There’s a long list of Saturday Night Live personalities who have rocked the Weekend Update slot. Michael Che and Colin Jost have currently been at it for long enough people have wondered if they may exit soon, and when they do eventually walk out the door they’ll join a list of alums that includes Chevy Chase, Tina Fey, Kevin Nealon, Colin Quinn, Jane Curtin (you ignorant slut), Norm Macdonald, Amy Poehler, and Seth Meyers among others. Not every week is easy, however, as even seasoned vets like Meyers have admitted they’ve gone on bad streaks.
Meyers actually talks about his time on SNL quite a lot, and brings a lot of former SNL personalities on to his late night show, so it wasn’t a huge surprise when he was recently asked about his time on Weekend Update. At the time, the funnyman was pulling double duty as head writer and Update host, and early on it wasn’t going well, as he recounted:
I was head writer, and we’d had like three bad Updates in a row. And I went into Lorne’s office. I was like, ‘So, I think I have a fix for Update. ‘And he’s like, ‘Update’s is the least of my problems.’
Speaking during a recent audience Q&A, he admitted he was a little taken aback by Lorne’s response, and had a witty one-liner about the experience.
And I swear to God, I was like, ‘Whoa! The least of your problems? Well, well, well, don’t be so flirty, Lorne.’
Honestly though? This is about the most on-brand Lorne Michaels story ever. The man is dry, and says what he thinks. He once straight up told David Spade he was “not” the funniest guy on the show. And he has an incredible hate for one skit Andy Samberg wrote. Still, what he thinks is often, inarguably quirky. Pete Davidson’s recounted a story where Lorne told him jeans shouldn’t be worn “after 50,” as one example.
Lorne’s absolutely a character, and this interaction is exactly what I would expect from the man. It’s also probably why, despite having one of the more incredible runs on the late night series, Seth Meyers said it took him literally “seven years” to settle in. In fact, it was only when he realized Lorne trusted him enough with "Update" that he was putting out much larger fires did he feel like he’d found his place on the show.
If you're loving the Seth Meyers Weekend Update stories, he told a great one about taking over after Amy Poehler left a little while ago.
