‘Saturday Night Live’ to debut British version of the show in 2026
Will Heath/NBC
Live from London, it’s Saturday night!
Saturday Night Live is set to launch its first-ever British edition of the series. In partnership with Sky, the NBC late-night sketch show will premiere Saturday Night Live U.K. in 2026, according to Sky News.
The original show’s creator, Lorne Michaels, will be an executive producer on the new version of the show as he continues to run the American version. Based in London, the new edition of the show will follow the exact same format as its U.S. counterpart.
British comedians will get the spotlight on this new show. While there are no announcements about its cast, hosts and premiere date at this time, those details can be expected in the coming months.
Cecile Frot-Coutaz, the chief executive of Sky Studios, said the network is thrilled to bring the late-night series across the pond.
“For over 50 years Saturday Night Live has held a unique position in TV and in our collective culture, reflecting and creating the global conversation, all under the masterful comedic guidance of Lorne Michaels,” Frot-Coutaz said. “The show has discovered and nurtured countless comedy and musical talents over the years and we are thrilled to be partnering with Lorne and the SNL team to bring an all-British version of the show to UK audiences next year — all live from London on Saturday night.”
Saturday Night Live U.K. will air on Sky Max and the streaming service NOW in 2026.
Sorry, Avengers fans — you’ll have to wait a little while longer for the next movie(s) to hit the big screen.
Disney revealed Thursday that Marvel Studios is pushing back the release of two of its upcoming films: Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars.
Doomsday,which had an original release date of May 1, 2026, is now set for December 18, 2026. Secret Wars had its release moved from May 7, 2027, to December 17, 2027. The later premieres allow for more time to spend making the films as they are among the most in-depth productions yet.
In a March announcement that production had begun on Avengers: Doomsday, Marvel also revealed the cast, naming Chris Hemsworth, RobertDowneyJr., AnthonyMackie, SebastianStan, PaulRudd, LetitiaWright, FlorencePugh, SimuLiu, TomHiddleston, WyattRussell, DavidHarbour, WinstonDuke and other Marvel familiars.
Anthony and JoeRusso, who’ve directed four other MCU films, return as directors for both films.
“Being able to create stories and explore characters within the Marvel Universe fulfilled a lifelong dream of ours, and we discovered a powerful connection with audiences in each film that we made,” the Russos said in a statement last year.
Disney is the parent company of Marvel and ABC News.
Blake Lively‘s friendship with music superstar Taylor Swift is now at the center of her legal battle with her former It Ends With Us co-star Justin Baldoni.
In a new court filing Wednesday, attorneys for Baldoni claim Lively pressured Swift to get involved in the legal back and forth, which first began in December.
That month, Lively filed a complaint against Baldoni with the California Civil Rights Department accusing him of sexual harassment on the set of It Ends With Us, which he also directed. Lively and Baldoni subsequently launched dueling lawsuits against each other, with Lively alleging that Baldoni and key stakeholders of the film sexually harassed her and attempted, along with Baldoni’s production company and crisis PR company, The Agency Group PR, to orchestrate a smear campaign against her.
Baldoni denied the allegations via a statement from his attorney, who called Lively’s actions “shameful” for making “serious and categorically false accusations” against Baldoni.
Baldoni later sued Lively, her husband, Ryan Reynolds, the couple’s publicist, LeslieSloane, and Sloane’s public relations company, Vision PR, for extortion and defamation, among other things.
Lively’s lawyers called Baldoni’s lawsuit “another chapter in the abuser playbook” and accused Baldoni of “trying to shift the narrative to Ms. Lively by falsely claiming that she seized creative control and alienated the cast from Mr. Baldoni.”
Earlier this month, Swift was subpoenaed by Baldoni’s lawyer, BryanFreedman.
Lawyers for Lively and Reynolds responded by trying to block the subpoena, which Baldoni’s attorneys argued was necessary.
Citing “a source,” Baldoni’s legal team claims in Wednesday’s court filing that Lively’s attorney “demanded that Ms. Swift release a statement of support for Ms. Lively” amid the legal scuffle, alleging that “if Ms. Swift refused to do so, private text messages of a personal nature in Ms. Lively’s possession would be released.”
Baldoni’s attorneys allege in the new filing that, “Lively requested that Taylor Swift delete their text messages.” The court filing also claims that “a representative of Ms. Swift addressed these inappropriate and apparently extortionate threats in at least one written communication.”
In response, Lively’s lawyer, MikeGottlieb, asked the court to strike the documents as “unnecessary, improper and abusive.”
Gottlieb said in a statement to ABC News Wednesday that the allegations made in Baldoni’s court filing are “categorically false.”
“This is categorically false. We unequivocally deny all of these so-called allegations, which are cowardly sourced to supposed anonymous sources, and completely untethered from reality,” Gottlieb said. “This is what we have come to expect from the Wayfarer parties’ lawyers, who appear to love nothing more than shooting first, without any evidence, and with no care for the people they are harming in the process. We will imminently file motions with the court to hold these attorneys accountable for their misconduct here.”
Baldoni’s initial complaint against Lively, filed in January, detailed a text message he allegedly received from Lively in which Baldoni claims Lively referred to Swift and Reynolds as her “dragons.” The complaint claimed Lively leveraged her relationships with high-profile individuals like Swift and Reynolds to exert her influence over the film.
Swift has not responded to ABC News’ request for comment about the latest court filing.
In response to being subpoenaed, a spokesperson for Swift said she was only involved in licensing her song “My Tears Ricochet” for the film and was never on set.
“Taylor Swift never set foot on the set of this movie, she was not involved in any casting or creative decisions, she did not score the film, she never saw an edit or made any notes on the film, she did not even see It Ends With Us until weeks after its public release, and was traveling around the globe during 2023 and 2024 headlining the biggest tour in history,” the spokesperson said. “The connection Taylor had to this film was permitting the use of one song, ‘My Tears Ricochet.'”
The spokesperson added, “Given that her involvement was licensing a song for the film, which 19 other artists also did, this document subpoena is designed to use Taylor Swift’s name to draw public interest by creating tabloid clickbait instead of focusing on the facts of the case.”
Lively and Baldoni are due to appear in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on March 9, 2026.
Stranger Things 5 officially has a release date – three of them, to be exact.
The fifth and final season of the Netflix hit will air in three parts, with the first four episodes debuting November 26; the next three episodes dropping on Christmas Day, December 25; and the final episode streaming on New Year’s Eve, December 31. Each volume will release at 5 p.m. PT.
The news was revealed during Netflix’s fan event Tudum 2025, along with a new teaser for season five. The teaser mixes footage from previous seasons with some quick glimpses of the new episodes, ending with a shot of Noah Schnapp‘s Will Byers screaming “Run!” as he faces an unknown horror.
A synopsis for season five says the episodes pick up in the fall of 1987, with Hawkins dealing with the aftermath of the opening of the Rifts and our group of heroes uniting to find and kill Vecna.
“The final battle is looming — and with it, a darkness more powerful and more deadly than anything they’ve faced before,” the synopsis reads. “To end this nightmare, they’ll need everyone — the full party — standing together, one last time.”
Stranger Things stars Millie Bobby Brown, Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp and Sadie Sink.
