Showrunners over at Saturday Night Live announced late this afternoon that out of an abundance of caution there would be no audience for tonight’s taping and a limited cast. The final SNL of 2021.
There will also be no musical guest. Charlie XCX had been scheduled. You can view the tweets below.
Due to the recent spike in the Omicron variant and out of an abundance of caution, there will be no live audience for tonight’s taping of “Saturday Night Live” and the show will have limited cast and crew.
— Saturday Night Live – SNL (@nbcsnl) December 18, 2021
Charlie XCX also tweeted her regrets.
— Charli (@charli_xcx) December 18, 2021
While circumstances are certainly understandable, it’s an unfortunate turn of events for the show right now. Saturday Night Live is off to it’s best start in years. The new cast members have been funny and the old cast members are still making us laugh. Even the hopeless “Weekend Update” has been enjoyable so far this year with Colin Jost and Michael Che actually being funny for a change. Every host and musical guest has been good.
The show will still go on with Paul Rudd as host. If there is a talent that can pull of a stripped down show no audience, it’s him.
SNL modified their show during the beginning of the pandemic, going to a zoom oriented presentation for the ending of that season with mixed results.