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For the final eight years, Heidi Gardner has made New York Metropolis’s 30 Rockefeller Plaza her residence because the longest-tenured feminine forged member at present on Saturday Night time Reside. Whereas she’s proud to be a part of the legendary comedy present because it toasts its fiftieth anniversary this weekend — with SNL50: The Homecoming Live performance on Peacock on Friday, Feb. 14, main as much as the massive SNL50: The Anniversary Particular on NBC and Peacock on Sunday, Feb. 16 — a fast browse of her Instagram tales or a glimpse of her frequent red-and-gold outfits through the present’s goodnights leaves little doubt that her best love is her hometown of Kansas Metropolis.
“Kansas Metropolis is sort of a hug — it’s like my consolation place,” the 41-year-old actress-comedian instructed Journey + Leisure on a name from KC final week. “I really feel like myself once I’m right here.”
She first heard that description from a pal who visited her a couple of summers in the past. “She simply felt a heat embrace from the second she stepped off the aircraft,” Gardner stated. “I really feel that manner, however I grew up right here, so it’s at all times felt like that to me.”
For many of her life, she stated vacationers tended to consider the town, which straddles Missouri and Kansas, as a “stop-over city,” however there’s been a shift within the final decade. “Persons are beginning to understand there’s a lot extra right here, and it’s turning right into a vacation spot spot, which feels actually good,” she stated.
Synonymous with the town is its barbecue scene — and Gardner is so well-versed that with out lacking a beat, she rattled off a listing by specialties. For burnt ends, her high choose is LC’s Bar-B-Q, proper down the road from the place she grew up, whereas she goes to Arthur Bryant’s Barbeque for its ribs, Gates BBQ for the “most nostalgic sauce,” and Slap’s BBQ for its sausage that “legit melts in your mouth, like butter.”
Courtesy of Heidi Gardner
She additionally steered first-time guests head to River Market, which is a “cool open-air market with a number of distributors that’s very enjoyable.” It is also residence to the Arabia Steamboat Museum, highlighting American frontier life. Additionally itinerary-worthy are throwback film theaters Screenland Armour and Stray Cat Movie Heart, “that are simply very nice locations that care about films — simply actually good vibes,” in addition to Nelson Atkins Museum of Artwork and the Nerman Museum of Modern Artwork in close by Overland Park, Kansas, which simply debuted a Jeremy Scott exhibit final weekend.
Should you occur to be on the town the primary weekend of the month, she stated to not miss out on First Fridays, when the Crossroads Arts District springs to life in an artwork gallery open home of types, together with artisan retailers, meals vans, craft breweries, and artwork alleys.
One among her favourite spots to remain is the boutique resort No Emptiness with a bar area referred to as Le Lounge, the place she celebrated her birthday final July, describing it as “transportive” because it “looks like Kansas Metropolis, but in addition Moroccan and European” and is “simply so effectively curated.”
Since Kansas Metropolis is in the end a “sports activities city,” she recommends catching a Kansas Metropolis Present (the ladies’s soccer workforce) sport, particularly as a result of its venue CPKC Stadium simply opened in 2024 and is the primary stadium ever constructed for a girls’s skilled sports activities workforce, “which is a stunning reality,” and the video games are “such a enjoyable time.” Additionally price testing: Kansas Metropolis Royals video games at Kauffman Stadium.
And, after all, there’s the largest motive for Kansas Metropolis being on the map greater than ever within the final decade: her beloved Kansas Metropolis Chiefs. “I will not lie: having a world championship soccer workforce has helped us,” she stated. Regardless of Sunday’s Tremendous Bowl loss, she posted after the sport: “Thanks for placing it on the market each Sunday. You give us a lot to smile about.”
Window or aisle?
Window.
Castmate who would make the very best journey buddy?
Ego [Nwodim]. She has the very best style and can get you to the very best restaurant, whether or not it’s thought of the very best or has one thing like the very best soup dumplings. She is aware of every little thing.
Greatest SNL after-party location?
I’ll be the one one that says this — and am most likely not cool for this — however Rosa Mexicano. Quite than getting a steak at 3 a.m., I can get chips and actually good guacamole and a margarita. That’s the right factor after a present.
Subsequent vacation spot in your journey want listing?
I need to go to Japan, particularly Tokyo, as a result of I am nonetheless an amusement park particular person. I need to go to Tokyo Disneyland and Sanrio Puroland.
Should-have merchandise in your carry-on?
Truthfully, a toothbrush. I really like to only brush my tooth midway by way of the flight. It wakes you up.
Caro Scarimbolo/Courtesy of NBC
In truth, it was Gardner herself who campaigned on to her SNL boss Lorne Michaels for the Chiefs’ Travis Kelce to host the present earlier than Taylor Swift was within the image — the last word proof of how revered she is on the comedy mainstay broadcast stay from 30 Rock’s Studio 8H.
“After I began there, it was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I am at Rockefeller Heart!’” she recalled of her first season in 2017. “There’s a lot to take a look at, and also you consider the historical past of the constructing with SNL and The Tonight Present.” These days, it’s a little bit of a unique really feel: “I’ve made buddies with so most of the safety guards, it’s like strolling down a row of pleasant faces as you get to work.”
Nonetheless, the magic of passing by way of the constructing’s foyer isn’t misplaced on her, as she reminds vacationers to take a second to search for on the murals — the identical piece of recommendation her co-star Colin Jost handed alongside to T+L final yr, recounting the storied previous of Spanish artist José Maria Sert’s fresco.
“Take a great look across the partitions,” she stated. “Plus each Saturday, they create in these new floral preparations in essentially the most big vases I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s simply actually spectacular — such a gorgeous area.”
However she stated the SNL employees’s newest hotspot is down within the Rockefeller Heart basement: Lil Candy Deal with. “We’re all obsessed — it’s an habit, and it’s dangerous,” she stated of the sweet store with a rotating providing of worldwide gummies and sweets. “You’ll go in someday and it’s gummy fish and frogs, and the subsequent they’re getting so particular, like gummy Ferraris and ashtrays — they’re operating out of things!”
At all times seeing the comical facet of issues, Gardner — who usually has sketches and Weekend Replace characters she’s penned on air — admitted journey experiences usually make for SNL sketch fodder, like a current incident on a delayed flight the place the gate agent saved updating the passengers that they didn’t have a pilot, however that flight crew was on a bunch textual content with one other pilot who was keen to return in. “It was like me on a bunch textual content with my buddies, besides that is an airline!” the actress-comedian stated.
Will Heath/Courtesy of NBC
Gardner’s at all times been near the journey world as a result of her mother was a journey agent. “Journey was throughout me,” she recounted of her childhood. “However she was a single mother or father and had two children that she was operating round on a regular basis, so when she acquired to journey, she traveled alone. However I heard numerous good tales!”
She did finally get to pack her luggage too, on street journeys to Branson, Missouri, which she referred to as a “sober Vegas.” Alongside the best way, she and her older brother Justin would struggle over a single Sport Boy earlier than it ran out of batteries, making stops at Dairy Queen and McDonald’s alongside the best way.
Her most memorable childhood journey was when her grandparents took the siblings to Walt Disney World — instilling a love of theme parks, which she nonetheless has at present, in addition to themed motor inns, as soon as staying in a decked-out Renaissance room.
As of late, her method to journey is easy, like a current pre-Thanksgiving California street journey to Ojai, Santa Barbara, and Malibu. “I really feel so grateful to have been there only a couple months earlier than the fires,” she stated. Alongside the best way, she rode horses on the seaside and stayed at San Ysidro Ranch in Santa Barbara and Nobu Resort Ryokan Malibu, the place it was “actually peaceable to fall asleep subsequent to the water listening to the waves. It was a very particular journey.”
She additionally retains it mild as an “absolute under-packer” with the smallest model of Away’s The Carry-On. “I don’t like over-packing in any respect anymore, to a fault. I at all times have sufficient underwear and socks, however every little thing else I am re-wearing fairly a bit.”
That stated, she stated her general journey persona is “form of complicated and ever-evolving,” musing “I need to consider myself as an adventurer and an explorer. I did these issues in Hawaii, however I used to be like, I may have simply laid in my room your entire time, appeared out the window on the stunning view, and gotten up for poke bowls and shaved ice. I believe as a result of the job I do is so overstimulating, at sure factors, I do not want an overstimulating trip.”
However there are components of engaged on the famously hectic stay present that she hopes she will be able to incorporate into her personal life higher. “After I went to Hawaii, we had been speculated to have an hour layover in Honolulu however acquired delayed a day, so we ended up spending the evening and I used to be so pissed off about it,” she admitted. “I’ve discovered to take care of the surprising and chaos in my job, and I used to be like, ‘Heidi, it’s essential embrace the surprising and chaos in actual life — particularly while you get an additional day in paradise!'”