Chiefs’ Travis Kelce is hosting ‘SNL.’ Here’s how KC’s Heidi Gardner made it happen
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Travis Kelce
After helping lead the Kansas City Chiefs to their second Super Bowl win in four years, record-breaking tight end Travis Kelce is making waves — on the field and off.
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If Travis Kelce scores big-time hosting “Saturday Night Live” this weekend, thank the woman who started talking him up to the show’s producers more than two years ago — Heidi Gardner.
And if the Kansas City Chiefs tight end fumbles … well, there’s little chance of that happening, according to Gardner, the Kansas City native who joined the “SNL” cast in 2017.
Six years in, she knows what it takes to be a stellar host. She recognized that electricity in Kelce during his epic, high-voltage victory speech at the Super Bowl parade in 2020 after the Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers.
“I’m wearing about half the beers I been tryin’ to drink, baby,” Kelce, in a $20,000 Louis Vuitton fur coat, shouted to the massive crowd of Chiefs fans. “It’s been a long time comin’ because what did we do?
“We had to fight, for our right, to PA-RRRRRRRRTY!”
The first promo for the show released Wednesday suggests “SNL” will take full advantage of Kelce’s larger-than-life personality and leading man good looks. He plays Indiana Jones in a live-or-die scene with the shiny Lombardi Trophy and three “SNL” cast members.
Chiefs fans are speculating about who might pop up on the show with him. His mom, Donna Kelce, a celebrity in her own right? Brother Jason Kelce, the Philadelphia Eagles center, perhaps to make up for getting beaten in the Super Bowl? Maybe Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes?
Seeing how “loud and fearless and funny Travis was at the parade in 2020, I was just kind of like, ‘OK, he’s good,’” Gardner told The Star this week.
She met him virtually a few months after his rebel “party” yell. She did a skit for the ESPY Awards, via Zoom because of the pandemic, with Kelce, Mahomes, and three funny guys with Kansas City ties — Big Slick fundraiser co-hosts Rob Riggle, Eric Stonestreet and David Koechner. (Gardner is a newly minted Big Slick host.)
And once again, she was struck by how funny and quick Kelce was; Mahomes, too.
So when the new season of “SNL” started that fall, the long-time Chiefs fan went back to work with an idea.
Hey, I know every couple of years we have an athlete host, I just want to say Travis Kelce would be great.
“And I think they were like, of course you’d say that, you’re a huge Kansas City fan,” she said. “I don’t know seriously they were taking me at the time.
“But then I also feel like Travis has had lots of appearances since then on lots of things, same with Patrick in the State Farm commercials.
“These guys are obviously, they’re athletes for one, but they have charming, hilarious personalities, too. So I think their work just started speaking for itself.”
So she persisted. She kept pushing for Kelce to host.
“I kind of wouldn’t shut my mouth about it, I’ll be honest,” said Gardner, known at work for wearing Chiefs gear on the “SNL” stage and inserting Kansas City references into skits.
And then, the Chiefs won the Super Bowl again last month. “Oh yeah, of course, this guy’s gotta do it now,” she said.
Tom Brady also hosted the show right after winning one of his Super Bowls, in 2005.
Kelce announced his “SNL” gig on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” a few days after the win. He told the late-night host he was nervous.
He doesn’t have anything to worry about, said Gardner.
“My job as a cast member at SNL is to make people laugh, but it’s also to support the host and make them feel as comfortable and shake off those nerves as possible,” she said. “And so of course you’d be nervous hosting ‘SNL.’ It’s like the biggest gig out there.
“But I know myself and I know my cast, I know my writers, I know my producers, I know all the departments are only there to make Travis look awesome. And that is our job this week. And so we’re going to do that.”
And because all her colleagues know of her “immense love of the Chiefs, I think it’s going to be like an extra-warm reception,” she told The Star just a couple of hours before Kelce met the “SNL” family on Monday.
“He’s entering like just a giant love zone. So he’ll be great.”
This won’t be Kelce’s first acting gig. In 2016 he starred on a reality dating show, “Catching Kelce,” in which 50 women, one from each state, tried to win his heart.
(Perhaps an “SNL” skit about that? As of Monday, nothing for the show had been written yet, Gardner told The Star. “But I will say that’s a great idea,” she said.)
Kelce also appeared in the first episode of Showtime’s “Moonbase 8” in 2020. Kelce played a fictional version of himself as he bullied the captain of the would-be astronauts played by John C. Reilly. The short-lived show also starred “SNL” alumn Fred Armisen.
“I think he showed a lot of the reason he’d be great when he was just on Fallon when he announced he would be hosting,” said Gardner. “He sang ... he’s a performer.
“I mean, he’s the greatest tight end ever, but he’s also definitely a performer. He’s fearless. He’s got the podcast with his brother. He’s used to being in front of a camera, being in front of a mic.
“A crowd is an audience. I just think he has that natural performer instincts.”
Kelce joins a long line of professional athletes who have hosted “SNL,” beginning with quarterback Fran Tarkenton in 1977 who appeared while playing for the Minnesota Vikings, according to Insider website, which listed 33 athletes who have hosted in 46 seasons.
The second athlete to host: O.J. Simpson in 1978, who played an iconic Conehead in an “SNL” skit before he became infamous for something other than football.
Joe Montana and Walter Payton co-hosted the night before the Super Bowl in 1987. Michael Jordan hosted in 1991, just months after winning his first NBA championship. Hockey legend Wayne Gretzky and Olympic figure skater Nancy Kerrigan both left the ice to host.
Tennis legend Chris Evert was the first female athlete to host. Charles Barkley has hosted four times.
“It’s super exciting when an athlete hosts because they’re out of their comfort zone, this is something different that they’re doing,” said Gardner. “They’re really jumping in the deep end and that’s just exciting to watch, that’s an energy you don’t necessarily see every week when you have talented actors and comedians.
“So it gives it that little fresh, unexpected vibe, which I think is really fun.”
Gardner thinks that anyone who has only seen Kelce perform on the field will be surprised Saturday night when he goes live.
“They’ll be like, ‘Wait, the greatest tight end ever can also sing? Wait, he can deliver a joke? OK, cool. Oh, he’s dancing,” she said.
“I don’t know what he’s going to do on the show. This is me like thinking what I want him to do or what I know he is capable of from what I’ve seen. So I think people will be pleasantly surprised, and that’s a great feeling.”
This story was originally published March 2, 2023 at 5:30 AM.
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