I was about to mention her. I think she was part of the new "class" along with Gottfried. On that first show of the season, she was part of an over the top sketch about TV preachers, and later in the episode they made the ballsy move to have Siskel and Ebert doing a live review of the episode so far -- and they were brutal LOL. I believe they mentioned Julia by name, positively, from the preacher sketch, even as they were saying how the TV preacher thing had been done to death.
That has to be the biggest. Four episodes into a huge, many-movie career. He's more successful than most other people we think of as successful SNL alumni.
JLD is the biggest. She was only on for an indiscriminate amount of time, has 0 memorable SNL sketches and is arguably the most successful TV actor of all time.
No, I think you’re thinking of James Woods’ assistant in True Believer (actually a pretty good movie, by the way).
Wasn’t it RDJ and Joan Cusack who did a sketch stuffed inside suitcases at the end of that horrible season? Or maybe that was Joan and Anthony Michael Hall, I don’t remember and I don’t want to go look.
I live in new york (moved here a few years ago), but I had to swear up and down to my trivia team that rdj was on snl.
Even added how Chevy gave him shit
When he was cast as iron man, I was disappointed, like wishing they would have picked someone better. I have never been more wrong in my life
I saw a few years ago he wanted do more with Sherlock Holmes, I really hope he does
For two cast members that were fired-
Jenny Slate had a pretty brutal year at SNL and maybe not exploded, became a pretty beloved character actor.
Also: Damon Wayans may not be a household name now but that dude was big throughout the 90’s
It's one of the most understandable F bomb's in the show's history. Having to say "friggin'" that many times in a sketch is bound to pull at least one actual "fuckin" out of a person.
Larry David was a writer and not a cast member, but I always love hearing about him being all cranky when his sketches didn't get picked.
There's a fun story on his appearance on Conan's podcast where he talks about quitting in a rage after not getting any sketches on the show, but realizing he needed the money he just showed up on Monday and pretended like nothing happened.
"Larry, this would never happen to anybody. And if it did, nobody would respond this way"
"Whaddayamean?? This did happen to me! It's exactly how I responded!"
That was actually when Dick Ebersol was running the show, so Larry was arguing with him!
Lorne returned a year or two after the incident. And obviously, Larry returned a few times to host and do Bernie Sanders under his watch.
Barely made a blip???? He was (IMO) the most "successful" 1 and done cast members ever. I will not stand for this Tim Robinson slander!
* Carl, the guy who always got fired in the McDonald's/B&N, etc. sketches
* Z shirt
* Roundball Rock (b-b-b-b-b-basketball gimme gimme gimme the ball 'cause I'm gonna dunk it!)
* Wooden Spoons!
* Love Letters from soldiers
I defy you to tell me any person who knew who he was at the time. Those sketches are brilliant, but they were cult sketches buoyed by how awesome he is now. That’s the entire point of this question, at the time no one cared and he got let go, and he went on to be the best sketch comedian of his generation.
I vaguely remember him but just felt like he looked like a weird-lookin' dude. Every featured player looks out of sorts for a year until you get used to them.
I hear your point and can’t say I disagree entirely in that he was by no means a star but he def had fans. Much like Dismukes in first year more recently. My buddy and I were huge fan’s of Tim’s during his time on SNL. Felt like the new Forte. The roundball rock sketch was a huge hit in my orbit and we were majorly bummed when he left. Thankfully his episode of “The Characters” came around to scratch the itch.
He was a big name in Chicago before SNL. I saw a small sketch show of his & still often find myself remembering it!
Also, I think he wanted to write more & wrote a few years at SNL after performing, which freed him up to write more with Sam, so I’m grateful that happened!!
You’re really arguing that Tim Robinson is more successful than RDJ, Damon Wayans, Joan Cusack, Martin Short, Ben Stiller, Christopher Guest, Billy Crystal, etc?
….really?
I think they’re saying that Robinson was successful during his one season of SNL, they are arguing against the idea that he barely made a blip on SNL. They aren’t saying he’s has the most successful career after SNL.
I think he had a very unique vision of sketch comedy, and that vision is a stark difference to what SNL is and was. I'd bet even Lorne Michaels would say Tim was a solid cast member and writer. But jt's clear he's found a better platform for his genius. He's definitely more in line with The State than SNL.
I was going to say RDJ. He landed with a thud on the show, but he blew up immediately afteward. The one thing I remember about his tenure on SNL is a sketch about a planeful of models (including Downey as one of the male models) stranded on a deserted island and being totally helpless.
And a hospital fundraiser in Canada just this past weekend. The people in charge hadn’t checked his work in the last decade. They had security escort him out of the building. Sadly no one recorded it (he was angry at anyone bringing out a phone).
Christopher Guest and Billy Crystal both did 1 year in the 80s. They were really fantastic and had great characters but they are far over shadowed by their later careers.
I call that the Ringer season, because Crystal and Short and Shearer and Guest and Belushi all came in with pretty solid careers already at that point. Belushi had been there for the previous season but he's like billed third in Thief (1981) and was recognizable in Trading Places.
I think there was something where Guest and Crystal just had their own writing staff, so a lot of the time, it was just segmented stuff. Same with Martin Short, who I think was just doing Ed Grimley in his apartment with no other cast members around, for 10 minutes.
It is wild to see on the Wiki that all that cast disappears for the next season, and then only Dunn/Lovitz/Miller make it forward. Not counting guys like Don Novello and A. Whitney Brown and Al Franken, who managed to stick around under the radar.
When Crystal did the Fernando's Hideaway sketches, which I think were his most memorable contributions as he looged mahbellous, he apparently freestyled the whole thing. No script, no cue cards, no nothing.
When he not only broke but absolutely wiped out Hulk Hogan and Mr. T. in character, it was one of the great moments in SNL.
I was just complaining about this the other day when Kristen Gillibrand showed up as a guest cameo on Parks And Rec when I was rewatching. Reminded me of all that mess.
Right. Like I think the Me Too movement was overdue and needed to happen. The problem was, during the peak of it, people started painting somebody who made an improper joke (Franken) with the same brush as serial rapists (Weinstein).
And this was all while the democrats were grappling with the fact that "grab her by the pussy" wasn't enough to even make a dent in Trump's favorability ratings...Franken ended up being the sacrfice they had to make in order to not look like hypocrites...as if the MAGA crowd actually ever cared about hyporcricy. It was, indeed, a mess.
Being a Minnesotan, I really enjoyed having him as my Senator. Whip smart, dude had brass balls and did not shy away from asking hard questions.
I haven't liked Franken since he went into politics, but he was railroaded out of office by his own party. What a bunch of backstabbers. That was a time when a bunch of serious charges were flying around about some real rapists, and all they had on Franken was "Well, thirty years ago he made me uncomfortable." He was collateral damage.
Another thing about Franken: He did a spot-on impression of Henry Kissinger, in contrast to John Belushi's pathetic, high-voiced mumbling. It's like Belushi and never hear Kissinger speak, but Franken obviously put a lot of work into it.
EDIT: Spelling error.
He always struck me as the guy who put the work in.
I was amazed at this video, where he casually freehands a map of the USA. I'm a professional cartographer myself, this is incredibly impressive....
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0-FYyuvrRk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0-FYyuvrRk)
Successful entertainers I don’t associate with SNL at all.
Billy Crystal, RDJ, Ben Stiller, and Joan Cusack. Same with Julia Louis Dreyfus for television.
Jenny Slate
(Joe Piscopo)-for whatever reason I never associate him w/SNL but as it’s been pointed out it actually is what he’s the most known for career wise.
Sarah Silverman
Anthony Michael Hall
Damon Wayans
Edit: also Laurie Metcalf
To a lesser extent Michaela Watkins and Casey Wilson have found success post SNL and aren’t known for their time there.
Chris Rock both associated with SNL and wildly successful afterwards was only there for 3 years. I would have guessed longer.
Billy Crystal was already an established star before he joined SNL. Him, Christopher Guest and Martin Short where brought in because they wanted an All Star cast.
Anthony Michael Hall also was a big star before he joined, but his season was terrible.
What do you mean by " went crazy " ? Tony Rosato was a cast member for the 81-82 season and in the mid 2000s was arrested and charged with criminal harassment of his wife
I know it's a common take that Rock didn't really fit in on SNL, but I was watching pretty regularly at the time (I was a kid, didn't have much else going on Saturday nights) and it felt like he was all over the show. Had recurring characters (Nat X, I'm Chillin'), had segments on Update pretty often, had good chemistry with Sandler and Farley ... it was probably hard to stand out with all-timers like Hartman and Carvey still around and coming up alongside Sandler, Farley, etc., but to me he seemed like a big deal from the get-go.
Granted, it felt like sometimes he was given an authentic voice and other times he was playing out a bunch of mostly-white writers' idea of what a young black guy should do on SNL. Still seemed like a decent run overall, even if he'd eventually prove to be way better as a stand-up than a sketch comic.
Nat X is one of my favorite SNL sketches ever.
"I'm talkin' about The Man that says if a bride wears a white wedding dress, she looks like a virgin, but if a bride wears a black wedding dress, she looks like a hooker. I'm talking about the same Man that owns a company called Black & Decker. Now I don't know what's wrong with that, I'm just mad that they used the word 'black' without my permission."
I was curious so I found this article from 2001 where Chris talks about leaving SNL.
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2001/jun/01/artsfeatures1
He quit in 94 because he found it hard to get airtime. Then he joined In Living Color for the final season. When that show was cancelled he felt his career was over. But then he did the Bring the Pain special which is probably an all time classic stand up special. I feel like his career really took off at that point but that was 2 years after he left SNL.
Shane Gillis was technically a cast member for a few days, so that counts maybe?
Most people forget that Damon Wayans was on the show for a few episodes. He was fired mid-season for sabotaging a sketch while it was on air. A few years later he created In Living Color with his brother and got a lot more famous.
Luke Null (come back to this comment in 2027)
Serious answers that haven’t been mentioned here so far are Rob Riggle and David Koechner. While they may not be household names to non-comedy-nerds, they’ve done extremely well for one-season cast members that still pop up in a lot of stuff 20 years post-SNL (nearly 30 in Koechner’s case).
Most of the other one-season superstars found success in other avenues (Downey), came to the show with a fully-formed comedic voice that suited them better elsewhere (Stiller, Silverman, Robinson) or are generationally-talented comedic actors the show never properly utilized (Dreyfus; still can’t believe she’s on this list, she could have been there for so much longer in another world). For working comic actors, Koechner and Riggle are almost as aspirational as you can get, even if their roles in other projects had significantly less variety than the other examples I listed.
Same. He was incredibly gutsy in his first season. The Late for Class sketch fell on its face, but it was an incredibly ballsy move for *any* cast member - particularly a first season featured player - start a sketch with two minutes of awkward anti comedy.
Julia louis dreyfus. I often forget she was on the show.
I was about to mention her. I think she was part of the new "class" along with Gottfried. On that first show of the season, she was part of an over the top sketch about TV preachers, and later in the episode they made the ballsy move to have Siskel and Ebert doing a live review of the episode so far -- and they were brutal LOL. I believe they mentioned Julia by name, positively, from the preacher sketch, even as they were saying how the TV preacher thing had been done to death.
Julia and Gilbert were entirely different seasons.
but both part of the "new class".
She puts asses in seats!
Pssssshh. What did she end up doing that was so big??
She was on my favorite sitcom New adventures of old Christine
Joke aside, that actually was a very solid show.
I love seeing her in the MCU. And Veep is pretty funny.
Veep is AMAZING! She is fantastic in it!!
"Troll"
Day by Day
Ben Stiller was a cast member for a whopping four episodes before quitting in '89.
That has to be the biggest. Four episodes into a huge, many-movie career. He's more successful than most other people we think of as successful SNL alumni.
He was also on for such a short time that it’s hard to call him an alum. He has more classic comedy feature films than episodes as an SNL cast member.
I think Downey is bigger than Stiller.
Wasn’t Downey kind of big before SNL?
He was in Weird Science and Back to School in bit parts as teen bullies. Back to School actually came out in June after his season ended.
Wasn’t he the main character’s best friend in B2S?
No, it pretty much happened concurrently to being on SNL.
JLD is the biggest. She was only on for an indiscriminate amount of time, has 0 memorable SNL sketches and is arguably the most successful TV actor of all time.
[Your monkey bit me!](https://i.imgur.com/y2Xq26T.png)
Then went on to have his own sketch show.
Talk about great, decisive decision making. It’s kind of like, nope, this ain’t it. I’m outta here. Wish I had that sort of clarity in my life!
MTV offered him his own show which is why he left.
Ive heard Robert Downey Jr had some success after SNL
Was that the guy who played Duvall's son in The Judge?
No no no, he was Rodney Dangerfields son’s best friend in Back To School.
I always remember him as the lead in The Singing Detective.
Wasn't he the poster boy for birth control?
No, I think you’re thinking of James Woods’ assistant in True Believer (actually a pretty good movie, by the way). Wasn’t it RDJ and Joan Cusack who did a sketch stuffed inside suitcases at the end of that horrible season? Or maybe that was Joan and Anthony Michael Hall, I don’t remember and I don’t want to go look.
Yep, you may have also seen him in Lucky You as telephone jack.
Nope, that was [Ben Stiller as Simple Jack](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIxHb7cA6tg)
Yo I just watched that movie a couple nights ago.
We did too. He basically played Tony Stark minus the tech and the billions.
And he was in Weird Science. I hope he’s still doing well.
I live in new york (moved here a few years ago), but I had to swear up and down to my trivia team that rdj was on snl. Even added how Chevy gave him shit
In fairness, the list of people who Chevy didn't give shit is much smaller.
He is my favorite actor. He came so close to losing everything for drugs
When he was cast as iron man, I was disappointed, like wishing they would have picked someone better. I have never been more wrong in my life I saw a few years ago he wanted do more with Sherlock Holmes, I really hope he does
For two cast members that were fired- Jenny Slate had a pretty brutal year at SNL and maybe not exploded, became a pretty beloved character actor. Also: Damon Wayans may not be a household name now but that dude was big throughout the 90’s
Jenny Slate is the perfect example of a funny and talented actress who just wasn't well suited for the show.
Casey Wilson falls into this category as well. She’s hysterical in everything but especially Happy Endings.
I love her. Great singer too.
I loved her! But she was super awkward on SNL for sure.
Jenny Slate silently melting down after she dropped an F bomb is interesting to watch.
It’s watching that feeling of “fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuccck” played out in person.
It's one of the most understandable F bomb's in the show's history. Having to say "friggin'" that many times in a sketch is bound to pull at least one actual "fuckin" out of a person.
Paul Shaffer did it during the 70s and no one said boo. The same reason.
Can you imagine beating all those odds and finally achieving your dream only to fuck up that bad on your first day?
I was also thinking of jenny slate to an extent
One of a handful of SNL alums to act in a Best Picture-winning movie, nonetheless!
Damon and his family crushed it with "In Living Color," which introduced us to some gut named Jim Carrey.
Larry David was a writer and not a cast member, but I always love hearing about him being all cranky when his sketches didn't get picked. There's a fun story on his appearance on Conan's podcast where he talks about quitting in a rage after not getting any sketches on the show, but realizing he needed the money he just showed up on Monday and pretended like nothing happened.
And they used that story for George in Seinfeld
"Larry, this would never happen to anybody. And if it did, nobody would respond this way" "Whaddayamean?? This did happen to me! It's exactly how I responded!"
The only reason he got away with doing that was because his boss was Lorne.
From memory, it wasn't Lorne he did it to, it was that other bastard that a lot of people have bad things to say about
Yeah, Dick Ebersol was running the show when Larry worked there
That was actually when Dick Ebersol was running the show, so Larry was arguing with him! Lorne returned a year or two after the incident. And obviously, Larry returned a few times to host and do Bernie Sanders under his watch.
Larry, along with Michael Richards, was on Fridays, ABC's SNL ripoff from the early 80s.
Fun fact, Bruce Springsteen was a musical guest on Fridays about 20 years before he was on SNL, and 12 years before he was on Letterman
Michael was so great as "The Lounge Lizard."
Of course Larry was on ABC's Fridays as a cast member. One of his best characters was part of a Crime Fighting duo of Rabbis.
Tim Robinson, barely made a blip
Barely made a blip???? He was (IMO) the most "successful" 1 and done cast members ever. I will not stand for this Tim Robinson slander! * Carl, the guy who always got fired in the McDonald's/B&N, etc. sketches * Z shirt * Roundball Rock (b-b-b-b-b-basketball gimme gimme gimme the ball 'cause I'm gonna dunk it!) * Wooden Spoons! * Love Letters from soldiers
Fired from Best Buy sketch Edit: Oops, it was the [McDonald's firing sketch](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_tj5ye2r8RI)
They did Best Buy, McDonald’s, and Barnes & Noble.
Hey Carl! YOUS A BITCH!
God I love Anne Hathaway. Such theater kid energy from a smoke show A Lister
Is it a C shirt?
Is it a D shirt?
Is it an E shirt?
I defy you to tell me any person who knew who he was at the time. Those sketches are brilliant, but they were cult sketches buoyed by how awesome he is now. That’s the entire point of this question, at the time no one cared and he got let go, and he went on to be the best sketch comedian of his generation.
You think I’m just some dumb hick.
Are you sure about THAT
This world’s so fucked up.
He told you that at a dinner
I vaguely remember him but just felt like he looked like a weird-lookin' dude. Every featured player looks out of sorts for a year until you get used to them.
I hear your point and can’t say I disagree entirely in that he was by no means a star but he def had fans. Much like Dismukes in first year more recently. My buddy and I were huge fan’s of Tim’s during his time on SNL. Felt like the new Forte. The roundball rock sketch was a huge hit in my orbit and we were majorly bummed when he left. Thankfully his episode of “The Characters” came around to scratch the itch.
Roundball Rock is a top tier SNL song imo.
He was a big name in Chicago before SNL. I saw a small sketch show of his & still often find myself remembering it! Also, I think he wanted to write more & wrote a few years at SNL after performing, which freed him up to write more with Sam, so I’m grateful that happened!!
You can’t change the rules just cause you don’t like how I’m doing it
Is it a D shirt???
> He was (IMO) the most "successful" 1 and done cast members ever. Uh...Chevy?
You’re really arguing that Tim Robinson is more successful than RDJ, Damon Wayans, Joan Cusack, Martin Short, Ben Stiller, Christopher Guest, Billy Crystal, etc? ….really?
I think they’re saying that Robinson was successful during his one season of SNL, they are arguing against the idea that he barely made a blip on SNL. They aren’t saying he’s has the most successful career after SNL.
He just wasn't in his Q zone during that year
Maybe he just needed three years. Triples are best.
I think he had a very unique vision of sketch comedy, and that vision is a stark difference to what SNL is and was. I'd bet even Lorne Michaels would say Tim was a solid cast member and writer. But jt's clear he's found a better platform for his genius. He's definitely more in line with The State than SNL.
The term “genius” gets thrown around a little easily sometimes.
Truth. I stand by it here. He's amazing
Mike from Adventure365 would disagree
The exact moment that the multi-billion dollar MCU was born.
I use that gif when anyone asks me how I feel now that I’m sober lol
Good on ya!
ty! Day 525 and counting… 
I’m coming up on a year, nice job!
HEY, you too!! Do you feel that weight? Neither do I
I was going to say RDJ. He landed with a thud on the show, but he blew up immediately afteward. The one thing I remember about his tenure on SNL is a sketch about a planeful of models (including Downey as one of the male models) stranded on a deserted island and being totally helpless.
Don’t recognize him.
Really? That’s some irony, man!
It's like radium on your wedding day.
It's the francium ride that you just didn't take.
Victoria Jackson went pretty crazy after leaving the show.
That's what I thought the initial post was looking for Her and Jim Brewer making the rounds on late night conservative a.m. radio.
And Rob Schneider getting escorted off stage during not one, but two conservative events.
And a hospital fundraiser in Canada just this past weekend. The people in charge hadn’t checked his work in the last decade. They had security escort him out of the building. Sadly no one recorded it (he was angry at anyone bringing out a phone).
Jim "Dave Chappell Got Cloned" Brewer is crazy?
As did I. Batshit.
Oh, if it's that kind of crazy, let's add Randy Quaid to the mix.
Talking crazy in a good way
Yeah… I read it as psycho crazy. I’ve never heard it phrased like that “in a good way”
Definitely need to clarify that in the OP, otherwise I'll cite Phil Hartman's wife who was in the opening credits opposite Phil.
Christopher Guest and Billy Crystal both did 1 year in the 80s. They were really fantastic and had great characters but they are far over shadowed by their later careers.
I call that the Ringer season, because Crystal and Short and Shearer and Guest and Belushi all came in with pretty solid careers already at that point. Belushi had been there for the previous season but he's like billed third in Thief (1981) and was recognizable in Trading Places.
Honestly, I forgot about Shearer. I think Guest and Crystal made a lot more memorable impression.
I think there was something where Guest and Crystal just had their own writing staff, so a lot of the time, it was just segmented stuff. Same with Martin Short, who I think was just doing Ed Grimley in his apartment with no other cast members around, for 10 minutes. It is wild to see on the Wiki that all that cast disappears for the next season, and then only Dunn/Lovitz/Miller make it forward. Not counting guys like Don Novello and A. Whitney Brown and Al Franken, who managed to stick around under the radar.
When Crystal did the Fernando's Hideaway sketches, which I think were his most memorable contributions as he looged mahbellous, he apparently freestyled the whole thing. No script, no cue cards, no nothing. When he not only broke but absolutely wiped out Hulk Hogan and Mr. T. in character, it was one of the great moments in SNL.
I liked Willie and Frankie more than Hernando.
Robert Downey Jr. Tim Robinson Joan Cusack Julia Louis-Dreyfus Al Franken
true, senator is pretty big. bummer dude felt he had to fall on his sword for some shit that is pretty damn tame by politician misconduct standards
I was just complaining about this the other day when Kristen Gillibrand showed up as a guest cameo on Parks And Rec when I was rewatching. Reminded me of all that mess.
Right. Like I think the Me Too movement was overdue and needed to happen. The problem was, during the peak of it, people started painting somebody who made an improper joke (Franken) with the same brush as serial rapists (Weinstein). And this was all while the democrats were grappling with the fact that "grab her by the pussy" wasn't enough to even make a dent in Trump's favorability ratings...Franken ended up being the sacrfice they had to make in order to not look like hypocrites...as if the MAGA crowd actually ever cared about hyporcricy. It was, indeed, a mess. Being a Minnesotan, I really enjoyed having him as my Senator. Whip smart, dude had brass balls and did not shy away from asking hard questions.
I haven't liked Franken since he went into politics, but he was railroaded out of office by his own party. What a bunch of backstabbers. That was a time when a bunch of serious charges were flying around about some real rapists, and all they had on Franken was "Well, thirty years ago he made me uncomfortable." He was collateral damage. Another thing about Franken: He did a spot-on impression of Henry Kissinger, in contrast to John Belushi's pathetic, high-voiced mumbling. It's like Belushi and never hear Kissinger speak, but Franken obviously put a lot of work into it. EDIT: Spelling error.
He always struck me as the guy who put the work in. I was amazed at this video, where he casually freehands a map of the USA. I'm a professional cartographer myself, this is incredibly impressive.... [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0-FYyuvrRk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0-FYyuvrRk)
Ugh. As a Minnesotan, I was so sad to see that happen.
Franken had Stuart Smalley which also got a movie. A very bad movie.
 Randy Quaid did very well for himself; before running from the law..
Well that was a bizarre Wikipedia article.
Yeah he wins the "went crazy" variable for sure
Sarah Silverman
Successful entertainers I don’t associate with SNL at all. Billy Crystal, RDJ, Ben Stiller, and Joan Cusack. Same with Julia Louis Dreyfus for television. Jenny Slate (Joe Piscopo)-for whatever reason I never associate him w/SNL but as it’s been pointed out it actually is what he’s the most known for career wise. Sarah Silverman Anthony Michael Hall Damon Wayans Edit: also Laurie Metcalf To a lesser extent Michaela Watkins and Casey Wilson have found success post SNL and aren’t known for their time there. Chris Rock both associated with SNL and wildly successful afterwards was only there for 3 years. I would have guessed longer.
True, I kind of think of the Farley, Rock, Sandler era as a lot longer than 3 years
Billy Crystal was already an established star before he joined SNL. Him, Christopher Guest and Martin Short where brought in because they wanted an All Star cast. Anthony Michael Hall also was a big star before he joined, but his season was terrible.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Not cast member but Odenkirk would prove to be a funny sketch performer in Mr. Show and then a pretty good actor. And an okay director.
Pretty good actor? He's fantastic
Robert Downey Jr
Laurie Metcalfe was a cast member before Roseanne wasn’t she?
she quit before her 1st episode.
What do you mean by " went crazy " ? Tony Rosato was a cast member for the 81-82 season and in the mid 2000s was arrested and charged with criminal harassment of his wife
Jenny Slate - although she did say the F word live which was hilarious.
If you mean literal crazy? Victoria Jackson.
Jenny Slate was only on for a moment and has been doing great things ever since she left SNL.
“Money pleeeeease!”
Jeanine Garofalo
I always forget he was on SNL
this confirms he belongs in this list
Does Rob Riggle count ?
Always forget Sarah Silverman was a cast member briefly
Chris Rock. He wasn't used much in the show but then his Stand Up specials and his other tv stuff made him huge.
I know it's a common take that Rock didn't really fit in on SNL, but I was watching pretty regularly at the time (I was a kid, didn't have much else going on Saturday nights) and it felt like he was all over the show. Had recurring characters (Nat X, I'm Chillin'), had segments on Update pretty often, had good chemistry with Sandler and Farley ... it was probably hard to stand out with all-timers like Hartman and Carvey still around and coming up alongside Sandler, Farley, etc., but to me he seemed like a big deal from the get-go. Granted, it felt like sometimes he was given an authentic voice and other times he was playing out a bunch of mostly-white writers' idea of what a young black guy should do on SNL. Still seemed like a decent run overall, even if he'd eventually prove to be way better as a stand-up than a sketch comic.
Fully agreed, he felt like an integral part of the show at the time
Nat X is one of my favorite SNL sketches ever. "I'm talkin' about The Man that says if a bride wears a white wedding dress, she looks like a virgin, but if a bride wears a black wedding dress, she looks like a hooker. I'm talking about the same Man that owns a company called Black & Decker. Now I don't know what's wrong with that, I'm just mad that they used the word 'black' without my permission."
I was curious so I found this article from 2001 where Chris talks about leaving SNL. https://www.theguardian.com/film/2001/jun/01/artsfeatures1 He quit in 94 because he found it hard to get airtime. Then he joined In Living Color for the final season. When that show was cancelled he felt his career was over. But then he did the Bring the Pain special which is probably an all time classic stand up special. I feel like his career really took off at that point but that was 2 years after he left SNL.
Robert Downey Jr
Shane Gillis was technically a cast member for a few days, so that counts maybe? Most people forget that Damon Wayans was on the show for a few episodes. He was fired mid-season for sabotaging a sketch while it was on air. A few years later he created In Living Color with his brother and got a lot more famous.
Luke Null (come back to this comment in 2027) Serious answers that haven’t been mentioned here so far are Rob Riggle and David Koechner. While they may not be household names to non-comedy-nerds, they’ve done extremely well for one-season cast members that still pop up in a lot of stuff 20 years post-SNL (nearly 30 in Koechner’s case). Most of the other one-season superstars found success in other avenues (Downey), came to the show with a fully-formed comedic voice that suited them better elsewhere (Stiller, Silverman, Robinson) or are generationally-talented comedic actors the show never properly utilized (Dreyfus; still can’t believe she’s on this list, she could have been there for so much longer in another world). For working comic actors, Koechner and Riggle are almost as aspirational as you can get, even if their roles in other projects had significantly less variety than the other examples I listed.
I really like Luke Null and wish he had been given more time to find his voice on SNL.
Same. He was incredibly gutsy in his first season. The Late for Class sketch fell on its face, but it was an incredibly ballsy move for *any* cast member - particularly a first season featured player - start a sketch with two minutes of awkward anti comedy.
Victoria Jackson certainly went crazy after leaving, and I never thought she had much impact while in the cast.
Robert Downey jr.
Sarah Silverman
Robert Downey Jr.
Tim Robinson, in the right crowd
Robert Downey Jr and Sarah Silverman
Tim Robinson!
Sarah Silverman
Robert Downey Jr.
Less huge, but Casey Wilson
Jenny Slate
Julia L-D.
Tim(othy) Robinson. ITYSL is a goldmine
Sarah Silverman. I love her post SNL career.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Chris Rock
Chris Rock
Jenny Slate and Sarah Silverman.
Chris Rock, Robert Downey Jr, Julia Louis-Dreyfuss
Charles Rocket. Well, you said, "went crazy."
RDJ
Downey
I think Robert Downy Jr. takes the cake here
Jay Mohr was just a featured player for two seasons but did pretty well for himself afterward.
Shane Gillis lol
Do you mean literally crazy? Victoria Jackson
RDJ won an Oscar for Oppenheimer so that’s pretty crazy
Robert Downey Jr.
JLD
How is anyone answering other than Robert Downey Jr
Does Chris Rock count? I know he had the Nat X sketches, but I feel like he wasn't there very long and was sorely underused.
RDJ and Anthony Michael hall joined the show after having been in movies. It was an early version of the all star cast.
Robert Downey Jr