The Saturday Night Live hosts who introduced the musical guest were repurposed as quick memes on Twitter.
The most famous example is Daniel Craig's introduction of The Weeknd, which Twitter coopted to celebrate the beginning of the literal weekend. Craig loves it, at least until a New York Times reporter made him aware of his tweet-less self.
Social media, like everything else, loves to embrace an idea and take it on. The Daniel Craig meme inspired @snlhostinro, a Twitter account that grew in popularity to almost 100,000 followers in just a few months.
The account owner, who wanted to remain anonymous, grew-up watching SNL every week, and also ingested Comedy Central reruns. The account owner and his friends were able to share stories about strange pairings of host/musical guest.
@snlhostintro said that "I didn’t think this would be more than four guys reminiscing," but "when I saw the popularity on the Daniel Craig/The Weeknd accounts, I realized there might have been an appetite for something similar."
The account was created in September. They posted a few intros per day, but no one noticed. An especially bizarre clip was then added to the mix: Adrien Brody, actor, introduces Sean Paul, a Jamaican reggae artist.
Brody was banned from SNL's show after the improvised stunt became so offensive, Lorne Michaels, SNL's head of programming, ban him. This clip was also viralized by @snlhostintro
"People shared that one a lot. I'm assuming it was meant to...avoid suffering alone?" @snlhostintro mused. They think that having 30 intros in the backlog made people more excited to visit the account because they could go down a portal.
They said, "Would have been different if there were only a few of them."
It is still in its infancy. There are many clips from SNL to choose from. And @snlhostintro hasn’t touched any episodes since 2005. They post at a steady pace, but there are still many more to come.
What are they doing to choose the right posts? They have begun to research celebrity birthdays in order to help them make their decisions. One recent example is Peter Boyle, who was born in October. He introduced Al Jarreau. Boyle described Jarreau as "a valentine in your ears."
"His daughter saw it, and really appreciated it," stated @snlhostintro. "This was very nice to witness."
