Saturday Night Live alum Kristen Wiig returned the show last night, becoming the second Season 49 host to join the Five-Timers Club, following Emma Stone last December. Although a bevy of surprise guests cut into her screen time, she still managed to rack up almost 21 minutes, constituting just over one-third of the episode.
Scroll down to see how each of the show’s named performers stacked up against Wiig, including first-time musical guest Raye and upcoming host Ryan Gosling. 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.
Kristen Wiig – 20:56 / 33.47%
Wiig’s fifth hosting gig was preceded by a five-minute performance in this season’s eighth episode (hosted by former cast member Kate McKinnon). Following her nearly seven-minute monologue featuring a whopping nine celebrity cameos, she took part in six sketches and–for the first time since 2010–visited the “Weekend Update” desk as malcontent movie critic Aunt Linda. This made her the first host to appear during the news segment since Michael B. Jordan in January 2023.
Raye – 9:01 / 14.42%
On her first SNL outing, Raye performed two songs from her Brit Award-winning debut album, My 21st Century Blues: “Escapism” and “Worth It.” Also included at the end of the latter segment was an 80-second rendition of the unreleased “Let There Be Light.”
Colin Jost – 6:49 / 10.90%
Although Jost had more screen time in several recent episodes, it only took this much for him to outpace all of his cast mates for the first time this season. For the second week in a row, every “Weekend Update” guest (Marcello Hernandez, Kenan Thompson and Wiig) spoke with him almost exclusively, with co-anchor Michael Che only exchanging a few words with Aunt Linda.
James Austin Johnson – 6:35 / 10.52%
Johnson achieved his second highest screen time of the season immediately after finishing first just last week. Including the cold open, he was seen in five out of six live sketches, with his longest performance (3:06) being as a dad with frustratingly vague bad news for his kids in “Go-Karts.”
Bowen Yang – 6:15 / 9.99%
After showing up for just one sketch at the end of last week’s show, Yang bounced back with performances in five this time. By a margin of less than 10 seconds, he was most prominently featured in “Jumanji” as a dinner guest whose friend’s new girlfriend (Wiig) causes a heated argument by refusing to play a seemingly harmless board game.
Kenan Thompson – 5:17 / 8.45%
As he did on February 3, Thompson spent over two minutes playing NBA legend Charles Barkley during this week’s cold open, which focused on the unusually high level of interest in this year’s NCAA women’s basketball tournament. He subsequently made his second “Weekend Update” appearance of the season (following the October 14 premiere episode), this time personifying the impending total solar eclipse.
Andrew Dismukes – 4:29 / 7.17%
This marks the end of a streak for Dismukes, as his screen time had not fallen below five minutes since episode 10. He maintained a sizable number by participating in three live sketches, with over half of his time being devoted to playing an increasingly concerned child in “Go-Karts.”
Jon Hamm – 4:02 / 6.45%
After supporting Wiig in her monologue, Hamm amassed two and a half more minutes of screen time during “Secretaries,” in which he played the boss of two incompetent office workers (Wiig and Heidi Gardner). His last appearance on the series was during the Season 48 premiere in October 2022, with his last hosting stint occuring 12 years before that.
Will Forte – 3:59 / 6.37%
Forte, who was Wiig’s SNL cast mate for five seasons, outdid this episode’s other surprise guests by appearing in two post-monologue sketches. After showing up at the end of “Jumanji” as a sadistic train conductor, he gave his longest performance of the night (1:36) as his old recurring character Hamilton in “Retirement Party.”
Chloe Fineman – 3:56 / 6.29%
Fineman slightly improved upon her March 30 screen time by performing in four sketches, including the pretaped “Pilates.” Like Yang, the largest portion of her time (1:24) was spent playing her “Jumanji” character: a party hostess named Bev who finds that all of her friends are more knowledgeable than her about the titular movie.
Ego Nwodim – 3:44 / 5.97%
After playing a relatively smaller role in “Jumanji” and a tiny one in “Pilates,” Nwodim gained nearly two and a half minutes of screen time during the night’s final sketch, “La Maison Du Bang.” As the host of the PBS program Sonic Pioneers, she guided viewers through a series of clips from a 1970s French variety show created by an eccentric couple of dancers (Yang and Fineman).
Matt Damon – 3:26 / 5.49%
Of the five surprise monologue guests who appeared in at least one subsequent sketch, Damon is the only one who consistently played himself. In his first SNL appearance since December 2018, he explained why his two hosting gigs should count for five and then took the stage during “Retirement Party” to pay tribute to (and inadvertently embarrass) accountant Jerry (Thompson).
Michael Che – 2:50 / 4.53%
Although he (mostly) did not interact with the “Weekend Update” guests for the third week in a row, Che still amassed enough screen time in this episode to now give him a Season 49 total in excess of one hour. By contrast, Jost hit that mark in late January and is now likely one episode away from reaching 100 minutes.
Heidi Gardner – 2:48 / 4.48%
Compared to last week, Gardner experienced a 58% screen time increase, primarily due to her reprisal of season premiere character Trudy in “Secretaries.” She also took part in her fourth consecutive cold open, this time as LSU women’s basketball coach Kim Mulkey.
Mikey Day – 2:39 / 4.24%
Day played roles in all of this episode’s last three sketches, with over 70% of his time devoted to portraying the “Retirement Party” master of ceremonies, who served as straight man to eight wacky guests insistent on giving speeches. He later took on the parts of a ride operator in “Go-Karts” and a French mime in “La Maison Du Bang.”
Marcello Hernandez – 2:35 / 4.13%
Despite his March 30 screen time being three minutes greater than this, Hernandez still managed to outpace each of his fellow featured players for the sixth straight week. All but 10 seconds of his time was spent visiting “Weekend Update” in character as the earthquake that impacted the northeastern U.S. Friday morning.
Fred Armisen – 2:17 / 3.65%
Armisen, who left the SNL cast one season after Wiig, was included in her monologue segment as well as “Retirement Party” as one of the guest of honor’s particularly crass coworkers. He was last seen in the pretaped “The Age of Discovery” sketch on October 21 (alongside host and musical guest Bad Bunny).
Paul Rudd – 2:15 / 3.60%
Like Damon and Armisen, Rudd’s latest guest spot consisted of an appearance during the monologue and a cameo in “Retirement Party.” He stood out from the rest of the episode’s performers in that he is a true member of the Five-Timers Club, having joined in December 2021.
Martin Short – 1:33 / 2.48%
During the monologue, former cast member Short lamented that he had not hosted the show since 2012, although he and Steve Martin did fulfill the duties together just last season. Between then and now, he showed up last April alongside Lorne Michaels to support host Molly Shannon’s opening segment.
Devon Walker – 1:19 / 2.10%
Walker’s 28% drop in screen time compared to March 30 gave him his lowest number since December 9. After participating in two sketches last week, he only played one character this time: March Madness commentator Kenny Smith in the cold open.
Chloe Troast – 0:59 / 1.57%
Troast’s near-minute of screen time was spread over three sketches, with her role as stressed-out birthday girl Ashley in “Go-Karts” taking up 36 seconds alone. She also played a pushy member of the “Pilates” cult and chain-smoking “La Maison Du Bang” performer.
Lorne Michaels – 0:52 / 1.39%
SNL’s famed creator welcomed Wiig back by participating in her monologue segment, ostensibly handing out Five-Timers Club jackets to celebrities who had not earned them. He was last seen on screen during Stone’s December 2 monologue in which she jokingly referred to him as her husband.
Punkie Johnson – 0:47 / 1.25%
While this stands as Johnson’s fourth lowest screen time of the season, it is significantly higher than the mere eight seconds she ended up with last week. In this case, she was seen for five seconds as an overly confident “Pilates” pupil and then for much longer in “Retirement Party” as a member of the improv troupe Gits & Shiggles.
Sarah Sherman – 0:46 / 1.23%
Sherman’s lowest screen time of Season 49 resulted from her brief appearances in one pretaped and one live sketch. Before taking on the non-speaking part of security guard Wendy in “Retirement Party,” she played a key expository role in “Pilates” – a trailer for a horror movie in which an exercise instructor is revealed to be a brainwashing cult leader.
Molly Kearney – 0:42 / 1.12%
Kearney played small parts in “Pilates” and “La Maison Du Bang” after having not been utilized at all during the preceding episode. In this case, featured player Michael Longfellow rode the bench all night, but, like Kearney last week, was on stage during the goodnights.
Ryan Gosling – 0:36 / 0.96%
As the host of next week’s show, Gosling got a head start by briefly stealing the spotlight during Wiig’s monologue. This marked his first SNL appearance of any kind since September 2017, when he hosted for the second time.
Paula Pell – 0:32 / 0.85%
Pell, who wrote for SNL for 25 years, has made numerous appearances on the show since the mid-nineties. Her latest one (as herself pretending to be a typical audience member) was preceded by her cameo in the pretaped December 16 sketch, “Tampon Farm,” which also featured Wiig.
Kaia Gerber – 0:05 / 0.13%
Gerber’s performance as an eerily flexible version of herself in “Pilates” consisted of a single five-word line of dialogue. The supermodel and actress currently appears in a recurring capacity alongside Wiig on Palm Royale.
Season 49 of SNL continues next week with host Ryan Gosling and musical guest Chris Stapleton.
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.
