Colin Jost and Pete Davidson are still working on finding a place to dock the Staten Island ferry they bought, which Jost calls the "riskiest thing that I've done."
The Saturday Night Live co-stars announced on the show in January that along with investor Paul Italia, they'd bought the vessel that they called at the time "the windowless van of the sea."
Jost took a ride out on his investment on Monday with his dad and his 96-year-old grandfather. Davidson, whose personal life has been making headlines as he continues his relationship with Kim Kardashian, was absent from the voyage. They moved the ferry to a new location at a shipyard in Staten Island while they progress with plans to turn it into an "entertainment venue"
"I'm a cautious person by nature and this is definitely the riskiest thing that I've done," Jost told the New York Times while aboard his new purchase. He recalled that when the opportunity arose to buy the ferry, he asked fellow Staten Island native Pete Davidson, "Split it?" Jost said Davidson replied with enthusiasm right away.
Together other other partners, Jost and Davidson bought the ship for $280,100 at auction in January with comedy club owner Italia. They had previously announced plans to turn the Staten Island ferry into an "entertainment" space, permanently docked somewhere in New York.
The venue will feature "music, comedy, and anything else you could think of," Italia told a reporter for the New York Post on Monday. "I mean, we really want it to be a place that you can perform for, we hope, over 1,000 people."
The buyers' goal at the moment is to find that permanent space to keep the boat. Italia studied a satellite image of New York Harbor and, with the help of city officials, contacted everyone he could find who owned waterfront property in Brooklyn and Manhattan, the New York Times wrote.
"The ideal spot would be at the end of its own pier because the ferry was built to load — both people and cars — from either end," another investment partner, architect Ron Castellano, said.
During Monday's voyage, Jost, who was onboard with his family, reminisced about getting the Staten Island ferry to high school in Manhattan everyday.
Walking around the ferry that he now part-owns, he commented on its mechanics to the New York Post.
"This is such a crazy old mechanical boat," he said. "You don't see anything like this anymore. And there's nothing digital. There's like no digital components on it. It's all weird switches and levers and pulleys and things that I don't understand at all but I think my dad maybe does."
Like many Staten Island residents, Jost has plenty of memories of traveling to Manhattan by boat. He especially recalls commuting to school on the famed ferry line.
"So I had like, my kids that I met up with who are also commuting in and we had like our section that we would always sit in and stuff," he said. "I went to Regis [High School], so Regis had a section. Xavier had a section. Kids that go to Stuyvesant had a section, La Guardia. It was kind of this weird, almost like a kind of cafeteria vibe."
Jost will return to Saturday Night Live on April 16 when the host and musical guest is Lizzo.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Jamie Burton is a Newsweek Senior TV and Film Reporter (Interviews) based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on ... Read more
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