as they've booked the suddenly controversial pop singer to host and musical guest on the October 5 episode.
.Saturday Night Live is hoping that the great American Miley Cyrus debate will still matter next month, as they've booked the suddenly controversial pop singer to host and musical guest on the October 5 episode.
The long-running comedy show announced its new season's first few host/musical guest pairings this morning. And while the season opener's combo of SNL vet Tina Fey as host and beloved indie act Arcade Fire as musical guest certainly implies that September 28 will be a quality night of television, the fact that the show is giving Cyrus a platform to do her wild thing is the more intriguing news. Cyrus last hosted in 2011.
It's probably good business for the show, which should get a ratings boost as folks tune in to see whether Cyrus will set tongues wagging (her own included) like she did on last month's MTV Video Music Awards. Chances are she will: this past weekend Cyrus performed her hit song "We Can't Stop" on a German TV show backed by a band made up of little people. Good news for an American public that's more interested in the singer than, well, Syria.
On the comedy side, Cyrus's sketches practically write themselves. Can't you just see the digital short—or whatever they're calling those in the post-Lonely Island days—about teaching old people how to twerk? Or the Weekend Update segment featuring one of the gigantic teddy bears from Miley's VMA act, complaining about how he didn't get the attention he deserved? Or the sketch about a treatment center for people who just can't stop sticking their tongues out? It's all there, Saturday Night Live writers!
Meanwhile, it's hard to know what the rest of the show will look like in the upcoming season. The show is in flux after veterans Bill Hader, Fred Armisen, and Jason Sudeikis bid their farewells at the end of last season. Deadline's Nellie Andreeva reported on the comedians who are likely to join the cast last month, but there has been no official announcement.