ASHLEE Simpson returns to “Saturday Night Live” this weekend – a year after her embarrassing lip-synching incident on the show.
Simpson is scheduled to perform two songs – live – on this Saturday’s show, hosted by “Napoleon Dynamite” star Jon Heder.
“SNL” executive producer Lorne Michaels says “there’s a chance” that Simpson might appear in a sketch or two.
“What I want to do, honestly, is let her perform [her music],” Michaels told The Post. “I think what happened last year was, to say the least, unfortunate.
“I don’t want to take too much away from her performing.”
Simpson appeared last October on “SNL” to sing her new hit, “Autobiography.”
But she was thrown for a loop when her band cued up pre-recorded vocals from another track, “Pieces of Me.”
A flustered Simpson stopped moving her mouth, did a little jig and ran off the stage – blaming the mishap on everything from acid reflux to the band’s drummer pressing the wrong button.
Simpson cancelled a series of radio interviews in which she was supposed to explain to her fans what happened, and the incident dogged the pop singer for months.
“I think she was ill-advised,” Michaels said. “She’s too young and the repercussions went on for so long.
“I felt it was unfair that she shouldn’t have the chance to make it up . . . and I can assure you she will be singing live.”
Simpson, 21, is the younger sister of Jessica Simpson.
She has a good reason to come back to “SNL” – besides getting back up on the horse that threw her, so to speak.
She is releasing her second album, “I Am Me,” the following week.
Like her sister, who starred in “Newlyweds” with husband Nick Lachey, Ashlee Simpson had an MTV reality show, “The Ashlee Simpson Show,” which centered around the making of her first album.