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WWE formally announced details of the return of Saturday Night’s Main Event to its programming schedule as part of its new deal with NBC Universal. While WWE Smackdown leaving the widely-available free broadcast platform Fox and returning to the smaller cable audience with USA Network (already costing Smackdown viewers), WWE has revived a deal with broadcast network NBC for Saturday Night’s Main Event.
The SNME events will take place quarterly, and WWE announced today the first event will take place on Dec. 14, 2024 and emanate from the same arena where the first-ever SNME was taped nearly 40 years ago in May 1985, Uniondale, N.Y. at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum. Tickets go on sale Sept. 20 (pre-sale on Sept. 19).
The new SNME logo is similar to the original. The poster that WWE placed on its website today includes images of Cody Rhodes front and center with Roman Reigns, Bianca Belair, Seth Rollins, and Liv Morgan equally featured on the perimeter.
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The events will not only air live on NBC for free for anyone with a TV with an antennae or a cable/streaming service that carries an NBC affiliate, but it will be available on NBC Universal’s streaming service Peacock and will thus also be available on delay, on-demand on Peacock.
WWE’s press release and website article stated:
This marks the first primetime special, which will air quarterly on NBC and Peacock, as part of WWE’s new, five-year domestic media rights partnership with NBCUniversal, which officially kicked off last Friday with SmackDown on USA Network.
When Saturday Night’s Main Event debuted on NBC, it was a return of pro wrestling to broadcast TV after it had instead gained popularity in the 1960s, 1970s, and into the 1980s on regional TV stations during the territory era of pro wrestling. Vincent K. McMahon’s aggressive expansion nationally included national PPVs such as WrestleMania and Survivor Series, national syndication in territories other than the traditional Northeast region that his father had largely stayed within, and national television via SNME.
SNME was a 90 minute show that aired in the slot normally occupied by Saturday Night Live, but rather than air a rerun of SNL, NBC opted to air first-run WWE programming for 90 minutes. The SNME events were pre-taped, heavily edited in post-production, included soundbites from wrestlers and announcers that were more scripted than any other pro wrestling programs of that era, and usually began with a big Hulk Hogan match since the biggest audience at 11:30 p.m. when SNME aired was at the start of the show.
The format included more zany content (Bobby Heenan dunking for pumpkins in chocolate sauce on a Halloween-themed episode, an Uncle Elmer “hillbilly wedding,” etc.) meant to appeal to people who might otherwise be looking for some laughs at that late night hour on a weekend. The format also included main event match-ups rarely seen on TV in those days, since pro wrestling promoters used TV as a way to sell tickets to live events and convince people to order PPVs. SNME broke from that, but most often featured matches that had already been on tour for months so there was little risk of it affected live event ticket sales.
WWE released a video with vintage clips from the 1980s early SNME events and the late-Gene Okerlund’s voice. Watch that HERE.
(ABOUT THE AUTHOR: PWTorch editor Wade Keller founded Pro Wrestling Torch in September 1987. He has been interviewed as a pro wrestling industry go-to analyst by dozens of TV and radio stations across the country; he has also been quoted in dozens of major newspapers and magazines across the world. Media entities that have featured Keller in stories covering wrestling include National Public Radio, Fox News Channel, ESPN Magazine, the New York Post, Entertainment Weekly, the Associated Press, and the Washington Post. He also hosted his own weekly two hour wrestling talk show on KFAN sport radio in the ’90s. Over the past 35+ years Keller has also interviewed, one-on-one, pro wrestling’s top names for in-depth “Torch Talks” and feature articles including powerbrokers such as Vince McMahon, Eric Bischoff, Jerry Jarrett, Bill Watts, Jim Cornette, Jim Crockett, Jim Herd, Paul Heyman, Kevin Sullivan, Jim Ross, Vince Russo, Brian Gewirtz, and Tony Kha n; top wrestling stars such as The Rock, Steve Austin, Mick Foley, Rick Steamboat, Jerry Lawler, Bill Goldberg, British Bulldog, Road Warrior Hawk, Jesse Ventura, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, Bobby Lashley, and Hulk Hogan; and legends such as Lou Thesz, Gordon Solie, Bruno Sammartino, Roy Shires, Terry Funk, and Verne Gagne.)
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