{"id":784774,"date":"2026-09-28T00:50:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-28T00:50:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/784774\/"},"modified":"2026-09-28T00:50:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T00:50:16","slug":"snl-recap-best-of-jalen-brunsons-episode-sept-26-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/784774\/","title":{"rendered":"‘SNL’ recap: Best of Jalen Brunson’s episode (Sept. 26, 2026)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEntertainment\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tNew York Knicks star Jalen Brunson hosted the Season 52 premiere of “Saturday Night Live” on Sept. 26, with Katseye as musical guest.<\/p>\n

\"SNL
\n\tSNL recap: Host Jalen Brunson and Marcello Hern\u00e1ndez (center) with musical guest Katseye ahead of the Season 52 premiere of “Saturday Night Live” on Sept. 26, 2026. Rosalind O’Connor\/NBC\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBy Kevin Slane<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSeptember 27, 2026 | 10:01 AM\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

2 minutes to read<\/p>\n

\u201cSNL\u201d returned to the air for the season premiere of its 52nd season on Saturday, Sept. 26, with New York Knicks star Jalen Brunson serving as host alongside musical guest Katseye.<\/p>\n

As is typically the case at the start of a new season, there was change in the air at Studio 8H. Two new cast members<\/a> (Grace Reiter, Saidah Belo-Osagie) took the stage, with Reiter landing an unexpectedly high number of appearances as a rookie.<\/p>\n

On the other side of the coin, several cast members left the show. Bowen Yang was a midseason departure in Season 51, while Chloe Fineman departed this summer after seven seasons on the show. Martin Herlihy, a writer who frequently appeared on screen as part of the trio \u201cPlease Don\u2019t Destroy\u201d<\/a> or in his own short films<\/a>, also left the show after five seasons.<\/p>\n

Brunson, who led the Knicks to their first NBA championship since 1973 in June, fittingly received a hero\u2019s welcome during his opening monologue. With rare exceptions (Peyton Manning, Charles Barkley), athletes don\u2019t typically make for the best \u201cSNL\u201d hosts, and that proved to be the case in the Season 52 premiere.<\/p>\n

Brunson even admitted that his delivery was a bit wooden, but the New York City crowd was forgiving \u2014 especially when he brought out fellow Knicks stars Karl-Anthony Towns, Mikal Bridges, OG Anunoby, and Josh Hart.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere in the show, the political cold open continued to be a place for celebrity cameos, with Ramy Youssef returning as New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani alongside an impressed Donald Trump (James Austin Johnson) and a jealous Natalie Harp (Ashley Padilla). On a show that leaned into sports premises and Brunson playing himself, the cold open was one of the episode\u2019s highlights, as was the return of Tucker Carlson (Jeremy Culinane) to the \u201cWeekend Update\u201d desk.<\/p>\n

Speaking of \u201cWeekend Update,\u201d co-anchor Michael Che made a joke that indirectly tied in to the ongoing Ed Sheeran, Robert Kraft, and Macklemore controversy, which avoided an obvious flashpoint this weekend when Sheeran\u2019s Gillette Stadium shows were canceled<\/a> due to the inclement weather.<\/p>\n

\u201cRapper Macklemore, who was dropped as the opening act for Ed Sheeran, announced that he is launching a Free Palestine tour,\u201d Che said. \u201cHaven\u2019t the Palestinian people been through enough?\u201d<\/p>\n

Check out the videos below to see highlights from the Season 52 premiere of \u201cSNL,\u201d including Jalen Brunson\u2019s opening monologue, a pair of musical performances from Katseye, and all of the guests visiting the \u201cWeekend Update\u201d desk.<\/p>\n

\u2018Saturday Night Live\u2019 Cold Open<\/p>\n

Jalen Brunson Monologue<\/p>\n

\u2018SNL\u2019 Weekend Update Clips<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Katseye Musical Performances<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Some of the Best \u2018SNL\u2019 Sketches<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u2018SNL\u2019 Cut for Time Sketches<\/p>\n

\t\t\"Profile\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for the Today newsletter<\/p>\n

Get everything you need to know to start your day, delivered right to your inbox every morning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Entertainment New York Knicks star Jalen Brunson hosted the Season 52 premiere of “Saturday Night Live” on Sept.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":784775,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[96,391,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-784774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-tv","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/784774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=784774"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/784774\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/784775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=784774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=784774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=784774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}