“I Think This Is A False Narrative”

Seth Meyers is sharing his thoughts on rumors that Lorne Michaels is ready to bid farewell to Saturday Night Live and retiring from the NBC late-night sketch show.

The Late Night host recently made an appearance on Mike Birbiglia’s Working It Out, where the podcast host asked Meyers about Michaels leaving SNL.

“Are you gonna take over for Lorne, or is it Tina [Fey] and then you?” Birbiglia asked, to which Meyers responded, “I think this is a false narrative that Lorne is going anywhere.”

Meyers was a head writer at SNL and worked on the sketch show between 2001 and 2014. The actor doesn’t think Michaels was completely serious when he said he wanted to retire from the comedy show after its 50th season.

“I think it made sense for Lorne — who’s, yeah, got a flair for the dramatic — to say, ‘I think I’ll be done at 50,’” Meyers said. “It’s not like Lorne’s got something else he wants to do more than this.”

Birbilgia fired back with a joke, saying, “So you think it’s Kenan [Thompson]?” to which Meyers quipped, “I think it’s Kenan.”

Earlier this year, Michaels reiterated his plans for the 50th anniversary of SNL and promised to figure things after that was done.

“We’re doing the 50th-anniversary show in February of ’25, so I will definitely be there for that, and definitely be there until that, and sometime before that, we’ll figure out what we’re gonna do,” he said in an interview with Entertainment Tonight.

After the ET reporter dropped Fey’s name about replacing him, Michaels said, “It could easily be Tina Fey, but you know, there are a lot of people who are there now who are also, you know…,” adding, “Tina’s brilliant and great at everything. She’s a very important person in my life.”

Michaels co-created SNL in 1975 and has been part of the NBC sketch late-night show since then, serving as writer, producer, and executive producer.