Deccan Chronicle

Elon Musk shows humility and hubris as SNL host

The Telsa CEO admitted that he’s the first person with Asperger’s syndrome to host the Saturday Night Live

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Elon Musk showed a combinatio­n of humility and hubris as he opened his highly anticipate­d hosting gig on Saturday Night Live. The 49-year-old Tesla CEO, SpaceX founder and one of the world’s richest men opened his monologue by mocking his monotonal speaking style, saying no one can tell when he’s joking. “It’s great to be hosting

Saturday Night Live, and I really mean it,” said Musk standing on the stage in a black suit with a black Tshirt. “Sometimes after I say something, I have to say that I mean it.” He added, in explanatio­n, that he is the first person with Asperger’s syndrome to host the show. “Or at least the first person to admit it,” he said.

It may have been the first time Musk has publicly said he has the mild form of autism. But at least one former SNL host, Dan Aykroyd, also has talked about having Asperger’s. Musk also joked about his Twitter account, which has more than 50 million followers, and the tweets that led some critics to object to his being invited to host the show.

“Look, I know I sometimes say or post strange things, but that’s just how my brain works,” he said. Then Musk added a boast that got his biggest laugh of the night, and an applause break from the studio audience. “To anyone who’s been offended, I just want to say I reinvented electric cars, and I’m sending people to Mars in a rocket ship,” Musk said. “Did you think I was also going to be a chill, normal dude?”

Musk didn’t appear in the show’s unconventi­onal and heart-warming cold open, in which cast members and their moms did brief bits for Mother’s Day as musical guest Miley Cyrus sang her godmother Dolly Parton’s inspiratio­nal

Light of a Clear Blue Morning.

But Musk brought his own mother, Maye Musk, on stage to talk about what he was like when he was 12. The casting choice brought criticism from those who felt the show was celebratin­g a man for his exorbitant wealth in a time of great inequality and a man who spread misinforma­tion to his huge Twitter following as he downplayed the severity of the pandemic.

The casting choice brought criticism from those who felt the show was celebratin­g the man who downplayed the severity of the pandemic, for his exorbitant wealth in a time of great

inequality.

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