-Our first guest tonight is an Emmy Award-winning comedian
who's currently in his 18th season
on "Saturday Night Live."
He also stars in the new comedy series "Kenan,"
which airs Tuesday nights at 8:30 right here on NBC.
Let's take a look.
-So, the fairy cursed Sleeping Beauty
to sleep for a hundred years.
Sound like the best curse ever.
Until the Prince arrived to try to awaken
Sleeping Beauty out of her slumber.
-Princesses are dumb. -What?
When did this happen?
-Recess. Princesses are out. Empowerment is in.
-Will you sing us a song about that, please?
-[ Sighs ] Okay. Uh...
♪ Title Nine ♪
♪ You are so fine ♪
♪ Famous for your place in athletics ♪
-Both: Yeah, no.
-Please welcome back to the show one of the best.
Kenan Thompson. How are you, Kenan?
-I'm good, buddy. How are you doing?
-I am wonderful
and got a little bonus "Kenan" last night.
You did "SNL" on Saturday, you flew to L.A.,
and then you did the Golden Globes last night with Maya.
And it just must have been a delight to be with Maya again.
-Absolute best.
It was the absolute best, just being around my sisters again --
you know, Tina, you know, Amy and Maya.
-For those who missed it, can you tell us a little bit
about the characters you guys played last night?
-Yes, that is Beverly Jackfruit on the left
and Francois Jean-Rudy on the right.
That is me. And I speak French only.
And we were the winners
of Least, I think, Creative Song or, like...
-I think Least Original. Maybe Least Original.
-Least Original, yes. Least Original.
-It was really fun to see.
It must have, you know -- Obviously it was extremely
difficult circumstances to do an awards show.
But it was like being in front of any audience,
like you guys have managed to do with "SNL."
It's still something special.
-Yeah, it's nice to have, you know,
some people in the room and not, like, totally virtual.
But, you know, it was really isolated backstage,
and I didn't really see anybody famous.
You know what I'm saying?
My first time at the Globes, and I saw just me.
It was like, "Okay, well.
Is this the Golden Globes or is this my house?"
-I'm very -- I want to talk about your show
because I'm very jealous about a famous person on your show,
who I have never met,
and that person is Don Johnson, who is very funny on your show.
And I'm just wondering,
is he a fun person to be around in real life?
-Don Johnson is the greatest.
Like, he could not be nicer
and he could not have better stories.
I mean, this guy was in Miami in the '80s and survived.
And he just loves to laugh, you know,
and we got really close, you know,
over our FaceTime meeting when I first met him.
You know, we just had, you know, just similar energy.
I don't know how to explain it. He's just a nice guy, you know?
And I've been a fan of him, you know, since those days.
I was a little kid, but I knew he was cool,
and to find out that he's cool in real life was just great.
-Yeah, 'cause they were -- I forget that they, of course,
were shooting "Miami" for Miami,
and if you were a fan of that show,
that meant you were a certain kind of person
who probably wanted to hang out with Don Johnson.
-Yeah, you either like Ferraris or you like guns
or you like blazers with colorful undershirts.
[ Laughter ]
-You -- You also returned
one of my favorite characters on "SNL" last week, LaVar Ball.
-Oh. Crazy.
-You do seem to be having a genuine ball
when you are doing this character.
Is it as much fun as it looks? -It really is,
and I think that's kind of my overall approach to "Update,"
especially when I'm nervous about something.
Because I haven't done LaVar in a while,
and it's kind of a niche kind of character.
Like, not a lot of people know exactly who he is.
So the more energy I give to it, people can just have fun
with it without even knowing, like, kind of,
who I'm talking about or whatever.
So, the shoe helps.
The chocolate shoe, the cookie, the caramel in the shoe.
Like, all those little crazy additives
help everybody enjoy the fact that there's comedy happening
and you should just enjoy it. You know what I mean?
-Yeah, because if he wasn't a real person,
he would also be a fantastic original character on "Update."
So you guys definitely make it work both ways.
-Thank you very much. The Cara-mellos!
Also put Charlotte on the map.
I heard so much from Charlotte people over the weekend.
They were like, "Thank you for shouting out Gastonia."
-How do you like -- How are you enjoying sitcom life
for being a guy who didn't just do 18 years
or hasn't just done 18 years of "SNL" sketches
but was doing sketches for years before that?
How is sitcom life?
-It's very different.
You know, it's like -- As soon as I come to work,
we start shooting and we're shooting all day.
So it's, like, performance every day, all day
as opposed to, like, "Saturday," you know,
we have writing headaches or whatever,
and then, like, rehearsal, but it's still kind of casual.
We're in our clothes, like, our normal clothes
as opposed to hair and makeup all week, you know?
So it's a bit of a grind.
I mean, they're both different.
I think "SNL" is more mental,
and sitcom is probably a lot more physical.
Like, a lot more physical.
-You have two young daughters in real life.
Have they come to set yet to meet your TV daughters?
-Unfortunately, no, and they are dying to.
They talk about them all the time.
They're, like, so intrigued by them.
You know, it's like, "So are they us or are we them?"
It's like, "No, sweethearts.
You guys are separate individuals.
This is television."
But, yeah, my big girl, Georgia, she's obsessed with the show.
She thinks it's really cool.
-I guess it's good that they haven't been able
to come to set yet, because sometimes, Kenan,
don't take offense to this,
you do not behave the way a father should.
-I've been acting up lately. -Yeah, so, our friend,
Mike O'Brien, who was a writer at "SNL"
and now is the creator of the show "AP Bio" --
you stopped by his parking spot?
And, Kenan, do you want to explain?
-Yeah, I saw his parking spot,
and I thought I'd take a little photo.
[ Laughter ]
Just to show him a little love. -Yeah.
-So, you know, I can't wait until he sees this.
[ Laughter ]
-This is the first he'll be seeing it?
-Absolutely.
-Kenan, I realized something right before you came on.
This is our 1,111th show.
11-11.
And if memory serves, you were married 11-11-11.
-So, 1-11 is a big number for my wife.
She's big on the number 3. I was big on the number 33.
So, yeah, 11-11-11 came up,
and we wanted to get married on that date.
My dressing room for the Golden Globes was 111 yesterday.
And, yeah, it's kind of a thing that, you know, circulates us.
I can't believe I'm on your episode, on 1,111.
Like, that's incredible.
But congratulations to you. That is so many checks.
[ Whistling ] -Thank you.
When somebody told me it has been 1,111 shows,
I said, "Give it to me in checks.
I don't want to hear how many shows I've done."
-Count it in checks, please.
-Hey, buddy, thanks as always for being here.
Congrats on all your shows. And great job again last night.
-Man, thank you so very much. It was a great weekend.
It's great to see you as always. I love you. I miss you.
I'm sure I'll see you soon. -I'll bet.
I'll see you back in the building.
"Kenan" airs Tuesdays at 8:30 p.m. here on NBC.