‘Saturday Night Live’ Will Continue to Air Live Coast-to-Coast This Season

NBC sketch show aired four episodes in this format during Season 42

Saturday Night Live
NBC

NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” will air live coast-to-coast for its upcoming 43rd season, the network announced Tuesday.

The long-running sketch show is continuing the format that it used for the final four episodes of Season 42. This marked the first time that “SNL” aired live throughout the contiguous U.S., rather than just in the Eastern and Central time zones.

Starting with the Season 43 premiere, airing Sept. 30 and featuring host Ryan Gosling and musical guest Jay Z, the show will run at 11:30 p.m. ET, 10:30 p.m. CT, 9:30 MT and 8:30 PT. The episode will repeat at 11:30 p.m. for Mountain and Pacific time zones.

Last season’s live coast-to-coast airings that began in April were up 11 percent in live-plus-same day viewership as compared to the average for the season’s previous episodes (8.3 million vs. 7.5 million).

The series comes into the new season with a ton of momentum, having nabbed nine Emmys and renewed buzz for Season 42, due in large part to its political sketches that featured Alec Baldwin as Donald Trump.

“SNL” is created and executive produced by Lorne Michaels. It is produced in association with Broadway Video.

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