Even before Saturday Night Live‘s season finale aired on May 19 — when seven-year veteran Kristen Wiig said goodbye to the show — there had been speculation Andy Samberg was getting ready to make his own exit. And today it became official.
“It’s an incredibly emotional and strange moment in my life,” Samberg told The New York Times. “Obviously it’s not a huge shock, but I did officially decide not to come back.”
Samberg went on to tell Times writer Dave Itzkoff that Wiig helped him come to the decision. “She kept saying it just feels like it’s her time,” Samberg said. “I connect with that. Something about it just feels like it’s the moment. My contract’s up and I did so much more than I ever thought I would ever even do.”
Over the last six years, Samberg has established himself as a solid sketch player and perhaps more importantly, helped create and foster one the show’s most popular recurring segments: SNL‘s Digital Shorts, on which he collaborated with Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer; together, the trio is Grammy-nominated musical comedy group The Lonely Island. The questions is: Will the Digital Short still exist without Samberg?
The other question is when is Jason Sudeikis going to announce his exit? He’s the third and last veteran SNL castmember who is not expected to return when the show starts its 38th season in a few months. As for Samberg, we’ll be seeing plenty of him. He’s starring opposite of Adam Sandler in the comedy That’s My Boy, in theaters June 15. But for now, let’s check out the Digital Short, “Lazy Sunday 2,” which aired during the season 37 finale.
