Saturday Night Live (season 47)
The forty-seventh season of the NBC comedy series "Saturday Night Live" premiered on October 2, 2021, during the 2021–22 television season with host Owen Wilson and musical guest Kacey Musgraves. For the first time, the season's first five episodes and the remainder from episode ten onward were live streamed on the streaming service Peacock in addition to its coast-to-coast live television broadcast. Cast. Prior to the start of the season, Beck Bennett and Lauren Holt had both left the show, though the rest of the cast from the previous season was  retained. Three new featured players were added: comedic actor and filmmaker Aristotle Athari, impressionist and actor James Austin Johnson, and surrealist comedian Sarah Sherman. Chloe Fineman and Bowen Yang, who were hired as featured players in season 45, were promoted to repertory status this season while Andrew Dismukes and Punkie Johnson remain as featured players. Kate McKinnon did not appear in the first seven episodes of the season, as she was filming "Joe vs. Carole". Cecily Strong was absent from the first three episodes of 2022 due to her appearance in the Off-Broadway revival of the one-woman play  The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe. Pete Davidson was absent from the thirteenth through eighteenth episodes, due to filming the movie "The Home". Don Roy King, who has directed the show since its 32nd season, retired after the ninth episode, hosted by Paul Rudd. He was succeeded by Liz Patrick, a longtime director of "The Ellen DeGeneres Show". This season saw the deaths of three former cast members; on September 14, 2021, a month before the season began, former cast member and "Weekend Update" anchor Norm Macdonald died at the age of 61 after a nine  year battle with leukemia. Two months later, on November 6, former featured player Peter Aykroyd died at the age of 65 from septicemia caused by an untreated abdominal hernia. Later in the season, on April 12, 2022, at the age of 67, season 6 cast member Gilbert Gottfried died after a long illness from a rare ventricular tachycardia disorder complicated by type II myotonic dystrophy. Cast roster. Repertory players Featured players Writers. Prior to the start of the season, the show hired ten new writers: Mike DiCenzo, Billy Domineau, Alex English, Martin Herlihy, John Higgins, Vanessa Jackson, Tesha Kondrat, Ben  Marshall, Jake Nordwind, and Ben Silva. Anna Drezen, Michael Che, Colin Jost, and Kent Sublette continued as the show's head writers, though after the Paul Rudd episode, Drezen left to focus on her new show for Freeform. It was also the last season for writers Jasmine Pierce and Steven Castillo (who also left after the Paul Rudd episode). Alison Gates, who has written for the show since 2018, was promoted to writing supervisor. Gates and Streeter Seidell joined Che, Jost, and Sublette as head writers beginning with the Ariana DeBose episode. Beginning with the John Mulaney episode, three new  writers were hired: Rosebud Baker, Clare O'Kane and Nicole Sun. Episodes. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude> Reception. In January 2022, Matthew Gilbert of "The Boston Globe" wrote that he was "surprised with the mediocrity" of the season, suggesting that individual cast members did not have opportunities to stand out; he cited the high number of players compared to past seasons, the periodic absence of some cast members due to other commitments, and regular use of guest stars and cameo appearances in sketches as possible reasons. Conversely, Michael Boyle of "Slate" praised the season's filmed sketches featuring the Please Don't Destroy  troupe, writing, "The basic character dynamics should be familiar to anyone who’s watched SNL before, but they’re done with an efficiency that puts the rest of the show to shame." New cast member James Austin Johnson and his impression of former U.S. President Donald Trump, which debuted on the show this season, received a positive reception from critics. Dennis Perkins of "The A.V. Club" wrote, "Johnson's Trump is as exact as advertised, and his Trump's discursively narcissistic screed is more comically illuminating than four full years of Alec Baldwin making funny Trump faces." Dan Spinelli of  Mother Jones lauded the accuracy of Johnson's impression, writing, "Close your eyes and you'll think new cast member James Austin Johnson is the real thing. He nails the preening self-regard, the incessant need for attention, and the way Trump wields 'excuse me' almost as a verbal saber." Gilbert, however, criticized Johnson's impression of President Joe Biden and opined it was not as good as his version of Trump. Andy Hoglund at "Entertainment Weekly" concurs, citing Johnson's "commendable if slightly less transcendent work as" the president.