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Elon Musk’s SNL hosting gig started with an unusual cold open celebrating the mothers of the show’s cast. And he continued that trend during the monologue by bringing his own mother on stage to talk about Dogecoin.

Musk took center stage in Studio 8H on Saturday for a much-anticipated hosting gig for the Tesla and SpaceX billionaire. But unlike many episodes with non-actors hosting, the monologue didn’t rely on music or bits to fill time, even if a person in a spacesuit could be seen before the crowd even stopped cheering. Instead, Musk gave a joke-filled opening five minutes, addressing his past controversial comments, weird tweets and admitting that he’s on the autism spectrum.

“Sometimes after I say something I have to say “I mean that,” he said. “That’s because I don’t always have a lot of intonational variation in how I speak. Which I’m told makes for great comedy.”

Musk described himself as “the first person with Aspergers to host SNL. Or at least the first to admit it.” But as many online mentioned, that declaration isn’t quite accurate. Former cast member and host Dan Aykroyd has also admitted he’s on the autism spectrum, so Musk isn’t actually the first despite his revelation here that he’s also on the spectrum.

Musk also went through some tweets, such as one that read “69 days after 420 haha.” He chalked it up to his being on the spectrum and admitted “that’s just how my brain works” along with a non-apology.

“To anyone that I’ve offended, I just want to say I reinvented electric cars and I’m sending people to Mars in a rocket ship,” Musk said. “Did you think I was also going to be a chill, normal dude?”

He also addressed his infamous appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast where he smoked weed and played with a sword. Joking that he doesn’t simply “go from podcast to podcast, lighting up joints” he compared himself to the very famous subject of a murder trial.

“It’s like reducing OJ Simpson to murderer. That was one time,” Musk said, doubling down on the joke later. “Fun fact OJ also hosted the show in ’79. and again in ’96. Killed both times.”

Again, however, that’s not quite right: Simpson hosted just once in 1978. In any event, Musk joked that he could test NBC’s censors and “say something truly shocking. Like I drive a Prius.” He also made fun of his child’s much talked-about name (“It’s pronounced ‘cat running across the keyboard’”).

Later on, he also brought his mom out to talk about the video game he made and sold as a child, part of his famous origin story. She struggled a bit with the timing, but was sure to mention Dogecoin, the first of several mentions of the cryptocurrency on the show.

In all, it wasn’t the best of monologues we’ve seen in Season 46 and served as an uneven introduction to an episode that continued that pace the rest of the night. But it was certainly one of the most talked-about of the year, and Musk showed that he had plenty to say.

Cryptocurrency evangelicals were thrilled about Elon Musk’s Saturday Night Live hosting gig, mostly for the sake of their bottom line. But despite all the hope that a mention or two would push the price of the joke crypto to even greater heights, Musk’s appearance on the show seems to have actually caused a plunge.

Hype about Musk hosting amid some outcry from fans and skeptics had pushed the price of the dog-themed currency to record highs in recent days, especially with the assumption that Musk would at least mention it on the NBC comedy program. And he did, including during a Weekend Update sketch where he played a fake financial advisor.

The mentions started during the uneven monologue, when Musk brought his mother, Maye, on stage briefly. She mentioned that she was hoping her Mother’s Day gift wasn’t just Dogecoin, which set Musk up for a joke and drew some cheers from the crowd. But according to Coinbase, right as the monologue played out the trading of Dogecoin started to crater.

The sketch with Musk as “financial expert Lloyd Ostertag” essentially had the billionaire, in glasses, explaining the history of Dogecoin as Colin Jost and Michael Che ask “what is Dogecoin?” over and over. It essentially sounded like an SEO post about Dogecoin played out on television, the joke being that the cryptocurrency was the focus of the bit in the first place.

Finally, though, all that asking turned into Musk breaking down and telling the truth about the whole deal.

“Yeah, it’s a hustle,” Musk admitted with a smile before an enthusiastic cry of “Dogecoin to the moon!” to end the sketch.

Even with an entire segment about the currency, prices continued to plummet as the show continued on Saturday night. Its Weekend Update mention saw a brief boost, but by show’s end and into Sunday morning the currency was down about 40 percent from its pre-show highs.

Later on, Musk took part in a Wild West sketch where he played “LeRon,” who was an “eccentric” cowboy who had ideas about electric horses, drilling tunnels and a decentralized currency not reliant on mining gold.

If that sounds a lot like Musk playing himself, you probably should also know there was a joke about his very bad coronavirus opinions as well.

“For a while, I thought masks were dumb,” Musk’s character said after he was accused of robbing a bank while refusing to wear one. “But now I admit, Masks make sense.”

As she’s done numerous times in her career over the last decade, Miley Cyrus once again found herself on the Saturday Night Live stage this weekend. Her gig as the show’s musical guest made for the singer’s sixth appearance on SNL. Thanks to this episode’s host, none other than Elon Musk, who had many viewers ready for some potential Dogecoin chatter, all eyes were on last night’s episode. Rather than the usual pair of performances that musical guests offer when they appear on the show, Cyrus blessed the audience with three songs last night.

She began the night with a cover of her godmother Dolly Parton’s “Light Of A Clear Blue Morning” for the show’s cold open. Rather than the typical sketch for the open, SNL cast members showed love to their moms with warm messages during the segment. “Tomorrow is Mother’s Day, and this is for all the moms out there,” Cyrus said before delivering the cover.

Later in the show, she brought out The Kid Laroi to perform their new collaboration, “Without You,” a track that was remixed with a new verse from Cyrus last week. Lastly, to bring and end to the night, Cyrus returned one last time for a solo performance of “Plastic Hearts,” the title track from her 2020 album.

You can watch all of Miley’s performances in the videos above.

In 2016, The Walking Dead’s Jeffrey Dean Morgan appeared briefly in Zack Snyder’s Batman vs. Superman as Thomas Wayne, the father of Batman. The speculation at the time was that Snyder was setting Morgan up to play Batman in the Flashpoint Timeline. For the unfamiliar, in the Flashpoint timeline, Barry Allen (The Flash) travels back in time to save his mother’s life but creates a butterfly effect that gives rise to an alternate timeline where Bruce Wayne is killed instead of his parents, and Thomas Wayne ultimately becomes Batman.

That storyline will be incorporated into next year’s Flash movie from director Andy Muschietti (It), and Jeffrey Dean Morgan would still really like to take on the role of Thomas Wayne, as he told CinePOP this week:

“Look, the top of my list has always been Batman. That’s always been my favorite superhero and talking about Flashpoint has been very fun. I get asked about it a lot. I love the story of Flashpoint. Who knows? Who knows with DC? Who knows how these franchises work? I suppose I probably have a two or three-year window and then I’m gonna be too old. There’s no way. Look, I’m available. Everybody knows I’m available. I say I’m available, I’ve been saying it for five years. We’ll see what happens.”

Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear as though it’s going to happen. “Ever since Zack Snyder walked away, my whole kind of bit in that world has walked away with him,” Morgan told Comicbook.com last year. The possibility seems to have been foreclosed by the casting of another Batman. “Michael Keaton swooped in and took my gig,” Morgan joked.

That’s bad news for Morgan. On the other hand, it should be a blast to see Michael Keaton — who played Batman in Tim Burton’s Batman films in the 1980s — return to play the Caped Crusader. Ben Affleck will also return to play Batman in the film, which hits theaters in November 2022. Meanwhile, Morgan may still yet return to the world of comic books. He’s been rumored for a role in The Boys for a couple of years, while he also told Cinepop, “I like Lobo a lot. I have something maybe cooking and I’ll let you know soon if that turns out to be,”

Morgan can currently be seen as Negan in The Walking Dead, which kicks off its final season — and will hopefully see the death of his character — in August.

Source: CinePop, Comicbook.com

Joss Whedon’s time filming Justice League has been examined many times in various ways in recent months. Replacing Zack Snyder on the DC project, reports have besieged the director after troubling interactions with both Ray Fisher and Gal Gadot, both of which were readdressed as Snyder’s original vision for the film was restored with a four-hour epic on HBO Max earlier in the year.

And according to a new report, Gadot was more forthcoming about her interactions with Whedon on set that won’t sit well with fans. Gadot had previously admitted that her experience “wasn’t the best one” with the director, but according to the report the director actually threatened her career over an on-set conflict that she claimed she dealt with personally.

N12, a publication based in Israel, interviewed Gadot who revealed she had “issues” with Whedon but also said she “handled it.” According to translations made by ComicBook.com and others, she confirmed things similar to an April disclosure that Whedon threatened to make Gadot look “incredibly stupid” while on set.

[via ComicBook.com]

Now, in a new interview Gadot confirms the extent of those issues, telling Israel’s N12 that Whedon threatened to damage her career when she asked to make changes to her character, noting that she handled the issue immediately.

“He kind of threatened my career and said if I did something, he would make my career miserable and I just took care of it instead,” Gadot said in the interview.

Translation of the interview hit Twitter on Saturday, leading to a new round of discussion about Whedon and Gadot, both of which started to trend on the social media site in light of the interview’s publication. Ray Fisher also tweeted about Whedon in the wake of the new details as well, the latest in a series of comments he’s made against Warner and their handling of the director’s on-set behavior.

It’s unclear exactly what Gadot did to handle it, but it’s the clearest indication yet that things weren’t great on the set of Justice League from one of the stars the long-rumored conflict between the director and Wonder Woman herself.

Mookie Betts found himself on third base in the top of the fourth inning of the Los Angeles Dodgers’ game against the Los Angeles Angels on Saturday evening. Usually the list of priorities when a player is in this spot goes something like “score” and then “do not get tagged out and prevent yourself from scoring,” but for Betts, an unexpected wrinkle was thrown into the equation.

Max Muncy checked his swing on a delivery from Angels pitcher Dylan Bundy, which led to a dribbler down the third-base line that went foul. In an attempt to keep Betts honest, Jose Rojas made the tag despite knowing nothing would come of it.

Well, one thing came of it: Rojas accidentally cup checked Betts, who went down in pain, because this is, uh, extremely painful.

A different angle shows that just about everyone on the diamond was able to laugh about this one, including Betts, which is the most important thing here.

Betts would go on to score later in the at-bat, kicking off what ended up being a monstrous 8-run inning for the Dodgers against their crosstown rivals. It was such a big inning for L.A. that Betts was able to come up to the plate a second time in the top of the fourth, and hopefully, he had a cup on for that one.

Russell Westbrook has made triple-doubles look easy over the course of his NBA career. He became the second player in league history to average a triple-double over an entire season with the Oklahoma City Thunder in 2016-17, which he parlayed into an MVP award, and then, he managed to do that in each of the next two seasons. Once again, Westbrook is on track to average a triple-double this season, this time as a member of the Washington Wizards.

Racking up triple-doubles is a pretty hard task, but Saturday night presented Westbrook the opportunity to make even more history. Westbrook was one game of 10+ points in three statistical categories away from 181 in his career, which would tie him for the career triple-double mark with the great Oscar Robertson, and with 1:39 left in the third quarter, Westbrook made it happen.

At that point, he already had achieved the requisite number of points and assists, all he needed was one more assist. Thanks to this pass and a little work by Bradley Beal, Westbrook made it happen.

Westbrook will go for sole possession of the record on Monday night against the Atlanta Hawks. Eclipsing Robertson in anything is quite the accomplishment, and fortunately for Westbrook, The Big O wants to see he get there.

“There’s no doubt about it,” Robertson recently told Marc Stein of the New York Times when asked if he wanted Westbrook to break his record. “I hope he gets it. I think he’s one of the elite guards in basketball.”

Elon Musk (and Grimes) will make their Saturday Night Live debut this weekend, and all the fuss about the billionaire hosting the show doesn’t seem to phase another former host.

As Deadline detailed, Dave Chappelle appeared on Joe Rogan’s podcast to talk about a number of things, including Musk’s forthcoming taping in Studio 8H. Chappelle himself hosted the show earlier in Season 46, a few weeks before he tested positive for coronavirus after some shows in Texas where he actually hung out with Musk and his partner, Grimes.

Rogan interviews are always sprawling, and so Chappelle and Rogan touched on a number of things like how Idris Elba used to sell Chappelle weed. But perhaps inevitably, the two touched on Musk’s appearance and reports that some members of the SNL cast weren’t thrilled that he would be hosting the show. Rogan set the scene with some high praise for Musk, calling him one of the “most brilliant” people ever and assuming that he isn’t “woke enough” as the reason people were upset he’s hosting.

“No one is woke enough,” Rogan said. “They can’t appreciate the fact that you’re dealing with one of the most brilliant men that’s ever lived.”

Chappelle recalled his interactions with the Tesla CEO, describing him as “incredibly kind.”

Chappelle didn’t have nearly as high praise for Musk as Rogan, obviously, and seemed to imply he can understand what people are talking about with their outrage. But he’s also criticized, well, critics plenty in his past. And though he understands why people have gripes with Grimes’ husband, he says the way critics go about it may not be very productive here.

Chappelle suggested he understood why some people were put off by Musk’s behavior.

“Like you said, no one can be woke enough,” the comedian said. “I’m torn, because I like a warrior for a good cause, but I’m really into tactics. You’re not gonna nag people into behaving … In fact, if you continue with this tone, even if you’re right, you’ll be very hard to hear.”

Chappelle also mentioned at one point during the interview that he completely forgot he had met Musk earlier in life, which may be funnier than anything Musk comes up with for his monologue. There are also some really interesting insights about his decision to walk away from Chappelle’s Show on Comedy Central more than a decade ago. But the conversation made it clear that comedian friends of Elon Musk certainly don’t see the problem with Musk trying comedy. Which is exactly what will happen on Saturday.

[via Deadline]

While NFTs might be something the youngsters are pushing nowadays, there’s no such thing as being “too old” for cryptocurrency. Just look at Mick Jagger, who recently dropped an NFT of his own. As this sector of the cryptocurrency world continues to grow, more and more musical artists are throwing their hats into the NFT mix, and the latest to do so is none other than Jay-Z.

He along with his Marcy Venture Partners joined a $19 million funding round for the NFT marketplace, Bitksi. Roc Nation’s co-founder Jay Brown, Troy Carter, Endeavor CEO Ari Emanuel, and 3LAU are also found on the list of investors.

Marcy Venture Partners joins the likes of Serena Williams, Wendi Murdoch, and executives at TikTok, Snapchat, Twitter, 100 Thieves and Adobe as the newest investors in Bitski. The San Francisco startup describes itself as the “Shopify for NFTs” and aims to provide an easy platform for brands, game developers, and consumers to create, buy, and sell digital goods. Prior to this, the San Francisco startup teamed up with Adidas and 2021 NFL Draft No. 1 pick Trevor Lawrence to drop an NFT collection of 3D animated trading cards.

In case you’ve lost track of Jay-Z’s business moves this year, the rapper sold half of his champagne company, Ace Of Spades, to LVHM (for a price Forbes estimates to be $315 million) and his streaming service, Tidal, to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s Square for $297 million in cash and stocks. He also invested in the Los Angeles-based fitness company, LIT Method, and most-recently filed a trademark for a TV and film production company.

This past Friday, Tee Grizzley shared his Built For Whatever album, an effort that stands as his seventh full-length project since 2017. The new release was led by “White Lows Off Designer” with frequent collaborator, Lil Durk, a record they both came together for in March.

Two months later, to coincide with his new album, Grizzley calls upon Durk once again to deliver a visual for their collaboration. In it, they both narrate the dangers of the streets they came from as Grizzley sits in the backseat of a car in the middle of a drive-by shooting while Durk resorts to a dimly lit abandoned house for his verse.

Tee Grizzley’s new album comes with nineteen tracks and a boatload of features from various rappers. Throughout the project’s near one-hour duration, listeners will hear appearances from King Von, Quavo, YNW Melly, Lil Tjay, Baby Grizzley, G Herbo, Big Sean, Babyface Ray and Young Dolph. Its release also comes after Grizzley joined Lil Yachty on his latest mixtape, Michigan Boy Boat.

As for Lil Durk, the new video comes after he joined DJ Khaled and Lil Baby in a visual for “Every Chance I Get,” a track from Khaled’s new album, Khaled Khaled.

Built For Whatever is out now via 300 Entertainment. Get it here.