Saturday Night Live/Trivia


 * Hey, It's That Guy! / Retroactive Recognition: Did you know that Gilbert Gottfried was a cast member? How about Anthony Michael Hall (SNL's youngest cast member at 17 years old), Harry Shearer, Randy Quaid, Robert Downey Jr., Joan Cusack, Sarah Silverman, Janeane Garofalo, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and Damon Wayans?
 * Mad TV fans might be surprised to discover that Jeff Richards and Taran Killam (two feature players who only spent one year on MADtv before leaving) were/are on this show. Jeff Richards was on Mad TV from 2000-01 before crossing over to SNL, where he stayed from 2001 to the early half of 2004. Taran Killam also appeared on MADtv in 2001 (becoming the youngest cast member on that show at age 19) and was let go a year later. Nine years after appearing on MADtv, he became one of four new feature players for SNL.
 * Killam had started in sketch comedy even before that, appearing as Spalding in the The Amanda Show sketch Moody's Point.
 * Noah Segan (Henry from Ka Blam) was on a few episodes in the 1990s episodes when the sketch called for a real child and not a 20- or 30-something cast member dressed as a kid.
 * Maraka, the Dora the Explorer parody on the episode hosted by Peyton Manning, voiced Judy Funnie.
 * Stephen Colbert (yes, that one) wrote for the show and did voicework for The Ambiguously Gay Duo (and appeared as Brain-io on the live-action version of The Ambiguously Gay Duo).
 * Yes, 1980s-1990s kids' show lovers. The Kenan Thompson who is on SNL is the same Kenan Thompson who was on Nickelodeon's All That and Kenan and Kel.
 * New featured player Kate McKinnon, much like Erica Ash on Mad TV, used to be a cast member on Logo's The Big Gay Sketch Show.
 * What Could Have Been: There are a handful of celebrities who have hosted SNL who originally auditioned to be cast members on the show, but never made it.
 * Jim Carrey: Auditioned for Season 6 (1980-81) headed by Jean Doumanian, but lost out to Charles Rocket and eventually found fame on In Living Color.
 * John Goodman: Also auditioned for Season 6, but lost out to Joe Piscopo.
 * Catherine O'Hara: Chosen to be Ann Risley's replacement when NBC was trying to fix SNL after Doumanian's tenure, but quit after Michael O'Donoghue yelled at everyone for running the show into the ground and was eventually replaced with Robin Duke (a feature player from SCTV) before the start of Season 7 (1981-82).
 * Paul Reubens aka "Pee Wee Herman": Auditioned for Season 10 (1984-85), but lost to Billy Crystal.
 * Geena Davis: Also auditioned for Season 10, but lost to Pamela Stephenson.
 * Lisa Kudrow: Auditioned for Season 16 (1990-91), but lost to Julia Sweeney.
 * Steve Carrell: Auditioned for Season 21 (1995-96), but lost to Will Ferrell. Despite this, he became a voice actor for the TV Funhouse series "The Ambiguously Gay Duo".
 * Johnny Knoxville: Was offered the chance to do his Jackass stunts as part of a short film series for Season 21, but rejected the offer.
 * Dane Cook: Auditioned for Season 28 (2002-03), but lost to Will Forte.
 * In addition to the hosts who auditioned and never made it, there are also comedians who never hosted but did audition to be in the cast, only to be turned down.
 * Dom Irrera: Auditioned for Season 6, but lost to Gilbert Gottfried.
 * Robert Townsend: Also auditioned for Season 6 and was chosen to be a cast member, but an agent named Neil Levy was gunning for Eddie Murphy instead and Townsend forgot to sign his contract.
 * Stephnie Weir: Auditioned for Season 25 (1999-2000), but lost to Rachel Dratch and ended up on Mad TV.
 * Maria Bamford: Auditioned for Season 29 (2003-04), but lost to Finesse Mitchell and Kenan Thompson.
 * Rob Huebel: Auditioned for Season 30 (2004-05) along with comedy partner Rob Riggle; Huebel lost to Riggle, who lasted just that one season.
 * Donald Glover: Auditioned for Season 33 (2007-08) when Lorne was looking for a cast member to play Barack Obama.
 * Mad TV's Jordan Peele (known for his dead-on impersonations of Ja Rule, Morgan Freeman, Big Bird, Montel Williams, Flava Flav, and Forest Whitaker): Also auditioned for Season 33 when Lorne was looking for a cast member to play Barack Obama.
 * Mindy Kaling: Auditioned for Season 32 (2006-07) and was offered a job as a writer, but wasn't allowed to break her contract at The Office to take it.
 * Also, Saturday Night Live was originally supposed to have one person act as a permanent host (Albert Brooks was chosen), but NBC and Lorne Michaels thought the show would be better if it were a little less like Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In (which Lorne wrote for before creating SNL) and had a celebrity host every week.
 * Burt Reynolds himself once talked with Norm MacDonald about a Celebrity Jeopardy! sketch where the real Burt would come out and punch Norm in the face, then the real Burt would take over and be worse than the fake one. This ended up not happening when Norm got fired.
 * Season six was originally supposed to be headed by Al Franken following Lorne Michaels' departure. However, Franken wrote a Weekend Update segment called "A Limo for the Lame-O," which made fun of Fred Silverman. As a result, Franken left along with Lorne Michaels, the writers, and the remnants of the Not Ready for Primetime cast and NBC hired Jean Doumanian in his place. Things didn't go well.
 * Seasons 6, 11, and 20 were all slated to be the final seasons for the show due to how disastrous they were and how much they were hated by fans and critics for being weak and humorless. All three of these seasons were saved from the chopping block by cast and crew overhauls and, for better or worse, SNL is still on the air.