Saturday Night Live is known for doing some wild things. There are hosts that you wouldn’t initially think would go on the show, and there are some sketches that are so wild that they don’t quite hit the mark. Yet, there is one thing that happened only once — and it will probably never happen again.
We’re talking about letting the internet choose the host. Well, okay, SNL didn’t quite give the internet free-rein, but Lorne Michaels did listen to what the people were saying, and it ended up being the best ever decision the show could have done.
Will it do it again, though? Seth Meyers doesn’t think so.
The time Betty White hosted Saturday Night Live
Now, when you think of Betty White, you’ll think of the icon that she became. We all remember her in Golden Girls, but that series didn’t make her as big of a star that would later become. Not really.
Golden Girls ended in 1992, but it wasn’t until 2009 that there was a huge push to get White on Saturday Night Live. This came after the 2009 rom-com The Proposal starring Sanda Bullock and Ryan Reynolds, where White played Reynold’s on-screen grandmother. And yes, there are some iconic moments from that movie that make it a must-watch, and it’s not surprising that the people of the internet thought she would make an excellent host.
And so, the campaign started. Michaels usually wouldn’t have given the campaign much thought, but mixed with The Proposal and then the Snickers Super Bowl add, he decided to listen to the people. Meyers noted on an episode of his podcast Lonely Island that it will likely never happen again, and he didn’t see it coming the first time, but it was “really cool.”
Betty White’s episode is one of the best SNL episodes ever
There’s no doubt that it was an excellent decision to have White host the episode. It turns out that behind-the-scenes, she was both down-to-earth and everything you would want in an 88-year-old woman, showing up at the afterparty with a hot dog and vodka. Look, did we expect anything else from this legend?
During the monologue, she noted on her age, doing live performances in the 1950s, and Facebook. Sure enough, it was because of the Facebook campaign, and while she didn’t know what Facebook was at the time, she quickly learned that it was “a huge waste of time.” This is one of those monologues that will go down in history, bringing up some of the elements of Facebook that have long been forgotten, such as “poking.”
The appearance would lead to her winning the Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series. And we can say that it was more than well deserved, and while this turned into a success, when you consider how the internet and campaigns are set up today, it’s probably best not to listen too much to them for SNL hosting.