‘Saturday Night Live’ celebrates 50th anniversary with star-studded special

Saturday Night Live celebrated its 50th anniversary with the live SNL50: The Anniversary Special on NBC Sunday night, featuring a mix of live sketches, packaged pieces and lots of celebrities.

The show opened with a performance of Simon & Garfunkel’s “Homeward Bound,” featuring Paul Simon and Sabrina Carpenter, with Simon noting he first performed the tune on SNL in 1976, while Sabrina added she wasn’t alive yet and neither were her parents.

Steve Martin handled the opening monologue, with help from John Mulaney, with the rest of the show featuring new takes on some classic SNL sketches, including the alien abduction sketch “Close Encounter,” featuring Pedro Pascal, Woody Harrelson and Jon Hamm, with Meryl Streep playing Kate McKinnon’s mom.

There was also “Black Jeopardy“, with contestants Leslie Jones, Tracy Morgan and Eddie Murphy impersonating Tracy Morgan right next to him, with Tom Hanks as a MAGA hat-wearing contestant joining in at the end.

Other throwback sketches included “Debbie Downer“, with Drew Barrymore, Ayo Edeberi, and Robert De Niro, a Mulaney-led musical about New York, with appearances by Nathan Lane and Lin-Manuel Miranda, the “Bronx Beat” talk show, with Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph and Mike Myers as Coffee Talk lady Linda Richman, a “Domingo” sketch, that featured Carpenter and Pascal and more.

Adam Sandler offered a poignant musical tribute to SNL, introduced by Jack Nicholson, making a rare public appearance, plus there was a “Weekend Update” with current anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che, joined by former “Update“ hosts Seth Meyers and Bill Murray.

There were also musical performances by Miley Cyrus and Brittany Howard, performing “Nothing Compares 2 U,” made famous by Sinead O’Connor, and Lil Wayne and The Roots, with Paul McCartney wrapping the show with “Golden Slumbers,” “Carry the Weight” and “The End.”