Saturday Night Live (season 35)


The thirty-fifth season of Saturday Night Live, an American sketch comedy series, originally aired in the United States on NBC between September 26, 2009, and May 15, 2010.
A total of 22 episodes were broadcast during the show's eight-month-long season, which included a two-week break in February due to the 2010 Winter Olympics. The season was accompanied by three prime-time episodes of Saturday Night Live Weekend Update Thursday and three prime-time SNL clip shows.
A notable moment of the season was when an internet campaign was created to get actress Betty White to host an episode of the show. The campaign was started in early 2010 on Facebook and the group was called "Betty White to Host SNL !" The campaign was successful, and White became the oldest person ever to host the show. For White's episode, Lorne Michaels brought back former cast members Rachel Dratch, Tina Fey, Ana Gasteyer, Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph and Molly Shannon. The episode garnered the show's highest ratings in over a year. with a rating of 5.8 in the 18–49 rating, demographic and with 12.1 million viewers overall.

Cast

Before the start of the season, Darrell Hammond, who was last cast member from the 1990s, left the show. At the time he became the longest-running cast member with a total of 14 seasons, he would later be surpassed by Kenan Thompson in 2017. Featured players Michaela Watkins and Casey Wilson were both let go from the show before the start of the season. To fill their absence the show brought in two new featured players, Nasim Pedrad of The Groundlings and stand-up comic Jenny Slate. Abby Elliott and Bobby Moynihan remained as featured players.
This would be the last season for longtime cast member Will Forte, who had been with the cast for 8 seasons since 2002. This would also be the only season for featured player Jenny Slate.

Cast roster

Repertory players
Featured players
bold denotes Weekend Update anchor

Writers

theater performer Mike O'Brien joins the writing staff. He would join the cast for the show's thirty-ninth season. Season 35 would prove to be the final season with Lonely Island member Jorma Taccone as a credited writer. He would make contributions to select Lonely Island sketches.

Episodes

Specials

''Saturday Night Live Weekend Update Thursday''

The second season of Saturday Night Live Weekend Update Thursday, a limited-run series based on Saturday Night Live's "Weekend Update" sketch, has aired in conjunction with this season. The show is hosted by Seth Meyers, Update's current host, and former Update co-host Amy Poehler. Like the sketch, the show is a parody of local news broadcasts and satirizes contemporary news stories and figures. As of June 2010, three episodes have aired. An additional three episodes were scheduled to air in spring 2010, but were scrapped.
Episode numberOriginal airdateNotes
Episode 1September 17, 2009
  • Amy Poehler appears as a special guest to co-anchor Update alongside Seth Meyers.
  • Darrell Hammond appears as former president Jimmy Carter.
Episode 2September 24, 2009
  • Amy Poehler returns as a special guest to co-anchor Update alongside Seth Meyers.
  • Former Saturday Night Live cast member Darrell Hammond appears as Bill Clinton and Megan Fox parodies the finale of the soap opera Guiding Light.
  • Newly hired Saturday Night Live featured player Nasim Pedrad appears for the first time in the cold open as Kathy Griffin.
    • Episode 3October 1, 2009
  • Darrell Hammond appears as Dennis Franz and Maya Rudolph appears as Oprah Winfrey.
  • This is the first Weekend Update Thursday episode not to feature a cold open.

    • ''MacGruber'' film

    The first SNL film since 2000's The Ladies Man, MacGruber was released on May 21, 2010. The film, starring SNL cast members Will Forte and Kristen Wiig and former cast member Maya Rudolph, is based on the "MacGruber" sketches from the show. It received mixed reviews from critics and, in spite of a wide initial release, was a box office bomb. After a two-week opening commitment during which it was shown in 2,546 theaters, it was dropped from all but 177 theaters starting in its third week, a drop exceeded since 1982 only by Meet Dave and The Rocker.