In less than a week, two popular “Saturday Night Live” cast members announced they wouldn’t be returning to the show, with the latest departing after just one season.
In a Monday Instagram post, Devon Walker, who joined the show in 2022, announced he was leaving in a note that read in part “Me and the show did three years together, and sometimes it was really cool. Sometimes it was toxic as hell. But we did what we made the most of what it was, even amidst all of the dysfunction.”
The note in his post was titled: “wait … did he quit or did he get fired?”
Wednesday, Chicago-born Emil Wakim, who joined the show just last year, announced in an Instagram post he wouldn’t be returning, hinting that he had been let go.
“It was a gut punch of a call to get but i’m so grateful for my time there,” Wakim’s post said. “It was the most terrifying, thrilling, and rewarding experience of my life and i will miss it dearly and all the brilliant people that work there that made it feel like a home. thank u to lorne for taking a chance on me and changing my life.”
Who else has left SNL?
The announcements follow Michaels saying that he anticipates changes following the show’s historic 50th season. No cast members had announced their departure following the season’s conclusion. In an interview with Puck that ran last week, Michaels answered “yes” when asked if he expected to “shake things up.”
“It’ll be announced in a week or so,” he said then.
Representatives for “Saturday Night Live” did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday.
Meanwhile, “SNL” writer Celeste Yim announced they were leaving after five seasons. Yim, the show’s first openly nonbinary writer, posted last weekend on Instagram that the job was a dream come true “BUT was also grueling and I slept in my office every week BUT my friends helped me with everything BUT I got yelled at by random famous men BUT some famous girls too BUT I loved it and I laughed every day and it’s where I grew up.”
Michaels told Puck at least one cast member was certain to be back: James Austin Johnson, who plays President Donald Trump.
Since its debut in 1975, the NBC program has reinvented itself often, with performers over the past 50 years ranging from John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd to Kate McKinnon and Kenan Thompson.
The 51st season will premiere Oct. 4.