Tons of rejection. A difficult divorce. His comedy hero disgraced.
Kenan Thompson brings the laughs on TV, but he's gone through some tough times in his life.
Keep watching to learn about the difficulties this funnyman has endured over the years.
Kenan's mother, Ann Thompson, noticed that her son had a knack for entertaining when
he was five years old. Before long, she was making big sacrifices for her son's career.
Ann would work a full week at her nursing job, weekends included,
so she could take the following week off to help her son pursue his dream.
Still, scraping together the money they needed for the VHS cassettes Kenan used to showcase his
skills was tough. The Daily Pennsylvanian quoted Kenan as saying at a 2017 event,
"When they asked me to send them another tape, I was like 'I can't afford all these tapes."
By the time Kenan landed his first role in a commercial, he'd been rejected around 100 times,
according to The Washington Post. He described the ad for a fried chicken restaurant as
"super-racist" in an interview with Vanity Fair, but he was excited to be paid for it.
He would continue to experience money woes even when his career
really began taking off. Kenan told "The Big Stage" podcast,
"I had a bad accountant growing up, someone who kind of like sweet-talked
my mother into a situation of controlling my s--- and ended up burning me severely."
Kenan Thompson and Kel Mitchell were one of Nickelodeon's most beloved duos.
They immediately clicked on "All That," and the pals played off each other so well that
they scored their own sitcom, "Kenan & Kel," as well as the 1997 movie "Good Burger."
"Kenan and I, they d put us in every sketch together,
because Kenan and I would always, like, hang out after a sketch, after a show."
Over time, the friends would lose touch. In 2012, Mitchell told TMZ,
"The truth is Kenan does not want to be seen with me in any form of media,
or even have my name mentioned around him."
Mitchell speculated that Thompson was keeping his
distance because he didn't want to be viewed as a part of a package deal.
Thompson seemed to confirm that in a 2018 interview with "The Breakfast Club."
"People were trying to lump us together so much after the show,
we kind of wanted to show everybody, there's a Kenan Thompson and a Kel Mitchell."
Thompson would eventually reach out to Mitchell, and if there was any beef between the two,
they turned it into a Good Burger. Thompson updated fans on their relationship in 2017,
telling the Huffington Post,
"We call each other and text each other all the time."
Thompson didn't have a direct line from Nickelodeon to "Saturday Night Live."
He endured a lot of rejection first. He told Vanity Fair,
"I kept sending tapes when I first left Nickelodeon, and was like,
'I would like to graduate now!' And they'd say, 'You look a little young. Check back with us.'"
The actor also spent a lot of time trying to convince casting directors that he was ready
to work on projects that weren't aimed at kids. Thompson explained to Variety,
"I was just surviving, one of the millions of people out here
in Los Angeles that are paying their bills however they can."
When Thompson finally got a chance to audition for "Saturday Night Live," he was asked to
perform a stand-up routine, despite having no background in stand-up. It didn't go well,
he told Vanity Fair, but luckily, he got another chance and landed a spot on the show.
Even after Thompson joined the cast,
it wasn't all smooth sailing. In an interview with The Washington Post,
he recalled how he had to hide a broken arm from the "SNL" audience in 2015. He said,
"You kind of don't have permission to not be perfect."
In 2013, Thompson got blasted for what he told TV
Guide about the lack of Black women in the "Saturday Night Live" cast. He said,
"They just never find ones that are ready."
Leslie Jones, who would join the "SNL" cast the following year, was one of the comics
who was offended by Thompson's words. Jones told The New Yorker that she recalled saying,
"He should come battle me. Give me ten minutes and I'll ruin his life."
In 2021, Thompson told Variety that his critics had misunderstood him. He
wasn't saying Black women weren't funny; he meant that there needed
to be more opportunities for Black women to better prepare for "SNL."
"Why would I bring my sisters down like that? My queens?
Why would I ever do something so crazy and drastic?"
Thompson and Jones thankfully worked things out after she joined "SNL." Thompson said,
"She just became my sister immediately."
In April 2022, Kenan Thompson and actor Christina Evangeline
announced that they were getting divorced. The couple had been married for 11 years
and share two daughters, Georgia and Gianna. An insider told Us Weekly,
"They really just grew apart and wanted different things.
There's nothing juicy about why they split."
The couple reportedly separated at the end of 2020, but Thompson spoke to Parade in January
2022 as if they were still together. He was promoting his sitcom "Kenan,"
in which he played a widower. In light of his divorce,
the way Thompson described the show takes on a new meaning. He said,
"It's only me imagining how heartbreaking it would
be to be in that situation to lose my best friend."
On the "Jemele Hill Is Unbothered" podcast,
Thompson spoke about his ex's reaction to the sitcom. He recalled her saying,
"'So I'm just dead?'"
"I don't really know if she's all the way cool with it today, actually."
According to The Washington Post, when Thompson auditioned for "All That,"
he impressed the producers by nailing an impression of Bill Cosby.
Thompson would later spoof Cosby on "Saturday Night Live" several times.
When dozens of women came forward and accused Cosby of drugging and sexually assaulting them,
Thompson was devastated. Deadline quoted him as saying at The New Yorker Festival in 2019,
"It's one of the more heartbreaking things of my life. He was the first comedian I grew to know."
Thompson actually starred in a project that Cosby co-wrote and produced,
the 2004 "Fat Albert" movie. Thompson told NPR,
"It felt gross to be in such a close proximity to that. I was still proud of the movie,
but definitely kind of devastated that it had this, you know, shadow around it now."
Thompson revealed that he once aspired to have a similar career to Cosby, elaborating,
"I felt super betrayed for being such a big fan and, you know,
idolizing somebody who was, you know, entrenched in what they were entrenched in."
If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault,
help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website
or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).