Behind-the-Scenes Chaos Ensues in Trailer for Jason Reitman’s Saturday Night

A new trailer has been released for director Jason Reitman’s highly anticipated biographical comedy Saturday Night.

Based on the launch of NBC’s Saturday Night Live and starring Gabriel LaBelle as legendary SNL creator Lorne Michaels, Saturday Night follows the tumultuous evening of SNL’s premiere in October 1975. This trailer sees Michaels battle with faulty stage lights, irritable crew and cynical executives to air the very first episode of what would come to be known as Saturday Night Live. 

This new trailer comes in the wake of a somewhat successful premiere at the Telluride Film Festival, with Rolling Stone’s David Fear describing it as a “hilarious 1970s gross-out romp”. This also follows an announced shift in the film’s release schedule, with Sony Pictures moving up its limited release, starting in Los Angeles, New York City and Toronto on September 27, expanding to more cities on October 4, and eventually opening it nationwide on October 11, 49 years to the day that SNL premiered on NBC.

From the trailer, Saturday Night already feels like one of the most anxiety-inducing films of the year. With steely NBC network executive David Tebet (Willem Dafoe) telling Michaels that he isn’t “ready for primetime” and executive Dick Ebersol (Cooper Hoffman) promising that everyone is waiting for Michaels to fail, Saturday Night returns to an era when SNL was actually an underdog. Still, Michaels remains resolute while working alongside his wife, writer Rosie Shuster (Rachel Sennott), and a supporting cast of future comedy stars including Chevy Chase (Cory Michael Smith), Gilda Radner (Ella Hunt) and Dan Aykroyd (Dylan O’Brien), towards a shared goal of proving everyone wrong and reimagining the future of Saturday night television in the U.S. 

Marking Reitman’s third co-writing venture with Monster House filmmaker Gil Kenan, Saturday Night is no doubt laden with heavy expectations from dedicated fans of the sketch show. But with a trailer showcasing Reitman’s whip-smart dialogue and a stacked ensemble cast that also includes J.K. Simmons, Lamorne Morris and Nicholas Braun (credited in the dual roles of entertainer Andy Kaufman and Muppets creator Jim Henson), Saturday Night seems to promise both reverence and hilarity in equal measure. 

The film hits theaters on October 11, 2024, and you can watch the new trailer below:

Nadira Begum is a freelance film critic and culture writer based in the UK. To see her talk endlessly about film, TV, and her love of vampires, you can follow her on Twitter (@nadirawrites) or Instagram (@iamnadirabegum).