Nikki Glaser will make one of her longtime dreams come true on Saturday, November 8, when she hosts Saturday Night Live for her first time.
How to Watch
Watch Saturday Night Live Saturdays at 11:30/10:30c on NBC and next day on Peacock.
The standup comedian sat down with Seth Meyers on Late Night on Monday, November 3 to describe what it felt like to finally be in 30 Rock for the big week, and revealed just how prepared she is for a show that’s famously hard to prepare for.
“For the monologue, it’s like rehearse, rehearse, rehearse, run it around town at different clubs,” Glaser told Meyers. “That’s the one I can have control over.”
“And they’re so happy that you’re coming and you have your own monologue,” Meyers told her. “It’s the hardest thing to write for a host, so when you have somebody who’s like, ‘I know my voice and I’m really good at it, and here, I’m gonna crush.’ They’re thrilled.”
RELATED: Saturday Night Live’s Season 51 Cast Members: The Full Lineup for 2025-2026
Glaser certainly knows her own comedic voice, as the seasoned standup has been a writer, stage performer and actress since the early 2000s. She’s particularly known for her roasts of celebrities on Comedy Central, including those of Rob Lowe, Bruce Willis, and Alec Baldwin, but she broke out in 2024 thanks to Tom Brady’s installment.
Has Nikki Glaser done sketch comedy before SNL?
While Glaser’s probably delivered thousands of jokes as herself, and has acted onscreen in shows like A.P. Bio and movies like I Feel Pretty, she admitted to Meyers she’s “never really done sketch acting before.”
“I’m just gonna throw myself into it,” she said. “And totally just go in and surrender to the process.” And come to think of it, another standup by the name of Nate Bargatze had little-to-no sketch experience before Season 49, and now he’s a two-time Host.
RELATED: Every Host of SNL Season 51 for 2025-2026
Nikki Glaser’s dad warned her not to read the SNL cue cards
Glaser is a huge SNL fan who watched the show with her family growing up. She told Deadline after the Tom Brady Roast, “I think I would kill it,” as Host.
Her dad, as a fellow fan, offered her some of his opinions on how best to handle the show.
“He’s obsessed with, like, ‘Don’t read the cue cards,'” she said. “He doesn’t understand that you kind of have to.”
Her parents will be in the audience that night, along with a few other special guests.
“I’m flying in my parents, my friends from high school, just anyone who didn’t ever see this happening for me,” she joked. “I just want to, like, look right at them and be like, ‘Look at me now.’ I was not the person from high school that anyone thought this would happen to.”
RELATED: Miles Teller Is Both Scott Brothers in SNL’s “White House Makeover” Demolition Sketch
Nikki Glaser on what it’s like to live St. Louis
Glaser is also marking a very specific achievement in SNL history, according to Meyers.
“It’s very hard with a show that’s been on for 50 years to be the first of anything, but you’re the first person to host the show who lives in St. Louis, currently,” he said. “That’s fantastic.”
“That does feel cool to me to be able to say that,” she said. “No one in St. Louis cares. I keep trying to drop it, because this is the best time, before you host it, to be like, ‘I’m hosting!’ It’s all anticipation, so I’ve been dropping it as much as I can, and people just go, ‘Oh fun!’ Like they are just not blown away. I think it keeps me humble because they’re not blown away by anything I do.”
Watch Nikki Glaser make her SNL debut with Musical Guest sombr on Saturday, November 8 at 11:30 ET, 8:30 PT. (For the citizens of St. Louis, that’s 10:30 CT.)
