Kenan Thompson: Kanye West held ‘SNL’ cast ‘hostage’ during Trump rant
Kenan Thompson‘s 16th season on “Saturday Night Live” kicked off with something of a head scratch this weekend, thanks in part to Kanye West’s closing, pro-Trump comments.
“He voiced his opinion, very loudly, for a long time,” the comedian recalled on Monday’s episode of “Late Night with Seth Meyers.” “We’re all entitled to our opinion, but you know, I don’t know if that’s the moment, necessarily, to hold people hostage like that, but hey.”
Following the opening monologue, Thompson said he got to “watch the circus unfold” from afar, as West brought the cast on stage after his performance. Thompson, who preferred to watch the musical act on TV, was happy he stayed backstage.
“As soon as he said, ‘Hey, join me up on stage, everybody,’ I was like, ‘Oh, there goes the little cheese in the mousetrap.’ It’s going down,” Thompson said. “I felt so bad for those guys, because it’s hard to stand there and not be able to debate somebody who is going so far against your personal opinion, and just stand there and take it.”
He continued, “We are fair. We’re in a service business, we try to cater to the host, make sure they have a good show and what not, and then when musical guests come in and they’re a little bit crazy, maybe they’re a little bit crazy, we let them have that. But we don’t judge, we’re not there to judge.”
West received a flurry of boos inside Studio 8H in response to his rant supporting President Trump.
“There are so many times I talk to like a white person about this and they say, ‘How could you like Trump? He’s racist.’ Well, if I was concerned about racism I would’ve moved out of America a long time ago,” West said.
While Trump, 70, applauded West’s remarks and slammed “SNL,” the Yeezy mastermind later called for the abolition of the 13th Amendment before clarifying his remarks.
“Not abolish but. let’s amend the 13th amendment,” West tweeted Sunday. “We apply everyone’s opinions to our platform.”