Over 20 seasons, Thompson has delivered the sort of constant, dedicated character work that may wring laughs out of even the present’s most lackluster episodes.
It wasn’t precisely a scene-stealing second—only a bodily gag executed seamlessly. Kenan Thompson performed Kevin, a person who was braggadociously excited to journey the amusement-park attraction Mission Slingshot, which promised to shoot riders up 400 toes in three seconds. Strapped in beside his extra timid good friend (performed by five-time host Woody Harrelson), Kevin shortly succumbed to the staggering heights and handed out. First his head lolled ahead in response to the gravitational pressure, then his physique flopped backwards. The sketch hinged on Thompson’s physicality, and he delivered within the exact but understated method that’s come to outline his 20 years on Saturday Night Live.
Now the longest-running solid member on the present, Thompson has turn into SNL’s quiet coronary heart. His presence has executed a lot to regular a very uneven season, and final evening emphasised how a lot his delicate skills add to a present that’s vulnerable to celebrating louder personalities. It wasn’t that Thompson had a breakthrough episode. Instead, he merely saved issues going, providing a consistency that saved the flat episode from crumbling solely.
It’s no secret that Saturday Night Live lacks an enormous star in the mean time. The present said as a lot in the course of the season premiere’s chilly open, when it urged that Bowen Yang would shoulder extra of the burden following the departure of a number of tenured solid members on the finish of final season. Rather than play up anybody solid member, nevertheless, the present has targeting getting its present solid to coalesce this season. And it’s leaned closely on Thompson. He doesn’t usually get the sparkly moments a few of his former castmates achieved, however he’s proved repeatedly what a stalwart scene accomplice he’s. He’s a reminder concerning the significance of ensemble on SNL.
When Thompson joined SNL in 2003, he was touted as the primary solid member to be born after the present’s 1975 debut. But even at age 25, he already provided a wealth of expertise. Before I spent my Saturday nights watching SNL, I spent them watching Thompson on Nickelodeon’s sketch collection All That, the place he performed oddball characters such because the French trainer Pierre Escargot, the chocolate-loving cooking host Randy, and Bradley the Big Ol’ Baby. (Earlier this season, SNL nodded to his historical past when Keke Palmer hosted and took part in a gritty reboot of the sitcom Kenan & Kel, which Thompson starred in with Kel Mitchell.) Thompson clearly had a ball exploiting foolish moments, a trait he’s delivered to SNL. You can see it in his smirk.
On SNL, Thompson hasn’t amassed as many memorable authentic characters as he did on All That—or as many as another solid members have developed on the present. His declare to fame stays Diondre Cole, the What Up With That? host extra eager about singing his speak present’s theme track than interviewing his well-known visitors. But his prolonged scroll of impressions—Steve Harvey, Whoopi Goldberg, Bill Cosby—has saved the present churning. He’s additionally formed SNL in different essential methods, like when he refused to decorate in drag to assist immediate the present to rent a Black girl.
But Thompson is most adept at growing one-off characters, those that exist in a fleeting second of absurdity. During one of many present’s well-known sketches, “Diner Lobster,” Thompson performed the lobster equal of Les Miserables’ Jean Valjean. Rolled onto the set in a effervescent lobster tank, carrying a French-soldier costume and enormous lobster claws, he proudly started singing the track “Who Am I?” Who else however Thompson might lend an operatic-lobster scene a lot gravitas, humor, and pathos?
He brings that very same craftsmanship even to lackluster sketches, wringing humor out of unfunny materials by imbuing his characters with a winking attraction. It’s an strategy that has grown increasingly more obligatory this season, as a result of many sketches haven’t constantly landed their comedic punches. For instance, when Megan Thee Stallion hosted, he infused a weak sketch a couple of father visiting his daughter’s new, distant home with a featherbrained paternal goofiness that made her break character.
Thompson is a delight to look at every time he’s onscreen, as a result of he’s at all times having enjoyable himself. Week after week, he genuinely by no means appears to tire of the playfulness of dwell TV. As SNL searches for its subsequent large star, the present is overlooking the one proper below its nostril. Thompson has constructed a special sort of legacy: dependable excellence.