So this weekend I lived out a dream I’ve had for more than 15 years – I waited in the SNL standby line for tickets.

Back in December, my friend Kristi and I decided we were going to try for SNL standby in the spring season. Since the schedule is not set in stone in advance, to help us choose the date I created a Google Docs spreadsheet (I’m obsessed) with a list of the most common Saturdays to have shows for the last 10 years. We settled on the second weekend of April since (see chart) there has been a show on that Saturday every year. We booked our flights/bus tickets, chose an Airbnb, took days off, and then waited.

About two weeks before we were set to go, NBC announced that John Mulaney would be hosting on April 14 and I literally screamed. (I was in a meeting at work and Kristi texted me, and I let out a small scream. In a meeting.) It felt like fate.

I have been an SNL fan for a good portion of my life and have seen basically every episode since the 2003-2004 season. Along with that, I have always loved John Mulaney, beginning with his Update appearances, his work with Bill Hader ( ❤), and, of course, “New In Town” which has been one of my favorite standup specials for more than five years now. I missed his show in Charleston, SC, earlier this year and figured I would need to wait a few more years for him to go on tour before I’d get a chance to see him.

So, for us to have picked a random date and to have him host on that random date felt perfect (It also helped to heal the burn from the fact that Bill Hader hosted two episodes prior, and I missed planning my trip for that date.)

Being a hardcore SNL fan for the last 15 years, I knew what the standby process entailed. Long waits. Sleeping outside. The possibility that even after all of that waiting we still might not get in. I was prepared.

Kristi and I bought and borrowed all of the camping/backpacking gear necessary and easy to travel with (by plane for me from SC, and by bus for her from MD). We got into NYC on Thursday, and Thursday night I monitored Twitter and the SNL Reddit page for updates on the standby line. We decided to check the line at 9:30 a.m. on Friday and if it was more than 30 people, we’d go ahead and put our stuff down.

For those unfamiliar with the process, the SNL Standby line is on 48th St. between 6th and 5th avenues. It starts approximately beside the Nintendo Store and stretches down 48th toward Times Square, wrapping around Rockefeller Center towards the “Tonight Show” entrance. Depending on the host, people can start lining up as early as the Wednesday before shows. (In this case – since John Mulaney is a pretty big draw for SNL fans – the line began late Thursday night.)

The standby tickets are given in order beginning at 7 a.m. on Saturday. You get the choice of dress rehearsal (which is what we chose) or live show, and the NBC pages give you your number for both before you choose your tickets.

We got there a little before 9:30 a.m. and there were already 28 people waiting in front of us. We decided not to risk it, and set our space up and began the wait. (For anyone familiar with the area, we were directly across from Sean’s Bar. Let’s just say the sight of that giant Guinness became a familiar one over the next 22 hours.)

We couldn’t have asked for better weather to wait in. It was sunny all day and during the afternoon it reached about 75 degrees. We both had on t-shirts and leggings and didn’t have to put on jackets until about 2 a.m. It stayed warm and pleasant for most of the day.



The weather definitely affected the number of people in line. By that afternoon, the line reached the end of the block and had already begun its turn around the building. Later, we heard from the security guards that the line reached the 300 person max they allow and that they began turning people away from waiting at 4 a.m. on Saturday.

The location is also great for waiting. There are plenty of restaurants, you’re not too far from Times Square, and there are two nearby Starbucks where you can use the restroom and charge your phone. We likened it, on that day, to being at the beach. We had sleeping bags, chairs, and an inflatable camping couch, with the great name of Chilbo Baggins, that made the whole experience incredibly enjoyable and comfortable. (I can provide my entire supply list for anyone interested.)

We also had some pretty great line neighbors who we were able to talk to for most of the day. Growing up in rural South Carolina, it was surreal to be surrounded for the first time in my life by people who were just as obsessed with SNL as I am.

The one issue we ran into, and completely didn’t understand, was line sitters. There are several line sitting companies in NYC that allow people to pay them to wait for them in line. For a process that seems to be based on rewarding people with free tickets for taking their time out to wait, it seems incredibly unfair, and I’m not sure why NBC allows it. We had two line-sitters in front of us who were gone for five hours at a time, while the rest of us were basically informed we had to take short, infrequent breaks or we would lose our places in line. Multiple people spoke to the guards and pages about the situation, but they ignored our complaints. On top of never being there, they also held loud business meetings right beside us during the night, and at 4:00 in the morning one of the line sitters from further back came up to the two sitters in front of us blaring an alarm on her phone and yelling about people cutting in line.

It was also angering that we waited 22 hours for tickets, and the people who paid for people to “wait for them” (not really) were able to show up well-rested and perky at 5 a.m., and got in before us. (The couple in front of us even had the nerve to complain about how sore their legs were from waiting those last two hours.)

The worst part of the night is definitely that stretch from about 2 a.m. to 5 a.m. where it starts to get cold and you’re getting tired. Also after 10 million times, it gets really old to have people come by and ask “What are you guys waiting for?” and for them to have absolutely no idea who John Mulaney is. Thankfully, I had a little bit of foresight and made a sign before going that really helped us out.

A little after 7 a.m. on Saturday the pages came out to distribute tickets. When they got to us, we were numbers 10 and 11 for dress rehearsal and 20 and 21 for the live show. I know that usually close to 50-60 people get into both, but since I cared a lot about John Mulaney – and Kristi was super tired and staying up late another night almost seemed out of the picture – we chose dress since with such a low number we were pretty much guaranteed to get in and it’s a longer show.

After grabbing a quick breakfast at Chick-Fil-A (you can take the girl out of South Carolina…), we headed back to our Airbnb in Washington Heights and slept into the afternoon.

We ate an early dinner in the Village and got back to Rockefeller Center around 6:15 p.m. The ticket says ticket holders should report to the NBC Store to check in. I’ve heard they’re usually pretty strict about letting people line up early, but we were able to go ahead and get in our spots in line in the NBC Store when we arrived. They put you in line in groups of 10, so I was at the end of one line and Kristi was at the beginning of the other.

Around 7:15 they began bringing us all upstairs to the second floor and then to the elevators to the eighth floor. Because I was number 10, I was one of the last ones in the elevator, and therefore in the front of the elevator. When we hit the eighth floor, they quickly pulled us out of the elevator, filed us through the halls and then rushed us into the studio, meaning that I was in the first few people to be seated.

I was placed in the front row of the balcony almost in the EXACT center! Because it is a live, working set, there are no “perfect” seats with “perfect” views, but I feel like I got pretty dang close. I was able to see both the cold open and the monologue very clearly, along with a good portion of the sketches.

After going back and watching the live show, I noticed a ton of differences between the live version and dress version we saw.

In addition to the two “cut for time” sketches posted on YouTube, there was another sketch cut with John, Cecily, Kyle, Kate, Alex, and Mikey about 1920s novelists. John was trying to become a new member of the famous Stratford-on-Odeon group of writers and proceeds to insult everyone in the group. Kristi and I both noticed in that sketch (and in others), John was was saying completely different things than those that were written on the cards– kind of doing a reverse Stefon.

There was also a bit from Update cut with Alex as Conor McGregor.

John also had some extra jokes in his monologue and in the “Switcheroo” sketch.

As other accounts have noted, the biggest highlight of that night was the complete disaster that was the dress version of the “Lobster Diner” sketch. At the beginning, they had trouble getting Kenan’s tank through the door and the laughing from Pete, Chris, Kate, and Kenan was even worse. If you watch the YouTube version of the sketch, they actually took some cuts from dress and put it into that version. The part with Pete laughing is from dress, along with the ending number. The audience was dying.

I also really enjoyed the “Wedding Singer” sketch and would have probably chosen that over the “Horns” sketch. I can hear myself laughing in the video they posted on YouTube at the parts where John interjects.

I felt a little emotional throughout the show, just because SNL has always meant so much to me. Just to be there, in that studio. Hearing “Live from New York…it’s Saturday Night!” and the theme music start up while I’m sitting right there; it was overwhelming. When they wheeled the Update desk and background out I was just in shock. I also spent the commercial breaks just taking in the experience of being in Studio 8H. There were lights above me with the old 1960s/1970s NBC logo. I was thinking of all the people I admire who have been in that studio–the original cast, my favorite cast members (like Dana Carvey, Bill Hader, and Jimmy Fallon), my favorite musicians (Paul McCartney, Paul Simon, George Harrison), my comedy heroes (Steve Martin, most of the members of Monty Python). It was crazy. And also to see Lorne Michaels in person, working down on the stage was just surreal.

At the end, they filed us all out back into the hallway where we were able to see the famous photos of former hosts and former sketches. Also, as I’ve heard others note before, the hallway (where I assume the writers are) smelled extremely strong of pot. Michael Che was also in the hall (possibly related? Haha).

We exited through the NBC Store, which was the only place still open in Rockefeller Centre at the time.

In all, this little adventure in NYC was the best trip I’ve ever taken in my life. I talked to some of the “old-timers” around me who have been doing this for years, and one told me that she could tell that I was going to do this again; that I had “caught the bug.” Which is absolutely true. I’ve definitely “caught the bug” and despite all the waiting, the stress, and the just overall exhaustion involved in the SNL standby process, I can see me doing this whole thing again very soon.

Another side note: I also attended Seth’s monologue rehearsal on Thursday, and he is the sweetest with the audience. That was so much fun, and because it was Thursday, SNL was in rehearsal and we got to see Pete Davidson and Kyle Mooney in the hallway. I was also standing beside the SNL stage, waiting to go into Late Night, and through the curtain I was able to see John, Luke, and Heidi rehearsing the “Horns” sketch.