‘SNL’ Wins Sixth Straight Variety Sketch Emmy; Lorne Michaels Thanks Cast For Not Leaving During Pandemic

Peter White

Saturday Night Live continued its Emmy winning streak in the Variety Sketch Series category.

The long-running NBC show picked up its sixth straight win in the category, beating HBO’s A Black Lady Sketch Show, which was its only rival.

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Creator Lorne Michaels thanked cast members for not leaving during the pandemic.

“I don’t know if you had it here [in LA] but in New York for the last two and a half years we had this pandemic. It’s really tough doing shows and lots of people who could have left didn’t and kind of stuck together and went through it together. There’s something in the DNA of the show that when it’s 11:30 pm on Saturdays, they show up and I want to thank them all for showing up,” he said.

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SNL scored nine nominations this year, down from last year, when it picked up 21 nominations. Other noms included Bowen Yang for Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series, Kate McKinnon for Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series and Jerrod Carmichael for Guest Actor in a Comedy Series.

There had been some concern that it was beaten at last week’s Creative Arts ceremony to the Outstanding Directing for a Variety Series award when A Black Lady Sketch Show’s Bridget Stokes beat SNL, Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, Late Night with Seth Meyers and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert in that category given that SNL had won it for the last five years in a row.

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The variety category has undergone a pretty seismic change over the last few years with the number of nominees decimated during the past couple of years. Last year, there were only two nominees –SNL and A Black Lady Sketch Show – while there were three in 2020 with the addition of Comedy Central’s now-canceled Drunk History. This is a far cry from the six nominees in 2019 – SNL, Drunk History, At Home with Amy Sedaris, I Love You, America with Sarah Silverman, Who Is America? and Documentary Now!

The two nominations were due to the TV Academy’s sliding scale rule, given that there were only nine submissions in this category.

It’s likely that the category, along with the main late-night category, will see some changes ahead of next year’s ceremony.

It’s also been a “year of change” for Saturday Night Live, which returns on October 1 for its 48th season.

Deadline revealed back in May that Kate McKinnon, Aidy Bryant and Kyle Mooney were leaving the show at the end of season 47 along with Pete Davidson. It later emerged that Alex Moffat, Melissa Villaseñor and Aristotle Athari would not be returning either.

Michaels is now in the middle of bringing in some new cast members for the new season.

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