‘Saturday Night Live’: Pete Davidson Episode Might Not Happen

Fans waiting for Pete Davidson’s return to Saturday Night Live may have to wait a bit longer. On Monday, negotiations between the Writers Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers failed, with the WGA officially beginning a strike at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday, May 2. The strike is already having wide-sweeping impacts on Hollywood and beyond, with numerous talk shows, including Saturday Night Live, impacted.

At this time, it is unclear if SNL will halt production. Nightly talk shows including The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon are going dark. Deadline reports that Late Night with Seth Meyers and The Daily Show will also be hit. However, the status of weekly shows, including SNL, Real Time with Bill Maher, and Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, remain unclear. Although these shows will feel the impact of the strike, the outlet reported that “final decisions on those shows are expected to come later in the week.” This means that Davidson’s return to SNL could be impacted.

Davidson made history as one of the youngest to ever be a full-time cast member when he joined SNL in 2014. He immediately became a fan favorite for his impersonations. However, Davidson ended up leaving the show at the end of last season, later sharing on Real Ones With Jon Bernthal that his tenure on the show grew to be “confusing.” His final taping of SNL was in May 2022, with it being confirmed almost a full year later in April 2023 that he was set to return to the SNL stage on May 6.

Appearing on The Tonight Show, Davidson discussed the potential strike, joking that “it sucks because it just feeds my weird story I have in my head, like, of course that would happen to me.” According to Deadline, “there are a number of possibilities for the Lorne Michaels-created show if there is a strike and that a decision is set to be made closer to showtime.” A decision has not yet been announced, but one SNL star told the outlet, “We have to think about our crew too. I absolutely support the writers, and I want the writers to get what they deserve and need, but I don’t want our crew to be out of work. We can’t make this art without each other.”