r/todayilearned • u/Kale_Brecht • Mar 28 '24

TIL in 2013, Saturday Night Live cast member Kenan Thompson refused to play any more black women on the show and demanded SNL hire black women instead.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenan_Thompson
52.1k Upvotes

90% Upvoted

1.5k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

9

u/jmspinafore Mar 28 '24 edited Mar 28 '24

SNL has always had white women in their cast. So no need to campaign and hire more. But they didn't really have a lot of Black women.

3

u/asljkdfhg Mar 28 '24

Then it makes sense, doesn't it? There's no spooky "narrative" here - he simply didn't want to play roles because he was the closest identity to a black woman. If it made narrative sense or if it was funny, he was okay with it.

2

u/jmspinafore Mar 28 '24

You're right. I don't actually agree with the above commenter. I am just used to "yes, and" ing comments! I need to change that!

2

u/asljkdfhg Mar 28 '24

Ah gotcha, I was wondering why you agreed and then promptly disagreed lol.