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Alec Baldwin returns to SNL for the first time since Rust trial

Reuters Alec Baldwin wears a grey suit and black glasses.Reuters
Alec Baldwin will not stand trial again over Halyna Hutchins' death

Alec Baldwin has returned to US sketch show Saturday Night Live (SNL) for the first time since his trial over a fatal shooting on the set of the film Rust was dismissed.

Baldwin said his career might be over after a prop gun he was holding during rehearsals fired a live round killing Halyna Hutchins in 2021, leading to him being charged with involuntary manslaughter, which he denied.

He returned to SNL this week, a show he has hosted a record 17 times.

He opened this week's episode as Fox News host Bret Baier, in a parody of his recent interview with Democratic US presidential nominee Kamala Harris.

Alongside Maya Rudolph as Harris, the pair poked fun at the combative interview.

Baldwin's Baier said he could not listen to his interviewee's answers "because I'm talking", a joke about how the pair interrupted each other.

After they shook hands, Rudolph's Harris laughed: "The pleasure is neither of ours."

In 2017, Baldwin won an Emmy award for his portrayal of Republican US presidential nominee Donald Trump on SNL.

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Baldwin will not face another trial on charges of involuntary manslaughter relating to Ms Hutchens' death after the case against him in New Mexico was dismissed in July.

He denied pulling the trigger on the set of the western, which was being filmed in the state, and said he did not know who put live bullets in the gun.

He called it a "one in a trillion episode".

The trial collapsed after his lawyers claimed police and prosecutors had hidden evidence - a batch of bullets - that could have been connected to the shooting.

While prosecutors argued the bullets were not relevant, the judge in New Mexico decided they should have been shared with Baldwin’s team regardless.

In April, the production's armourer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed was jailed after being found guilty of involuntary manslaughter.

Prosecutors said she had failed to notice that live bullets had been mixed with dummy rounds in a box of ammunition on set – one of which was in the firearm used by Baldwin.