16 Celebs Who Revealed Why They Got Rejected From "SNL" And Their Stories Are Shockingly Honest

"Being on SNL would’ve killed me. I got friends who made it on SNL and, at the time, I was like, damn. But if I got on SNL, my career wouldn’t have happened.”

1. Tiffany Haddish

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During an interview at the premiere of Tuca & Bertie in 2019, Haddish addressed having auditioned for the show in the past, saying, "I said, ‘If they don’t give it to me, fuck them.' Yep, I said, 'Next time I’ll be hosting,' and that’s that.” And host she did! In 2017, Tiffany became the first Black female comic to host the late night sketch show.

2. Jennifer Coolidge

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In a 2004 LA Mag interview, Coolidge revealed that she auditioned for the show in 1995 with future cast members Will Ferrell, Cheri Oteri, and Chris Kattan. "They chose Will and Cheri and not Chris and I, and six months later, they called up Chris. I was the one who got rejected,” she said. But she shared she felt like she "dodged a bullet" and that she "probably would have self-destructed on SNL." Jennifer was supposed to host the finale of this past season of SNL, but the WGA strike forced the show to shut down production.

3. Kevin Hart

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Hart talked about his audition in a 2015 interview with Conan O'Brien, saying his impression of Avery Johnson, "a person that nobody knew," fell flat. "I remember Lorne Michaels looking at me and he's like, 'Mmhmm, OK,'" Hart said, "He didn't say he didn't know who that was, but I could tell he definitely didn't know." 

In a monologue during one of his three SNL hosting gigs, he addressed the audition again, saying, "I found out that white people didn't know who Avery Johnson was. I was like, well if you knew who he was, you would know how good that impression was!"

4. Rachel Bloom

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In 2016, Bloom actually released a clip of her audition tape from 2012, showing her doing an impression of Katharine Hepburn reading for the part of Bugs Bunny in the 1996 hit Space Jam (it's as unhinged as it sounds). And although she didn't land a role as a cast member on the show, she actually did end up working at 30 Rock as an intern for SNL, which she talked about in a chat with Seth Meyers.

5. Mindy Kaling

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In an interview on The Last Laugh podcast, Kaling revealed that being on SNL had always been a dream of hers, and she got the opportunity to audition while she was writing and starring on The Office. “I auditioned, and afterwards, I had heard that Lorne [Michaels] wanted to offer me a job as a writer there, but not as a performer,” she said. Mindy had made a deal with The Office showrunner, Greg Daniels, that she could only break her contract if she was offered a spot on the cast of SNL, but not as a writer. “I went back and talked to Greg about it, and he said to me, ‘No, that’s not the deal we made.'" But she ultimately felt things worked out for the best, saying, "I think the course of my career would have gone really differently had I left The Office and done that instead."

6. Donald Glover

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Glover auditioned for the show twice, once in 2007 and again in 2009, but was never cast. In a recent interview with GQ, however, he revealed he feels grateful that SNL didn't hire him, stating, “Me being on SNL would’ve killed me. I got friends who made it on SNL and, at the time, I was like, damn. But if I got on SNL, my career wouldn’t have happened.” Donald did end up appearing on the show in 2018, pulling double duty as both host and musical guest.

7. Lisa Kudrow

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Lisa talked about auditioning in an interview with the Television Academy Foundation, where she recounted the reasons she felt she wasn't the right fit for the job. "The thing about my characters that I did at The Groundlings is they weren't the big crowdpleasers, they really weren't," she said. "I didn't know how to go too far outside of myself." Although she didn't feel like she gave an audition worthy of a spot in the SNL cast, Lorne Michaels later sang her praises in an interview with Vanity Fair, citing that timing was the big reason Kudrow wasn't cast. "There were lots of people who you’d see how brilliant they were, but you knew on some level that it wasn’t going to work. Lisa Kudrow gave a brilliant audition, but it was at the time when it was Jan Hooks and Nora [Dunn]... No one gets it all right."

8. Aubrey Plaza

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During an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, Aubrey shared her experience auditioning for Saturday Night Live, revealing, "I didn't make it to the Lorne [Michaels] audition, the famous final audition, but I did a preliminary first-round showcase," and even recounted some of the characters she performed, including a "sexy" Puerto Rican news reporter and "pill-popping housewife" who would "just name celebrities and name what kind of tail they would have if they had a tail." Plaza later worked on the show as an intern in the design department, and even reunited with some of her former co-workers during her debut hosting gig earlier this year.

9. Stephen Colbert

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Colbert talked about getting face time with an SNL scout in an interview with GQ. "[SNL writer and producer] Robert Smigel had seen me perform at Second City when he was one of the people scouting for Saturday Night Live... that was in 1992, and I didn't get hired for SNL that time." He ultimately worked on the show as a freelance writer for a short time, and lent his voice to the "TV Funhouse" animated sketches "The Ambiguously Gay Duo."

10. Amy Sedaris

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Comedy genius Amy Sedaris was offered a role on SNL, but ultimately turned it down. "When Janeane Garofalo was leaving the show [in 1995], I met with Lorne Michaels, but at that time, we were doing our play One Woman Shoe, and it was everything I wanted," she said in an interview. "Maybe even three years earlier, it would have been great, but at that point, it was like, 'Oh, it’s too late.' A few years later, Strangers with Candy fell into my lap. But television’s not something that I ever thought about or planned."

11. Nicole Byer

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Everyone's favorite TV host and prolific podcaster auditioned for SNL in 2013, and even though Byer didn't get the job, she told the Hollywood Reporter that there's no hard feelings. “I had the best time auditioning," she said. "I wasn’t nervous because I was like, ‘I’m not going to get this.’ And then, they didn’t hire anyone that year.” 

12. Geena Davis

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Davis recounted the audition process during an interview with the Daily Beast, saying, "I made a stupid videotape of myself doing hopefully funny things," and that she had a "pretty awkward" lunch with cast members from the show. "It was like, 'OK, what's funny about you? Just prove to us that you're funny,' and it was this lunch, and so it was definitely weird!" She didn't get the job, but she did go on to host the show five years later, in 1989.

13. Kathy Griffin

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Griffin was part of the same showcase at The Groundlings theater as Lisa Kudrow, something they talked about with Vanity Fair as part of an oral history for the comedy theater's 40th anniversary. Kathy later revealed to the Daily Beast that Alec Baldwin asked her to do a cameo during his SNL hosting gig, but she didn't think Lorne Michaels was too fond of her. "Alec Baldwin was reaching out… and he said, ‘Lorne and I would like you to do the premiere of SNL’… I even said, ‘I don’t think Lorne is a fan.’ … I auditioned for the show way back in the day, and I go, ‘I’ve got to be honest, Alec, I don’t think he’s a fan.'"

14. Marc Maron

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Maron interviewed Lorne Michaels in 2015 on his podcast WTF, and confronted the SNL creator about a failed 1995 audition. When asked if Maron wasn't a good fit for the show, Michaels responded, “No, no, no. You were fine. You had a strong point of view, and you were clear. You were just part of a mix." But it seems like there's no hard feelings, as Marc later said, "In retrospect, I don’t know if I was necessarily ready for the show."

15. Ellie Kemper

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Ellie told NPR about her SNL audition experience, and how she felt doomed from the start. She said, "I’m an anxious, nervous person, and I’m going to 30 Rockefeller Center to meet Lorne Michaels. Of course, I call him Michael Lornes... I didn’t stand a chance after that.” But she told Drew Barrymore last year that her audition led to some pretty important connections. "One thing leads to another, and I got to meet the creators of The Office," she recounted. "If I had gotten a part on Saturday Night Live, then maybe it wouldn't have led to The Office."

16. And finally, Jordan Peele

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Peele was finishing up his time on the sketch show MADtv when the opportunity to join SNL came around, but as he said to the Hollywood Reporter, “MADtv  wouldn’t let me out of my contract.” Disappointed after losing out on his dream job, he said, “They done fucked up now,” and accused MADtv of “using my fate as chess pieces.” But this experience was what led him to create his own production company. "These producers are making these decisions about art and comedy," he said, "and they didn’t know anything about art and comedy. I want to be a producer and bring my artistry to that, and they’ll all be sorry.”

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