A throwback-filled Q&A with Tina Fey and Amy Poehler in the middle of SNL50: The Anniversary Special suddenly felt very 2025 tonight.
As the former castmates joked with the A-lister crowd in Studio8H, and Tim Meadows and Quinta Brunson got a Sade reference in there, the news that is captivating Hollywood stood right up at Lorne Michaels’ celebration.
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Near the front of the star-powered audience bit, a tuxedo-clad Ryan Reynolds rose to ask a question of the 30 Rock and Parks & Recreation stars. With his in-the-news spouse Blake Lively looking on, the Deadpool actor stood up to a “How’s it going?”
That’s when Reynolds turned on the comedy chops and innocently replied: “Great. Why, what have you heard?”
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Needless to say, with Lively’s multi-lawsuit war with It Ends With Us co-star Justin Baldoni over what occurred during production of the film and the alleged online smear campaign that followed, everyone’s heard a lot. Which is likely why the celeb-strong crowd including Steven Spielberg, sitting right behind Reynolds and Lively, howled with laughter. The response was made all the more pronounced by Lively’s mock shock look at her husband.
Dragging the gag out a bit, Poehler and Fey put up their hands and acted like there was nothing to the question.
In the anti-climax sequence that followed, Reynolds asked the duo about any potential downside to taking a “couple of nibbles” on the headgear used for SNL‘s 1970s Coneheads skits. “Yes actually go to hospital right away,” Poehler told Reynolds.
Watch Reynolds’ bit at 1:53 of the video above.
The three-hour SNL50 Sunday is the culmination of a series of specials over the NBC late-night’s big anniversary. To that, hosts, cast members, musical guests and more past and present, including Keith Richards, Alec Baldwin, and Eddie Murphy were in the house. Closer to home for Reynolds and Lively, who are being sued for $400 million by Baldoni in a defamation and extortion suit, the Green Lantern actor’s ex-wife Scarlett Johansson (who is now married to Weekend Update co-anchor Colin Jost). Also there were Daniel Levy, Claire Danes, Tom Hanks, Will Ferrell, Kim Kardashian, Emma Stone, Jimmy Fallon, Paul Simon and many, many others.
Delivering a star turn on the red carpet before the live show tonight, Reynolds and Lively hit Baldoni with a defamation and retaliation lawsuit on New Year’s Eve. That filing came just over a week after the complaint that the Gossip Girl vet launched with California’s Civil Rights department on December 20 against Baldoni, his Wayfarer Studios, its CEO Jamey Heath, the company’s financier and publicists Melissa Nathan and Jennifer Abel.
With a settlement looking unlikely according to both sides, the whole thing is set to go to trial on March 29, 2026 – right near the end of SNL’s 51st season.