Reese Witherspoon says hosting first SNL after 9/11 was ‘too much responsibility for a 24-year-old girl’
Reese Witherspoon reflects on hosting SNL after 9/11
- Reese Witherspoon revealed that hosting the first Saturday Night Live episode after the 9/11 attacks in 2001 was "too much responsibility" for her at 24 years old.
- SNL creator Lorne Michaels personally asked her to host, urging her to help America "laugh again" and restore national spirit, with Rudy Giuliani and first responders present.
- Despite feeling immense pressure as a new mother with a one-year-old and a recent hit film, she chose not to back out of the commitment.
- Witherspoon admitted she "completely left her body" during the live taping and did not host the show again for almost 15 years, until 2015.
- Her opening monologue did not address the 9/11 events, a decision that some SNL staff members at the time considered a "disconnect".