One week after the release of his second HBO stand-up special, More Feelings, Ramy Youssef made his Saturday Night Live hosting debut. Amassing over 26 minutes of screen time (translating to more than 41% of the episode), the actor and comedian became one of the most heavily utilized hosts of the season, behind only Bad Bunny, Shane Gillis and Pete Davidson.
Scroll down to see how Youssef stacked up against each of the show’s named performers, including musical guest Travis Scott and featured artist Playboi Carti. Note that our screen time data is calculated using a method that prioritizes face time, meaning that any contiguous (off-screen but in-scene) moments and practically all partial body appearances do not count. Screen time in the show’s opening credits, bumpers and goodnights are not included, nor do those portions factor into our assessment of the episode’s total running time.
Ramy Youssef – 26:20 / 41.77%
At eight minutes and 12 seconds, Youssef’s opening monologue was the second longest of the season so far, after Nate Bargatze’s nine-minute and 24-second one on October 28. Youssef took part in nine subsequent segments, with his lengthiest sketch performance (4:41) being as disappointed father Hahmed Ahmed Mahmoud in “Immigrant Dad Talk Show.”
James Austin Johnson – 10:30 / 16.65%
SNL’s return from a two-week hiatus began with a cold open parodying Donald Trump’s recent foray into limited edition Bible sales. By playing the former president for almost five minutes and then appearing in four more live sketches, Johnson finished as the highest ranking cast member in terms of screen time for the first time this season.
Travis Scott – 7:21 / 11.66%
Scott’s second SNL outing (following his first in 2018) involved renditions of “My Eyes” and “Fe!n” from his Grammy-nominated fourth studio album, “Utopia.” He also showed up for 50 seconds as himself in the Please Don’t Destroy short “We Got Too High.”
Colin Jost – 7:00 / 11.10%
After giving his second shortest Season 49 performance two weeks ago, Jost delivered his third longest here. This is primarily due to the fact that he independently interacted with both of this “Weekend Update” segment’s guests (Chloe Fineman and Sarah Sherman), as he also did on February 24.
Sarah Sherman – 5:47 / 9.17%
Though she took a 26% screen time hit after outpacing all of her cast mates on March 9, Sherman still finished this episode with her fourth highest number of the season. Well over half of her time was spent making her third Season 49 “Weekend Update” appearance as the unnamed widow of Flaco, a real Central Park owl whose recent autopsy yielded some surprising results.
Marcello Hernandez – 5:39 / 8.96%
For the seventh time this season and fifth show in a row, Hernandez wound up with more screen time than any of the other four featured cast members. His longest performance since February 24 consisted of appearances in three live sketches, the first of which — “Immigrant Dad Talk Show” — accounted for 84% of his time as he co-hosted the titular program in character as Joaquin Antonio.
Andrew Dismukes – 5:13 / 8.27%
Dismukes kept his screen time above five minutes for the fifth episode in a row, participating in one pretaped and three live sketches. For nearly three and a half minutes (or just under two-thirds of his total time), he played a police officer obsessed with delivering a perfect CSI-esque one-liner in “Murder Detective.”
Ego Nwodim – 4:18 / 6.82%
Compared to the March 9 show, Nwodim’s screen time dropped by 37% this week. After appearing for two minutes and 44 seconds as a game show contestant in “Couple Goals,” she was seen just twice more: as a spokesperson in the pre-taped “Ozempic for Ramadan” and as one of Dismukes’ character’s colleagues in “Murder Detective.”
Kenan Thompson – 4:13 / 6.69%
Thompson amassed his longest screen time since February 3 over the course of three sketches, the middle of which featured him most prominently. For about three and a half minutes, he starred in “Team Captain” as a high school basketball coach trying to make his players forget about the fact that he accidentally texted them all a series of risqué photos meant for his wife.
Mikey Day – 3:38 / 5.76%
Day’s third shortest performance of the season consisted of appearances in four early segments, including the Please Don’t Destroy short. After spending almost a minute playing a “Couple Goals” contestant, he was utilized almost equally during “Immigrant Dad Talk Show” and “Team Captain” — first as an unusually affectionate father and then as one of the coach’s half dozen distracted players.
Chloe Fineman – 3:35 / 5.68%
Fineman made her second “Weekend Update” appearance of the season (and first of 2024) as Piper Dunster, a TikToker whose account is riddled with woefully ill-conceived content. This news desk visit constituted 64% of her screen time, the rest of which was divided between supporting Johnson during the cold open and providing the “Ozempic for Ramadan” voiceover.
Michael Che – 2:40 / 4.23%
Whereas Jost improved upon his March 9 screen time by over three minutes, Che clocked in two seconds lower this time. This wide gap between the “Weekend Update” anchors exists because, for the seventh time this season, Che did not interact with any guest commentators but rather simply delivered his portion of the news.
Bowen Yang – 2:18 / 3.65%
Yang came close to falling behind every repertory player for the first time this season until he finally showed up in “Tiny Desk Concert” as Elliott, an NPR intern thoroughly unamused by the Youssef-fronted Jonah Hughes Band. Until now, his lowest screen time of Season 49 had been exactly three minutes (over four segments) on October 21.
Devon Walker – 1:49 / 2.88%
Featured player Walker’s decent screen time in this episode was split almost evenly between two live sketches. He was first seen as a member of the basketball team (and the coach’s traumatized son) in “Team Captain” and then took on the role of a generally quiet forensics officer in “Murder Detective.”
Heidi Gardner – 1:46 / 2.80%
Heidi Gardner took a 75% screen time hit compared to March 9, giving her second shortest performance of the season as a participant in just two sketches. After acting alongside Sherman and Fineman as one of three biblical Marys during the cold open, she portrayed Day’s character’s “Couple Goals” partner (her landmark 500th sketch) and then signed off for the night.
Chloe Troast – 1:38 / 2.59%
Troast improved upon her March 9 screen time by over 30 seconds. After vocally contributing to the “Ozempic for Ramadan” theme song, she was physically utilized during “Tiny Desk Concert,” in which she portrayed an indie band member who, for the sake of quirkiness, left her cello at home to play a milk carton shaker instead.
Playboi Carti – 1:36 / 2.54%
By helping Scott close out his performance of “Fe!n,” Carti joined a list of eight other Season 49 surprise vocalists, the last of whom were Brent Faiyaz and Summer Walker (assisting 21 Savage) on February 24. He previously opened Nicki Minaj’s SNL performance of “Poke It Out” in May 2018.
Ben Marshall – 1:14 / 1.96%
The ninth Please Don’t Destroy short of the season (and first since March 2) was also the longest so far, barely exceeding the running time of November 11’s “Jumper” (which featured Timothée Chalamet). In “We Got Too High,” Marshall and his fellow writers find themselves in over their heads while out partying with Youssef and Scott.
Martin Herlihy – 1:05 / 1.72%
Counting his appearance during a live February 3 sketch, Herlihy has now appeared in 10 episodes this season. However, although his episode count is one lower, fellow Please Don’t Destroy member John Higgins’ Season 49 screen time is currently five minutes greater than those of both Herlihy and Marshall.
John Higgins – 1:03 / 1.67%
This marked the third instance of Higgins ending up on the bottom of the Please Don’t Destroy ranking this season, after October 21 (“Bad Bunny Is Shrek”) and March 2 (“Gone Too Soon”). In both previous cases, he was separated from the leader (Marshall) by just six seconds, but that margin nearly doubled this time.
Michael Longfellow – 0:29 / 0.77%
Although he fell significantly behind Hernandez, Walker and Troast, Longfellow was not this episode’s most underutilized featured player. That distinction technically belongs to Molly Kearney, who was not seen in any aired sketches but was on stage during the goodnights. Longfellow showed up twice late in the episode – first as a cop in “Murder Detective” and then as an NPR employee in “Tiny Desk Concert.”
Punkie Johnson – 0:08 / 0.21%
By very briefly popping into the “Team Captain” sketch and uttering less than 10 words, Johnson ended up with the least screen time among the repertory cast for the seventh time this season. Prior to this episode, her Season 49 performance length average was 2:20, but it has now dropped to 2:11.
Season 49 of SNL continues next week with host Kristen Wiig and musical guest Raye.
Can’t get enough SNL stats? Join us for an in-depth discussion of this week’s screen time, power rankings, and more on the Saturday Night Network’s By The Numbers podcast, streaming live Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET, right here on LateNighter.
