One of the more intriguing Emmy battles this year was Beyoncé going head-to-head with Saturday Night Live’s celeb-filled 50th anniversary special. It turns out that the TV Academy voters enjoyed the latter.
SNL 50: The Anniversary won the award for Outstanding Variety Special (Live).
It beat Netflix’s Beyoncé Bowl, the Apple Music Super Bowl LIX Halftime Show Starring Kendrick Lamar, The Oscars and its own SNL50: The Homecoming Concert.
Presented the award from his former SNL star Tina Fey, Lorne Michaels was nostalgic, having first won the Outstanding Variety Series award in 1976.
“I won this award for the first time 50 years in 1976. I was younger and had a lot of dreams about what would happen in my life. Not one of those dreams was me doing the same show for the next 50 years,” he said.
Michaels thanked NBC and Comcast. “The [anniversary] show was two years in the planning and they said we don’t care what it costs as long as it’s good. Maybe they didn’t say that, maybe that’s just what I heard,” he said.
“I also want to thank the Academy for keeping the word television in their name. As long as it’s that, we’ll keep showing up,” he added.
SNL 50: The Anniversary, which aired on February 16, starred a large swathe of SNL legends including Adam Sandler, Chevy Chase, Eddie Murphy, Kristen Wiig and Will Ferrell.
Sabrina Carpenter and Paul Simon opened the show, which also featured stars including Kim Kardashian, Cher, Tom Hanks, Bill Murray, Paul McCartney and Keith Richards. Jack Nicholson was also there.
Sketches included The Lawrence Welk Show & The Maharelle Sisters, Black Jeopardy! with Eddie Murphy as Tracy Morgan, Domingo, Close Encounters with Jon Hamm, Woody Harrelson, Pedro Pascal and Meryl Streep, John Mulaney’s Moving to New York musical sketch, Debbie Downer with Robert DeNiro and Scared Straight.
The Television Academy had originally scheduled this award to be handed out during the second night of the Creative Arts Emmys, but Deadline understands that it has now been moved to the main primetime show, which will take place September 14 at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles and air on CBS and Paramount+.
Saturday Night Live had a huge 2025 Emmys, after scoring its most ever Emmy nominations with 31 across its main show and various birthday celebrations.
SNL and SNL50: The Anniversary Special took home 11 wins over the weekend in categories such as writing, directing, production design, sound mixing, makeup, hairstyling, picture editing, lighting and technical direction.
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