Elon Musk to Host ‘SNL’ Alongside A-List Pop Star

Saturday Night Live has announced its next celebrity host and musical guest — Elon Musk and Miley Cyrus. Musk will host the sketch show with musical accompaniment from Cyrus on Saturday, May 8. The news has fans groaning on social media.

The official SNL Twitter account posted its usual index card announcement of its next host on Saturday afternoon, giving fans two weeks to clear their schedules. The post picked up a few thousand likes and retweets, but it received a brutal ratio of replies from critics saying this was a bad casting choice. Musk is a controversial figure thanks to his labor practices and his spread of misinformation during the coronavirus pandemic, and some are not excited to see him take the stage in Studio 8H.

“Miley deserves so much better than this,” one fan commented on the announcement. Another added: “Literally why are you having him on?? That man sucks,” while a third wrote: “idk how much communication you have with Lorne or the higher ups, but someone needs to tell them that absolutely no one wants this. I can not think of a single person who wants this. And I don’t mean Miley.”

Many commenters suggested that the show simply dismiss Musk and have Cyrus pull double duty as both host and musical guest of that upcoming episode. One even wrote: “Cancel this episode now. Just delete the post, say it was a funny joke, have Miley do double duty and never entertain an idea so horrendously stupid again.”

Musk is best known as the co-founder and executive of several major tech companies, including electric car company Tesla, rocketry company SpaceX and subterranean travel company The Boring Company. However, workers at some of these companies have issued public complaints about their treatment and conditions, while Musk himself has worked to avoid accountability. Many of these complaints were compiled in a report by Vanity Fair, describing Musk’s “total and complete pathological sociopathy.”

On top of that, the success rate of Musk’s lofty goals has been heavily criticized as well. According to a 2017 report by The Wall Street Journal, Musk insisted on describing Teslas as “self-driving,” even when multiple engineers resigned over the branding. They warned that this name would “put customer lives at risk,” and in the time since there have been many high-profile reports of horrendous accidents in Teslas.

Musk will host the next new episode of SNL, picking up after 4-week-long break for the show. Re-runs will air each weekend between now and then. Catch Musk’s SNL debut live on Saturday, May 8 at 11:30 p.m. ET on NBC.