The singer stopped by Saturday Night Live Oct. 3 to support her longtime friend and “Patient Zero” video costar Dakota Johnson during her opening monologue.
“I have really good friends,” the actress said before introducing her longtime pal. “They don’t judge me. They’re really supportive. Ladies and gentlemen, my literal therapist.”
Meanwhile, Swift playfully set the record straight, emphasizing that she is not her therapist.
“You just show up once a week at my house with an empty bottle of wine and ask if I want some,” she said. “You flop on my couch and overshare and every so often I say ‘Damn, that’s crazy.'”
“And then I go, ‘Well, you know, it’s getting late,” she continued, to which Johnson revealed that she would respond, “Sleepover! Yay!”
In fact, the “Karma” singer teased that she was less-than-enchanted by Johnson—who also made jokes about her former romances with exes Chris Martin and Role Model—dropping by her house.
She added, “Then I give you Pedialyte and my security drives you home.”
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Taylor Swift Gives Shoutout to Cara Delevingne After Surprise Role in “Patient Zero” Video
Swift’s sweet support of Johnson comes nearly a week after she debuted her “Patient Zero” music video starring Johnson—as well as Colin Farrell, Cara Delevingne and LA Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford.
“I want to thank @dakotajohnson and Colin for trusting me with their time, taste, and talent,” Swift wrote in a Sept. 27 Instagram post, adding of working with Johnson specifically, “Giggling with your friend because you’re twinning for an entire shoot was a new and truly delightful experience.”
Meanwhile, the Verity actress emphasized that the role in the “Patient Zero” video was the best thing that’s ever been hers.
“Taylor and I have been friends for a really long time, and we’re very close,” Johnson told Fan Girl Nation in a Sept. 24 interview. “And we decided to work together, and it’s great.”
And Swift’s attendance of SNL perfectly aligned with her husband Travis Kelce’s football schedule, as the Kansas City Chiefs will play an away game against the Las Vegas Raiders Oct. 4.
While Swift—who tied the knot with Kelce in July—has made a point to step out at all of her husband’s home games at Arrowhead Stadium this NFL season, she kept her schedule busy with the MTV VMAs last week while the Chiefs played in Miami.
Nevertheless, Grammy winner always wants to be there—whether Kelce and his team are the toast of the town or they strike out and are crawling home.
“When you say a relationship is public, that means I’m going to see him do what he loves, we’re showing up for each other, other people are there and we don’t care,” Swift explained to TIME in 2023, a few months after going public with Kelce by attending one of his games. “The opposite of that is you have to go to an extreme amount of effort to make sure no one knows that you’re seeing someone. And we’re just proud of each other.”
Swift’s night in New York may keep her out of Las Vegas, but keep reading for why she and Kelce continue to keep it 100 with each other no matter what…
Kevin Sabitus/Getty Images; Dustin Satloff/Getty Images
The star tight end’s interest in Taylor was first revealed by one of his teammates in a TikTok video posted by the Chiefs in August 2023 (which, in hindsight, was when the pair were secretly dating).
Before Travis could answer the prompt of who his celebrity crush was, wide receiver Marquez Valdes-Scantling spilled, “Taylor Swift!”
Travis smiled at the camera before holding his finger up to his mustache, saying, “Alright now!”
Plus, Travis was just one of many celebs to attend Taylor’s record-breaking Eras Tour even before the now-engaged duo kicked off their romance. But more on that enchanting moment in a bit…
She is typically attracted to creative types, including actors (Joe Alwyn, Jake Gyllenhaal, Taylor Lautner and Tom Hiddleston) and musicians (Calvin Harris, John Mayer, Harry Styles and, most recently, Matty Healy).
But perhaps that’s why her romance with the lighthearted and cheeky athlete—who signed an updated two-year deal with the Chiefs worth $34.25 million in 2024—feels like such a refreshing option for Taylor after her six-year uber-private relationship with Joe came to an end in April 2023.
Travis publicly aired his failed attempt to shoot his shot and talk to Taylor when he attended the Kansas City stop on her Eras Tour July 7, 2023. As it turns out, he had a special gift for her: A friendship bracelet bearing his “number” that he hoped to give Taylor. (He wouldn’t definitively say if it was his jersey number or phone number.)
Despite his claim that he was “disappointed” he failed to meet her after the concert, Taylor confirmed to TIME in December 2023 that she belatedly caught his podcast pass.
“Travis very adorably put me on blast on his podcast, which I thought was metal as hell,” she recalled. “We started hanging out right after that. So we actually had a significant amount of time that no one knew, which I’m grateful for, because we got to get to know each other.”
So, that whole theory about the Sept. 24 game being their first official hang? As Taylor clarified to TIME, “We would never be psychotic enough to hard launch a first date.”
But her most talked-about appearance? Sitting in Travis’ suite at the Chief’s Sept. 24, 2023 home game against the Chicago Bears.
Rather than shy away from the attention, Taylor cheered and screamed “Let’s f–king go!” when Travis scored a touchdown. Like the public, even Travis admitted he was caught off-guard by Taylor accepting his invite.
“Shoutout to Taylor for pulling up, that was pretty ballsy,” Travis said days later on his New Heights podcast. “I just thought it was awesome how everyone in the suite had nothing but great things to say about her, the friends and family.”
“She looked amazing,” he added. ” It was definitely a game I will remember, that’s for damn sure.”
Since then, Taylor and Travis have been photographed hand-in-hand on dates all around the world and have made multiple visits to a Christmas bar in Kansas City, where they were not shy about PDA.
And, after revealing to TIME that she retreated from the spotlight when Kim Kardashian’s infamous leaked phone call in 2016, Taylor is going out tonight…and every night, if she wants to, thank you very much.
“Life is short,” she said. “Have adventures. Me locking myself away in my house for a lot of years—I’ll never get that time back. I’m more trusting now than I was six years ago.”
“I know I brought all this attention to me,” he explained. “I did the whole friendship bracelet thing and told everyone how butthurt I was that I didn’t get to meet Taylor.” However, he continued, he didn’t plan to give a full play-by-play of their relationship.
“What’s real is that it is my personal life and I want to respect both of our lives,” he explained. “I’m enjoying life and I sure as hell enjoyed this weekend. So everything moving forward, I think me talking about sports and saying ‘alright nah’ will have to be where I keep it.”
He doubled-down on his desire to play it cool in a November 2023 interview with the Wall Street Journal.
“Everybody around me telling me: Don’t f–k this up! And me sitting here saying: Yeah—got it,” he told the outlet, before addressing the media attention. “That was the biggest thing to me: make sure I don’t say anything that would push Taylor away.”
But that doesn’t mean he’s been able to resist publicly talking about his girlfriend—crediting her for the boost in sales of his jersey and calling her “amazing” after she was booed by New England Patriots fans at a December 2023 game.
“I’ve never been a man of words,” he admitted to WSJ. “Being around her, seeing how smart Taylor is, has been f–king mind-blowing. I’m learning every day.”
Donna became a beloved public figure as the first mother to have two sons playing against each other in a Super Bowl, when Travis faced off against his older brother, Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce, in the big game in February 2023.
“For all the stars to align and for them to get through high school and college and the pros. And for them to both play in the Pro Bowl and to play in the Super Bowl, and then for this to happen,” Donna told ET at the time. “This is just like a dream come true. I can’t express enough how special this is for the family and it’s just crazy.”
Donna, who was married to Ed for 25 years before they divorced, supported both of her sons by wearing a half-black, half-red Eagles and Chiefs jacket.
After the Super Bowl, which saw the Chiefs best the Eagles, Travis and Jason got emotional while reflecting on sharing the experience with Donna.
“The moment I saw mom is when I got really emotional,” Jason said on the brothers’ New Heights podcast. “It was so awesome…She was on top of the world for a week.”
“She was the heavyweight champ man,” Travis added. “She was on top of it, and she shined the whole time.”
In addition to their impressive careers as NFL players, Travis and Jason launched their podcast New Heights in September 2022, a project that has only strengthened their relationship (and their bank accounts).
“What this did was gave us a scheduled two to three hour window where we have to talk to each other and we have to talk about what we’re going through, throughout the week and throughout the games,” Travis told NBC Sports in February 2023. “It’s almost been like therapy, man.”
Taylor and Travis both count Miles Teller as a friend, with the Top Gun: Maverick star and his wife Keleigh Sperry even being recruited by Taylor to star in the music video for “I Bet You Think About Me” off Red (Taylor’s Version) in 2021.
Travis, meanwhile, joined Miles and Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes for golfing practice ahead of the American Century Championship in 2022.
Miles tweeted a photo of himself on the golf course with the athletes, writing, “Grip it and rip it.” Travis proved the bromance was real when he reposted the shot and added, “Back at it like we never left!!”
(Interestingly enough, Miles is a noted diehard Philadelphia Eagles fans, so perhaps he put in a word with Jason to broker an IRL meet-up between Travis and Taylor?)
She was accompanied by BFFs Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds and his friend Hugh Jackman, as well as Sophie Turner, Sabrina Carpenter and Queer Eye’s Antoni Porowski.
While their attendance at the game spoke volumes, even more telling was Ryan following Travis on Instagram.
That may seem trivial, but Taylor has penned several songs regarding her fear that her level of fame could prove to be too much for her romantic partner to handle. (See: “Peace” and “The Archer.”)
“It all depends who you’re with,” Taylor said in, “If they have a serious issue with it, I guess you’ll hide or whatever, but I don’t really like that, because it makes me feel like I’m running from the law or something. I don’t want to feel like a fugitive, like, ‘Oh my god, we’re having a relationship, better hide!’
“I feel like if you can be in a relationship and have it seem normal, that would be good.”
And in his WSJ interview, Travis proved he’s more than ready for the pressure that comes with being married to someone as powerful as Taylor.
“Obviously I’ve never dated anyone with that kind of aura about them…I’ve never dealt with it,” he said. “But at the same time, I’m not running away from any of it.”
“The scrutiny she gets, how much she has a magnifying glass on her, every single day, paparazzi outside her house, outside every restaurant she goes to, after every flight she gets off, and she’s just living, enjoying life,” he added. “When she acts like that I better not be the one acting all strange.”
Turning out for one another’s stadium takeovers—Taylor attended 13 Chiefs games her first season with Travis, traveling straight from her Tokyo show to make the Super Bowl—is a show of how serious their relationship is.
“I’m going to see him do what he loves, we’re showing up for each other, other people are there and we don’t care,” Taylor told TIME of their public support. “The opposite of that is you have to go to an extreme amount of effort to make sure no one knows that you’re seeing someone. And we’re just proud of each other.”
And if her presence at the NFL games annoys you, well, Taylor can’t even be bothered to have bad blood with you.
“There’s a camera, like, a half-mile away, and you don’t know where it is, and you have no idea when the camera is putting you in the broadcast, so I don’t know if I’m being shown 17 times or once,” she said. “I’m just there to support Travis. I have no awareness of if I’m being shown too much and pissing off a few dads, Brads, and Chads.”
She’s loved him three summers now, honey, and she’s going to get ’em all.
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