Apple is reportedly planning to inject some much-needed humor into a few of its upcoming commercials after striking a deal with NBC that will see the team behind Saturday Night Live write a few ads for the iPhone-maker.

The partnership between Apple and NBC will result in a series of commercials slated to appear during Saturday Night Live in a couple of weeks, according to Variety. SNL also scored a deal with Verizon that will result in two ad spots being shown on April 8 and April 15.

Saturday Night Live Apple ads

Exact dates for Apple’s SNL ads haven’t been released, but they will supposedly look different than the commercials commissioned by Verizon. Those ads will be written by “Weekend Update” anchor Colin Jost with Kenan Thompson starring in the skits.

SNL has undergone a renaissance during the last year, thanks mostly to its incessant lampooning of Donald Trump. The show’s clips shine like viral gold on YouTube and other platforms, but producer Lorne Michaels wants to drive more eyeballs to the live show. By partnering with brands like Apple and Verizon, NBC is hoping to create more incentive for fans to tune in when the show airs.

“People can DVR and scroll through the commercials and watch it the next morning, but we want them to watch it as an event show,” Michaels told Variety. “And in exchange for losing three minutes of commercials, which makes the show go much faster, we sort of made an agreement that we would be open to working with advertisers.”

Adding sponsorships into the show could be a tricky balance for the creative team. Some early rumors suggest the show planned to do up to six different ads this season, but NBCUniversal’s chairman of advertising sales, Linda Yaccarino, has a very Apple-like view of the new ads.

“You can’t put something like this into a factory and churn it out,” she said. “The art takes a while.”

Source: cult of mac