Comedian and actor Andy Samberg is known for making some of the best skits in the history of the late-night show Saturday Night Live. The Palm Springs star, together with his bandmates Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone, worked on Saturday Night Live’s musical segment “SNL Shorts”. However, despite the show’s success, he left SNL at its peak in 2012 after working there for 7 years. Recently, Andy Samberg joined comedian Kevin Hart on his chat show and opened up about why he left SNL.
Andy Samberg said that he wanted a much-needed break. The show’s routine was intense even though it was creatively very satisfying. He recalled that the demanding schedule made him feel like he had not got proper sleep in seven years.
Andy Samberg recalled SNL’s weekly schedule and said, “We were writing stuff for the live show Tuesday night all night, the table read Wednesday, then being told now come up with a digital short so write all Thursday, all Thursday night, don’t sleep, get up, shoot Friday, edit all night Friday night and into Saturday, so it’s basically like four days a week you’re not sleeping, for seven years. So I just kinda fell apart physically.”
He also added the work pressure intensified after his co-writers and bandmates Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone departed. This meant that for his last two years at SNL, he worked alone on the SNL Shorts segment. The Hot Rod star finally had to make the “very difficult choice” of leaving SNL for his health’s sake.
Soon after leaving SNL in 2012, Andy Samberg’s next long-term project was NBC’s police sitcom Brooklyn Nine-Nine which he also produced. He played Jake Peralta in the show from 2013 to 2021. For Brooklyn Nine-Nine, he won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Television Series Musical or Comedy in 2013.
Saturday Night Live is now set to enter into its 50th season later this year on NBC. The iconic show has won a number of awards since its debut in 1975. The show has won 84 Primetime Emmy Awards, six Writers Guild of America Awards, and three Peabody Awards. As of September 2022, it has received 305 Primetime Emmy Award nominations.
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