While speaking with TV Guide in 2013, Kenan Thompson announced that he would no longer do sketches on Saturday Night Live that required him to dress in drag. Thompson had previously portrayed a number of black female celebrities on the show, including Mo’Nique, Maya Angelou, and Jennifer Hudson, but apparently got sick of being their go-to guy for such roles.
At the time, the only other black person on SNL was Jay Pharoah, and the series hadn’t had a black female cast member since Maya Rudolph left in 2007. Thompson’s decision came after many had publicly criticized SNL for its lack of diversity.
Interestingly, Thompson didn’t blame showrunner Lorne Michaels for the show’s diversity issue. Instead, he suggested that there weren’t a lot of quality black female comedians trying out for SNL. “It’s just a tough part of the business,” Thompson explained. “Like in auditions, they just never find ones that are ready.” Though TV Guide commended Thompson for helping SNL face the problem, they felt that his blaming it on black female comedians only served to perpetuate it.
The Kenan Thompson Decision That Helped Force ‘SNL’ to Address Its Diversity Problem
However, in the long run, Thompson refusing to do drag opened the door for Black women to join the cast. A few months after Thompson’sTV Guide interview was published, showcases featuring black female comedians were held in both New York and Los Angeles. These auditions were the first in SNL history to focus exclusively on minority women. By January 2014, Upright Citizens Brigade alum Sasheer Zamata was added to SNL’s Season 39 cast.
Zamata stayed with the show until 2017, and was joined by two black female writers that season: LaKendra Tookes and Leslie Jones. Before the end of 2014, Jones was promoted as a featured player. Punkie Johnson and Ego Nwodim have come and gone since then, but SNL has still only had eight black female cast members to date.
Though Thompson has never taken credit for the ones who were added to the cast following his 2013 announcement, some have pointed to him as the reason that they were given a shot in the first place.
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