Saturday Night Live saved Julia Stiles ’til the last minute.
The 10 Things I Hate About You star reflected on her 2023 “Weekend Update” cameo during an interview with Watch What Happens Live on Monday. “They contacted me the Friday before the Saturday show,” Stiles recalled of her SNL appearance, which saw her relive (and extend) the final number from 2001’s Save the Last Dance alongside cast member Chloe Fineman.
Since the show had such a quick turnaround, Stiles struggled a bit to find late-night childcare for her children. “I scrambled to find someone to take care of my kids until the middle of the night,” she said. Stiles’ SNL appearance came right around the time the actress welcomed her third child — though she didn’t reveal the baby’s birth until months after the fact.
Stiles said that she was “thrilled” to work on SNL for an evening. “I love that show, and I didn’t know what the sketch was going to be until, I think, probably Saturday morning,” she said. “But I thought it was so cool. I was excited to be there. It was so fun.”
Stiles had only appeared on SNL once before — she hosted the show on March 17, 2001, just two months after Save the Last Dance hit theaters.
Will Heath/NBC via Getty
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In the “Update” segment, Fineman recreated Stiles’ climactic Save the Last Dance routine as a holiday gift idea for “the sexiest present you can give your partner.” After she explained the film’s unusual plot, anchor Colin Jost asked if Stiles’ character fulfilled her dreams with that final dance.
“So does she get into Juilliard?” Jost asked.
That’s when Stiles made her surprise entrance. “Yes!” she confirmed. “Sarah did get into Julliard.” When Jost asked how the character was admitted to the prestigious performing arts school, the actress responded, “Well, you didn’t see the end of the dance.”
From there, Stiles and Fineman launched into a short, sweet routine that essentially continued the Last Dance audition scene, albeit with two dancers instead of one. At the conclusion of the brief performance, Jost echoed the words of the Juilliard scout from the end of the movie: “I can’t say this on the record yet, but welcome to Julliard.”
Elsewhere in her Watch What Happens Live appearance, Stiles reflected on working with some of her most famous costars, including Julia Roberts. “She took care of all the girls on that set, in a way she didn’t really [have to],” the actress said of her Mona Lisa Smile castmate. “The movie hinged on her — she’s a huge star; everything was riding on her performance in this movie, and yet she took the time to be really kind and generous to all the young women that were in it.”
Stiles also said that her Hustlers costar Jennifer Lopez was “incredibly hardworking” and “so focused” on set. And while discussing 10 Things I Hate About You, the actress praised Heath Ledger: “He was such a force. He walked into a room and just lit it up, and had so much energy and passion and it’s really sad that he’s gone.”