Saturday Night Live star opens up on ‘tailgating’ with Travis Kelce before Chiefs icon hosted the show

Travis Kelce ‘tailgated’ with Saturday Night Live stars before hosting the hit show, Heidi Gardner has revealed.

The Kansas City tight end, who is now pursuing a career behind the camera, made his SNL hosting debut in March 2023.

Gardner is a Chiefs fan and she recently opened up on working with Kelce before he went public with his romance with Taylor Swift.

The NFL star joined Gardner’s friends and family for a meal ahead of the show, with Kelce’s older brother Jason also making an appearance.

‘I just know for a fact that’s the only host in SNL history that’s ever tailgated before hosting,’ she told the the ‘Not Skinny But Not Fat’ podcast.

‘I was like, “I’m gonna have a tailgate in my room” because Arrowhead Stadium is famous for tailgating.

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Travis Kelce ‘tailgated’ with Saturday Night Live’s Heidi Gardner (R) before hosting the show

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Kelce fulfilled a lifelong ambition when he appeared as a guest SNL host in March 2023

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‘That’s what we do at the stadium in Kansas City. People show up early and they tailgate. They smoke barbecue all morning, they share their food and you just tailgate.’

Gardner added: ‘I got barbecue, we tailgated in the dressing room before the show and he came back with his brother, Jason, and they had barbecue before he hosted SNL.’

Gardner, who joined SNL in 2017, claims she had invited the younger Kelce brother to the tailgate earlier in the week but didn’t think the 35-year-old would show up.

‘That morning, he was so nice. Jeff, one of our guys in the talent department knocked on my dressing room, and I opened it, and he had these cans of tequila sodas… he said: “These are from Travis for the tailgate”,’ Gardner explained.

It had taken Gardner ‘a couple of years’ to convince SNL bosses to invite Kelce on, with Lorne Michaels saying Kelce had to win a second Super Bowl before he could host the show.

The Chiefs secured the Vince Lombardi Trophy in February 2023, with Kelce appearing on SNL a few weeks later. He and Swift then made brief cameos in October 2023.