The decision to invite Elon Musk to host Saturday Night Live has proved controversial among some of the show’s cast members.
Musk, the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, is due to make his SNL debut on 8 May, NBC announced on Saturday (24 April). He also shared the news on his personal Twitter, writing: “Let’s find out just how live Saturday Night Live really is.”
He will host opposite Miley Cyrus, who has been announced as the episode’s musical guest.
Several of the sketch show’s cast members appeared to respond negatively to the news on social media, albeit slightly cryptically.
Bowen Yang, a staff writer on SNL since 2018, posted a frowning emoji on Instagram seemingly in response to the announcement. Yang also later shared a screenshot of Musk’s tweet, adding: “What the f*** does this even mean?”
Shortly after Musk’s forthcoming stint as host was announced, Aidy Bryant – a regular on the show since 2012 and star of Shrill – shared a tweet from Bernie Sanders, which many have taken as her disapproval of the hosting decision.
The tweet did not directly mention the tech billionaire, but it did call out the “absurd” fact that “the 50 wealthiest people in America today own more wealth than the bottom half of our people”.
Andrew Dismukes, another writer-turned-actor on the programme, also appeared to weigh in on the decision.
In an Instagram post, he wrote: “Only CEO I wanna do sketch with is Cher-E Oteri”, a reference to Cheri Oteri, a regular cast member on SNL between 1995 and 2000.
In recent years, Musk has found himself at the centre of controversy. Amid the pandemic, he has attracted criticism for tweeting that Covid-19 tests were “extremely bogus” and that the “coronavirus panic is dumb”.
In December last year, the 49-year-old came under fire for mocking the use of gender pronouns.
He later defended himself, stating: “I absolutely support trans, but all these pronouns are an esthetic nightmare.”
