Despite multiple assurances that she would focus on acting during her appearance as host on “Saturday Night Live,” Adele burst into song several times during a spoof on “The Bachelor” about half an hour into the show.
The skit found Adele, who was introduced as her superstar self, interrupting every bachelor-dating scenario by bursting into solo-with-pianist versions of one of her hits — “Hello,” “Set Fire to the Rain,” and others — to the annoyance of the other women.
Some of Adele’s looks so far on SNL. And we love it. pic.twitter.com/aZ9r2fetvb
— Tim🍁 (@itstimir) October 25, 2020
The skit concludes with her breaking up a final scenario by bursting into a brief but full-voiced finale of “Someone Like You,” walking out into the studio the small, audience as they whooped and cheered. “Catch me next week on ‘Love Island’!” she shouted with a smile at the end.
Adele had even said during her opening monologue that she wouldn’t sing on the show, explaining that her long-awaited follow-up to her blockbuster 2015 album “25” isn’t finished, “and I’d rather put on some wigs, have a glass of wine or six and just see what happens!” The fast-rising R&B singer H.E.R. was the night’s musical guest — “I love her SO much” Adele gushed in an Instagram post — and was indeed excellent during her two performances.
It was an artful dodge of the longstanding question of when Adele’s fourth full-length album might arrive. Although Adele had said casually late last year that a new album would be released in September, her manager Jonathan Dickins told Music Week in June, “We’re all in the same boat, you’re doing stuff and then all of a sudden, the world stops. It’ll come when it’s ready. I can’t put a date on that yet. We have music, but we’re still working.”
The singer is reported to have been working with Raphael Saadiq and John Legend on new material, as well as longtime collaborator Paul Epworth, who co-wrote her 2011 hit “Rolling in the Deep” and the Oscar-winning James Bond song “Skyfall” with Adele, told The Times of the challenges in trying to top their earlier work.
“Every time there’s a little bit more pressure,” Epworth said. “It comes from the fact the first f—ing thing we did was ‘Rolling in the Deep.’ There’s more expectation from her and from me. And maybe I put pressure on myself to try and recreate it? It’s very difficult. We’d pick up the guitar and go, ‘Can’t do it.’ It feels like we’re trying to retread old ground.”
Monday: Coloring
Tuesday: Coloring
𝘼𝙡𝙡 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙙𝙖𝙮𝙨: 𝗖𝗢𝗟𝗢𝗥𝗜𝗡𝗚 pic.twitter.com/W5SruFZuNX— Saturday Night Live – SNL (@nbcsnl) October 25, 2020
🌹🌹🌹 pic.twitter.com/KbJMj3xcBM
— Saturday Night Live – SNL (@nbcsnl) October 25, 2020