Kenan Thompson
Never thought I'd be a bobble-head, but little did I know.
Comedy is here to bring joy to the world, whether you want to hear the curse words or not.
I owe a lot to Nickelodeon.
I want to get into producing and writing more for myself - setting up my own films and seeing what kind of personal touch I can put on movies, as opposed to just being in them.
There's a lot of pressure on kids, period, just to be successful in life.
I was a good student in school.
I was always pretty funny with my friends.
My immediate family is real close-knit.
I always just want to do non-typical voices for some reason.
Kids have awkward moments.
I'm a happy person, and I want everybody else to be happy. Nothing wrong with that.
I'm a fan of Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, and all these people. If I could end up like Jonah Hill, winding up in a Brad Pitt movie, that would be awesome.
I've always just tried to continue to be a working actor and let the work speak for itself as opposed to promoting myself as someone who needs to be in everybody's living room.
I'm silly. I can't help it.
It's just a challenge doing live television every week; you know, it's a challenge to come up with new material every week and stuff like that and try to keep it current, you know what I mean? Like, it's just, you know, it's a kind of a stressful environment.
Leaving Nickelodeon was definitely an adjustment. Because then, it was back to the real world of, 'Now I'm an adult looking for a job,' as opposed to a kid that's getting introduced to all these people like, 'Look how cute this little kid is. Don't you want to put him on your show?'
I wish we could just pick up and do 'Kenan & Kel: The Grown-Up Years,' getting everyone back working together. I feel like it would be an awesome moment for everybody.
I'm very happy here at 'SNL.' I've never been in a hurry to leave because it's such a special place. It's never the same when you leave and come back.
I started working right away as a kid, so I didn't have a chance to go to improv school or anything like that; I was already a working actor.
'SNL' has kind of been like my school.
As far as my sketches, I've always loved 'What's Up With That.' It's just a whole lot of fun, and I love 'Black Jeopardy,' too. Any kind of host capacity, I'm usually pretty good at.
I never did standup before. It just looked like it was really hard, looked like there was like up days and down days - and I'm too emotionally unstable for that. I need to always be funny and always be loved.
I used to go trick-or-treating all the time. When I was young we had the plastic mask with the rubber band that would cut your face, and you couldn't breathe and it was really sweaty! I had the Incredible Hulk and Spider-Man. I used to love the Incredible Hulk, and then one year I had the great idea to be Mr. T, and that was an awesome costume too.
It's just cool to witness talent.
I don't know what to do with babies.
I guess I was just a young, fun-loving kid! Me and my older brother was always quoting 'Coming to America,' 'Spies Like Us,' '48 Hours,' and all those movies, just having fun amongst ourselves.
When I started acting, doing theater stuff at a young age, I was always the comic relief-type roles, so I knew I had a funny bone and could make groups of people laugh, but I didn't really take it seriously until I started getting paid on a weekly basis; then I was like, 'Oh, well, this could be a lifestyle.'
There's a lot of theaters in New York. You can always go out and be around a lot of like-minded comedians.
I want to open an eye or two about what being an actor is really like because it's not all red carpets and photo shoots. It's like trying to get that job and going from job to job.
I'm very friendly. I get along with people.
I just try to deliver the laughs every time I get the opportunity.
I never really try to over-promote myself; I never have.
I don't necessarily have a traditional stand-up set.
It's nice to predict your schedule, especially with a child. It's nice to have work and be in a stable place, which isn't always easy for actors.
I support the homies, like Mike Jay and Hannibal Buress. And I listen to Comedy Central Radio in the car.
I got good at trying to throw a voice on a character from the very beginning as opposed to like reading it and sitting with it and mulling over it and stuff like that just try to read what it is and then try to put a funny voice to it like as soon as possible and stuff like that. Once you get laughs with your voice then you can start thinking about, you know the physical characteristics and how they might walk or if they stick out their buck teeth or if they wear an afro and stuff like that. I think like finding the voice of the character helps to like build the wardrobe and everything else.Collection: Reading
Singing a melody is like a lot of easier and when you sing harmony you have to really kind of know music and listen to the music and be able to hear the notes or whatever.Collection: Singing
You try to go with something that's familiar to people and that way they can jump on board with what you're trying to do basically. I only mimic people that really have like interesting voices because it's really hard to mimic like someone who just talks regularly like me like there's nothing fun about that.Collection: Fun
It's just a challenge doing live television every week, you know, it's a challenge to come up with new material every week and stuff like that and try to keep it current, you know what I mean, like it's just, you know, it's a kind of a stressful environment. Like I didn't really realize that we had a show this Thursday until yesterday.Collection: Mean
I don't know if people really know, when you shoot a TV show like you're really family and it really works, it's because it seems real to everybody, even to us. We were all so very close.Collection: Real