“Saturday Night Live” veteran Michael Che said this is his “last year” behind the “Weekend Update” desk, where he’s co-anchored the popular spoof-news segment with Colin Jost since 2014.
via: Page Six
The “Saturday Night Live” star said during a Minneapolis show that he’s done doing the “Weekend Update” segment on the hit NBC show.
“This is my last year,” Che reportedly said during a set at a Minnesota salon, according to the Star Tribune. “You know my tie is a clip-on, right? What man wears a clip-on tie to work for eight years — that’s embarrassing.”
It wasn’t clear if he’d still write for the segment or dissociate entirely from the series.
Che, 38, reportedly joked to the crowd that he had no interest in the “news” about the war between Ukraine and Russia.
“Did you guys think I was gonna talk about the news?” he asked the crowd. “I don’t really do jokes. If I had jokes, I would’ve like, booked a theater. I’m in a beauty shop.”
Che made history on “SNL” when he became the first black co-head writer in “SNL” in 2017, when he and co-anchor Colin Jost were promoted to lead the show’s writing team, according to Vice.
Despite his history-making role, Che has come under fire for his more controversial material in which he’s mocked Israel’s COVID-19 vaccination policies.
“Israel is reporting that they’ve vaccinated half of its population,” Che quipped during a “Weekend Update” segment. “And I’m gonna guess it’s the Jewish half.”
Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt called the joke “deeply offensive” on Twitter, adding it was full of “factual inaccuracies” and played into “an antisemitic trope in the process.”
ADL CEO @JGreenblattADL's statement on Saturday Night Live’s deeply offensive joke. pic.twitter.com/tf7ihwDr3k
— ADL (@ADL) February 22, 2021
