Carol Burnett has been known as one of the most talented comediennes of all time for decades. Despite this, she has never been invited to appear on the iconic sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live!
Now, Burnett is speaking out to blast the longtime Saturday Night Live! boss Lorne Michaels for never inviting her on his program.
Burnett Calls Out Michaels
Burnett showed the world just how talented she is at sketch comedy by hosting her own comedic sketch program The Carol Burnett Show from 1967 until 1978. Meanwhile, Saturday Night Live! premiered in 1975.
Even though the two shows overlapped, and Burnett would seem like the perfect Saturday Night Live! host, she has never been invited on the show in the 50 years that it’s been on the air. In a new interview, Burnett revealed that she believes that Michaels is to blame for this.
“I don’t know what I did to upset that man,” Burnett, 92, told The New Yorker. “Do you think it’s misogynistic?”
The publication went on to note that Michaels, 80, declined to comment when contacted.
Saturday Night Live! Alums Weigh In
Burnett being snubbed in this way is all the more surprising, given how much she has been praised by Saturday Night Live! alumni over the years. Indeed, many of them have listed Burnett as their comedic inspiration. The former Saturday Night Live! star Amy Poehler, 54, even stated that the show “owes everything to” Burnett when she presented her with a lifetime achievement award from Variety’s Power of Women event in 2024.
“I wanted to thank my mother, the mother,” Poehler said at the time. “SNL owes everything to you.”
Watch Poehler talk more about how much Burnett means to her in the video below.
Even so, Burnett has never even been asked to appear on the show. She’s also not the only person who has accused Michaels of sexism over the years.
“It was a very sexist environment,” Julia Louis-Dreyfus told The New York Times in 2016. Before rising to fame on Seinfeld, Louis-Dreyfus was a cast member on Saturday Night Live! from 1982 until 1985.
While it’s not an experience that she looks back on fondly these days, Louis-Dreyfus has also admitted that when she’s returned to host the show later in life, she’s found that “it’s much more of an equal-opportunity environment” these days.
Insiders have claimed that Michaels may have a personal vendetta against Burnett. Saturday Night Live! sources have alleged that Michaels has often used the phrase “too Carol Burnett” to criticize things that he doesn’t want on the show. Original writers like Al Franken and Buck Henry have even claimed that Burnett’s name became “shorthand” for everything that Michaels didn’t want Saturday Night Live! to become.
Would Burnett Appear On Saturday Night Live! Now?
To this day, Burnett still wonders what she “did” to cause what she believes is her rift with Michaels. As for whether she’d consider a Saturday Night Live! appearance now if Michaels ever comes around, it appears that it’s too late for that. Indeed, Burnett has confirmed that she “would not be interested” in hosting the show even if she was asked to do so.
“No, I don’t think I would. Maybe like 20 years ago or whatever,” she told Vulture in 2019. “But that ship has sailed.”
If Burnett ever changed her mind and agreed to host Saturday Night Live!, she’d break the record for the oldest host of the show of all time. The current record is held by Betty White, who was 88 when she hosted Saturday Night Live! back in 2010.
Relive one of White’s best Saturday Night Live! moments in the video below.
Whether it’s misogyny or there’s something else is at play here, it’s nothing short of a travesty that a living comedic legend like Burnett has never even been asked to be on the most popular sketch comedy show of our time.
In the end, Saturday Night Live! has been missing out for half a century by not inviting Burnett on the show. Even if she says no, Burnett deserves the honor of being asked to host Saturday Night Live!
Let’s make this happen, Lorne Michaels!