The new season of “Saturday Night Live” will bring changes galore, besides having a smaller live audience.

For one thing, according to reports, Jim Carrey will be playing Joe Biden. This will come as a bit of a sting to Jason Sudeikis, who originated Biden years ago when he was a regular. But Woody Harrelson played Biden last season, and now Carrey will step into the role. I wish they’d asked Sudeikis back, but this is like replacing Darrell Hammond with Alec Baldwin for Trump.

Three new players are joining the show: Lauren Holt, an actor and comedian; Punkie Johnson, a comedian and writer; and Andrew Dismukes, a stand-up comic who has been a staff writer at “SNL.”

Holt looks like she might be groomed as a replacement for Aidy Bryant, who Lorne Michaels has said will come and go this season while she shoots her series, “Shrill.” Cecily Strong is shooting a series in Vancouver, so Michaels tells New York Mag’s Vulture she’ll be green-screened in when she can’t be in New York. And Kate McKinnon? Michael says she’s “here for the election shows” somewhat enigmatically. After that, McKinnon could very well be moving on.

And Alec Baldwin? Now that he has five small children to support, you don’t hear him making noises about playing Donald Trump. It’s easy money and not much of a commute. When Biden wins the election, though, that may be the end of the line for his famous impersonation.

PS Congrats to Lorne. “SNL” won a bunch of creative arts Emmys earlier this week. Eddie Murphy is sure to win as Guest Star in a Variety series from last season. Forty six seasons and still at the top of the heap!

With the soaps struggling in the ratings since the return post-pandemic, everything matters in the way the shows are presented.

Over the summer, “Days of our Lives” vet Melissa Reeves– who’s played Jennifer Horton on and off since the mid 1980s– went on social media and liked a Tweet by right winger Candace Owens denouncing Black Lives Matter. “Days” shoots far enough in advance that the uproar which followed died down somewhat. But even some of her castmates were furious with Reeves, a Born Again Christian who flies back and forth to Los Angeles from her home in Nashville.

But apparently, backstage the scandal never went quiet. And now, Reeves is out. She’s being replaced by Cady McClain, an Emmy winner from “All My Children” and “As the World Turns” who can act like crazy. (Reeves is no Meryl Streep.)

The company line is that Reeves didn’t want to fly during the pandemic, and that McClain’s stint is temporary. It’s a convenient excuse. Sony TV wouldn’t have hired a heavy hitter like McClain for short term work. As “Days” has resumed shooting, McClain will be front burner and full time. It won’t be long before she gets her groove and becomes an MVP on “Days.” Meantime, the show is indeed having trouble, as are the three other soaps. The most recent ratings have them off by 260,000 from last year at this time. A  number of actors have been written off, and popular star Kristian Alfonso left the show when they tried to put her on a three month hiatus after 37 years.