Kenan Thompson may be the longest-tenured Saturday Night Live cast member, but even he knows someone doesn't have to be there for 23 years to make an impact. After hanging out at 30 Rock for the better part of a quarter-century, the comedian undoubtedly has seen some wild stuff, and he recalled one such memory of the late Norm Macdonald, who blew Thompson’s mind by putting a cigarette out on the carpet at Saturday Night Live.
The Kenan & Kel star talked about the event that “broke the glass menagerie of that place to me” on The Pete Davidson Show (streaming with a Netflix subscription for those who prefer to watch their favorite podcasts). Thompson has a lot of respect for the offices at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, and for good reason, despite some “young and dumb” antics. He told his former colleague:
It was very like, yo, this is a museum, like respect this shit. Highest level. Be on time. I was always getting in trouble, you know what I mean, for just doing this and that in the staircases and shit. Not knowing that there’s cameras everywhere and just being young and dumb or whatever.
I’m sure that now, after 23 years, Kenan Thompson can get away with pretty much anything, and that was apparently true back then for Norm Macdonald, despite his only being on SNL for five years before getting fired. Thompson witnessed one of Macdonald’s epic returns to SNL afterward, recalling:
Norm came through that bitch literally smoking a cigarette. And on the 17th floor, these are, like, offices. Corporate America. And it was like 6, 7 p.m. or whatever, but he was smoking a cigarette, and then he just put it out on the carpet.
Kenan Thompson was floored by the audacity that Norm Macdonald had, especially given that they were in a conference room area, which Thompson said was the first place that he met “literally everybody” from Saturday Night Live. He continued:
To watch him just standing in the doorway and kind of like smirking at the whole thing because of his relationship with the show I’m sure. I don’t know, that shit was a wild perspective to see, you know what I’m saying? Because he literally just like didn’t give a fuck — and was smoking for a while, like smoking a full cigarette and then just put it out. Just dropped it and stepped on it.
That is, indeed, a pretty wild memory to have but not altogether surprising given the brand of humor the former Weekend Update anchor showed in his monologue on Saturday Night Live after being fired, or any of the other hilariously dry quotes Norm Macdonald was known for.
Sadly, Norm Macdonald died in 2021 at age 61 after a long battle with cancer. SNL creator Lorne Michaels was one of many who paid tribute to Macdonald at the time, with Pete Davidson paying homage in his own way on the Weekend Update segment of the sketch comedy show.
There are plenty of shows and movies to watch to remember Norm Macdonald, and you can also catch Kenan Thompson on Saturday Night Live each week at 11:30 p.m. ET on NBC or streaming with a Peacock subscription.
