Beck Bennett
Saturday Night Live Season 47 Cast: Beck Bennett Leaving, Bowen Yang and Chloe Fineman Join Ensemble
Plenty of familiar faces will greet viewers when Season 47 of Saturday Night Live bows on October 2nd. Nearly the full ensemble is returning, and two featured players have been upgraded to series regulars: Bowen Yang, who has been on the writing staff since 2018; and Chloe Fineman, who joined last year. At the same time, two actors will be ending their runs on the venerable sketch program: Lauren Holt, who is leaving the show after one season; and Beck Bennett, whose eight-season run in New York comes to an end as his career in Los Angeles continues to tick upwards. Bennett is currently a series regular on the stop-motion Marvel series M.O.D.O.K., and he said goodbye in an emotional Instagram post. “Love you, SNL,” he wrote. “Gonna miss you so much. Thank you for 8 years&nbs...
SNL Top Highlights: Dan Levy Charms In Hosting Debut
Since kicking off Season 46 last fall, Saturday Night Live has been running closer to business-as-usual than almost any other late-night show during the pandemic. Still, if you look closely, there are differences: Their audience size has been reduced, which has often made studio reactions more muted; the schedule has featured more episodes in a row and yet longer breaks in between; and the host bookings feel less tethered to the usual promotional cycles of big movies, TV show premieres, and awards season. Case in point: 10 months after Schitt’s Creek ended, four months after the show’s historic Emmys sweep, and two months after his co-starring role in Hulu’s Happiest Season, Dan Levy took a victory lap this week with his first Saturday Night Live hosting gig. In other words, he wasn’t real...
Should SNL Replace Jim Carrey as Joe Biden?
What was big, exciting entertainment news just a month or so ago has already become routine tedium: Jim Carrey played presidential candidate Joe Biden on Saturday Night Live. For the third week in a row, the blockbuster comic returned to Studio 8H, where Issa-Rae hosted the festivities. Three sketches into his run, however, and it’s hard to find anyone who appears to be enjoying his antics. (Then again, social media presents a comically skewed demographic of people who more or less despise Saturday Night Live, but feel compelled to provide running commentary anyway. Come to think of it, that’s likely how a lot of SNL writers probably feel about the presidential election.) This week’s endless cold open–under 15 minutes, but, as with last week’s, feeling closer to a full hour–toggled between...
Bill and Ted: Face the Music Brings an Excellent Reunion But a Bogus Story: Review
The Pitch: It’s been decades since William “Bill” S. Preston Esq. (Alex Winter) and Theodore “Ted” Logan (Keanu Reeves) triumphed over Hell and defeated gym-teacher-turned-terrorist Chuck De Nomolos. Sadly, the Wyld Stallyns have seen better days, and the two world renown rockers have been reduced to garage band has-beens. With their rock and roll destiny in turmoil, the entire universe begins to crumble, leaving Bill and Ted exactly 78 minutes to face the music and save the world once again. Strange Things are Afoot: The beauty of the Bill and Ted franchise has always been its brazen imagination. It’s an ’80s slacker daydream fueled by the very slushees and sugary snacks our two heroes grab at the Circle K. Creators Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon have long been self-aware of that fact...
