Ryan Gosling And Jay-Z To Appear In 'SNL' Season 43 Curtain Raiser
The curtain-raiser for the upcoming season of ‘Saturday Night Live’ will be graced by Hollywood and pop royalty, with Ryan Gosling confirmed as the guest host of the season premiere next month and Jay-Z to perform live during the same episode.
‘Saturday Night Live’ made the big reveal for the start of its 43rd season via social media on Thursday (August 24th), using a bulletin board style layout with the various guest stars names on cards.
It’s the second time that La La Land star Gosling has hosted ‘SNL’, and the season premiere on September 30th comes just a week before his upcoming film, the much-vaunted cult sci-fi sequel Blade Runner 2049, opens in cinemas on October 6th.
Jay-Z will be making his fourth appearance as a musical guest, and will probably perform tracks from his recently released album 4:44. He last appeared in 2010, when he performed an eight-minute-long medley that included ‘Public Service Announcement’, ‘On to the Next One’, ‘99 Problems’ and ‘Empire State of Mind’.
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His performance coincides with the September 4th release of the A&E documentary Biggie: The Life of Notorious B.I.G., in which he is a talking-head guest star. Later in October, Jigga is kicking off a North American tour in Anaheim.
The election campaign and eventful presidency of Donald Trump have seen ‘SNL’ get its highest audience figures for many years, mainly due to Alec Baldwin’s ongoing impersonations of the divisive president.
Earlier this year, Lorne Michaels and the team behind ‘SNL’ made the bold decision to broadcast episodes live across the country, coast to coast. It seems likely that the experiment will continue into season 43.
More: Ryan Gosling promises that ‘Blade Runner 2049’ remains loyal to the original