"Saturday Night Live" is close to returning for an astounding 45th season, and the cast is preparing to take on whatever headlines come their way, even if it's harder than ever to satirize world events, according to cast member Kyle Mooney.
"It already is the weirdest, funniest possible version, just of reality, so what more can we do to it?"
Mooney knows in today's world, he needs to be ready for just about anything.
"Things are happening so quickly," he confessed, "We can have most of the show prepared by Friday, then there'll be some major news story, and we need to come up with something entirely new."
Still, it's not something the show can just ignore.
"The news cycle has been a crazy influence on the show, and it's something we have to deal with," Mooney said.
The writer and director of "Brigsby Bear" is getting ready for his seventh season on the iconic sketch comedy series, and unlike other comedians whose sense of humor has failed to keep them on for the long-run, like Zach Galifianakis and Sarah Silverman, he clearly has some staying power. Not that he seems to know why.
"I've just been fortunate in the sense that sometimes we get that stuff on the show, and people seem to like me. I don't know if there's a math to staying on the show, or what it is," he said. "I just try to be cool around people and have fun, and it's working so far."
Season 45 of "Saturday Night Live" premieres September 28 on NBC.
Jared C. Bass, senior director for Higher Education at the Center for American Progress, joins Cheddar News to discuss how schools are navigating the Omicron variant.
Sarah Kate Ellis, president and CEO of the advocacy group GLAAD, joined Cheddar to discuss the organization's Accelerating Acceptance report that examines how welcoming the general public is toward members of the LGBTQ+ community. Ellis noted that while visibility and representation is up in media, video games, and on social media, it has conversely opened the door for increased targeted harassment on the street, particularly for transgender and gender non-conforming people. "I go to the school board meetings, I hear the homophobia and the transphobia in-person, in real-time, and so, we're seeing that more and more at the local level across the country," Ellis said. "And we're going to see that play out in the midterm elections, especially the local elections."
Steve Patton, EY Americas Mobility Sector Leader, joins Cheddar News to discuss what can be done to speed up the adoption of EVs, and how infrastructure can be scaled up to support this transition.
New York Attorney General Letitia James is ramping up a civil investigation into The Trump Organization. The AG's office has subpoenaed Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr. They have refused to comply with the subpoenas. Bradley Moss, national security attorney, joins Cheddar News to discuss the next steps in this investigation.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis has officially reduced the 110-year prison sentence of truck driver Rogel Aguilera-Mederos to 10 years, calling the initial lengthy sentence “unjust.” Dan Gilleon, constitutional attorney at Gilleon Law Firm APC, joined Cheddar to discuss more.
LG announced its latest cooking appliances including its ThinQ Recipe service. The app allows people to choose from up to 10,000 recipes and have the ingredients delivered to their doorstep. LG Electronics executive Brandt Varner joins Cheddar News to talk about the products.
Former Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams was sworn in as the newest Mayor of New York City. Adams is now expected to work on a number of issues such as crime and coronavirus. Erin Durkin,, reporter at PoliticoNY, joins Cheddar News to discuss more.
The six-month trial of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes has come to an end with the former tech startup star found guilty of four out of 11 counts of fraud. Michael S. Weinstein, Esq, chair of the white collar criminal defense practice at Cole Schotz, and former Department of Justice trial attorney, joined Cheddar News Wrap to discuss what happens next for the former mogul. "Do I think it's going to be more than five or seven years? Probably yes. I think that's probably a fair range at this point," he said about her potential prison sentence.
We are just one day away from what has been called the most influential tech event in the world. CES 2022 will officially kick off on Wednesday in Las Vegas, but the annual tech summit is being impacted by COVID-19, like so many other recent events. The Consumer Technology Association originally planned for a hybrid event to take place from January 5-8, with some in-person events and some virtual; however, a few big-name companies announced they will not be attending in-person, so the CTA decided to shorten the event by one day, with it now ending on Friday. Consumer electronics senior analyst Will Greenwald joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
