Bill Hader remembers being awestruck by Adele’s debut performance at 'SNL'

Bill Hader, the American actor and director, recalled being lost for words when he witnessed Adele’s performance for the first time.

In the new documentary, Ladies & Gentlemen… 50 Years of SNL Music, the Barry actor recounted his first encounter with the Set Fire to the Rain singer when she made her Saturday Night Live debut in 2008.

"I remember us sitting at the rewrite table on [floor] 9, and Adele not a lot of us had heard of her," he explained. "And she started singing, and it was, like, we all stopped. We opened the curtain and everybody looked down, and went, 'Who is that?'"

Adele performed Chasing Pavements and Cold Shoulder from her debut album 19 in her first SNL appearance on October 18, 2008. She later returned to the show in 2015 to perform Hello and When We Were Young, and also hosted TV program in 2020.

The boss of iconic comedy sketch show, Lorne Michaels also appeared in the documentary recollecting how the 16-time Grammy award winner gained her popularity in America.

"The whole country was watching for other reasons. It just happened to be that show that Sarah Palin was on," he said. 

Michaels said when Adele was on the runway to fly back to England "she checked her computer, and she was at number 45. And when they landed, she was almost number one."

The episode with Josh Brolin and Sarah Palin is one of the most watched episodes of the decade of the show, and 19 leaped to the the top of the music charts the day after it aired.