Damon Wayans Explains the ‘SNL’ Skit That Got Him Fired Immediately

Damon Wayans is ready to laugh about his short-term job at Saturday evening live: “Yeah, I got fired. We’ll talk about it.”

The comedian sat down for an interview in The peacock SNL50: Beyond Saturday Night for the fourth episode of the documentary series titled “Season 11: The Weird Year,” a deep dive into one of the series’ most difficult seasons despite the creator’s return Lorne Michaels after five years of absence.

“I felt like I was born to be Saturday evening live. So I wasn’t nervous for the audition,” Wayans began. He explained that he had already worked on developing Homey D. Clown and other characters who would become fan favorites on his upcoming TV show. sketches, In living color, but I have never seen life SNL.

The working comic’s on-screen CV was empty at the time, aside from a small role in Beverly Hills Copalongside Eddie Murphywho had recently left the sketch show. THE SNL The superstar shared some words of wisdom when Wayans was cast on the show in 1985. “Eddie’s advice was, ‘Write your own sketches. Otherwise, they’ll give you black stuff to do and you won’t do it not’. I’m not going to like it,” he muses.

Those words turned into a sort of prophecy for Wayans as he struggled to find a connection with the writers.

“Hey, give me the ball, I know what this needs,” he recalled of trying to get his own hardware on the show. “But they would reject my ideas.” He cited Al Franken in particular as not fitting into his frame of reference.

“Everything Eddie said came true. They started writing me into their sketches,” he said of roles that resembled stereotypes. He noted that he would sometimes flat out refuse a role that white writers had created for him. “I’m like, ‘Hell no.’ I said, ‘Look, my mom is going to watch this show, I can’t do that, I won’t do that.'”

Register for Weekly Entertainment free daily newsletter to get the latest TV news, exclusive first looks, recaps, reviews, interviews with your favorite stars and much more.

Finally, on March 15, 1986, after 12 episodes of the season, he took matters into his own hands, while relying on a different stereotype for a sketch that will be remembered. SNL infamy for all the wrong reasons.

In “Mr. Monopoly,” Wayans and costar Randy Quaid play cops grilling a suspect (host Griffin Dunne) whose lawyer is the board game’s mascot. After following the rules during the dress rehearsal, Wayans, unhappy that another of his sketches had been cut, deviated from the script in the live version, playing his character as an exaggerated and effeminate gay stereotype, leaning his crotch towards Dunne . while he spoke.

“I thought it was weird, but people laughed anyway,” Dunne recalled of Wayans’ extra assignments. “And then Lorne kicked him out as he was leaving the stage.”

“I broke down. I didn’t care,” Wayans mused. “I did it on purpose because I wanted (Michaels) to fire me,” he explained.

Michaels called firing Wayans “really, really difficult, but it had to be done.”

“You can’t go rogue, you can’t try to steal a sketch,” partner A. Whitney Brown clarified about Michaels’ action. “A lot of people don’t know Saturday evening livebut the actual amount of improvisation in this show is minimal, maybe one line per year, I would bet one line every five years.”

What some thought at the time was career suicide turned out to be a boon for Wayans’ career and pop culture in general as he continued to work with his famous family to direct In living color, a sketch show featuring a largely black cast (and launching the career of Jim Carrey, who SNL passed on for hire) and serving a new point of view in the comedy landscape.

The show was very popular and even broke SNL to win the Emmy for Outstanding Variety, Musical or Comedy Series after its first season in 1990.

After leaving In living color, Wayans later starred in The last scout with Bruce Willis, Mo’Money, Blankman, Major Payne, The Great White Hype, and directed the sitcom My wife and children alongside Tisha Campbell-Martin. He currently plays on Dad’s house with his son, Damon Wayans Jr.

He also returned to SNL nearly nine years after he was fired from hosting the April 8, 1995 episode, in which he played another effeminate character, but this time it was in the script. He restarted his recurring behavior In living color character Blaine Edwards and was joined by former castmate David Alan Grier as Antoine Merriweather from their “Men on Film” sketches.

It’s also worth noting that despite being fired mid-season 11, Michaels also invited Wayans back to perform stand-up in this season’s finale.

“Lorne is a very forgiving man,” Wayans said, “and I think he just wanted to let me know that he believed in me.”

The four episodes of SNL50: Beyond Saturday Night are streaming on Peacock. Saturday evening live comes back with host Dave Chappelle Saturday at 11:30 p.m. ET/8:30 p.m. PT on NBC.