The Big Piece Of Advice That Stuck With SNL Newbie Devon Walker When He Started
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Saturday Night Live is a famously revolving door of talent. After Season 47 ended, for instance, the iconic sketch-comedy show said goodbye to key members Pete Davidson, Kate McKinnon and Aidy Bryant. But in doing so, the NBC hit made room for a new class of funny folk, including Season 48 cast members Devon Walker, Marcello Hernandez, Molly Kearney and Michael Longfellow.
Following that big cast transition, the four aforementioned featured players are still going strong in the current 49th edition of the NBC late-night show. Along with Season 47 additions Sarah Sherman and James Austin Johnson, the castmates took part in a March 2023 interview for GQ, and during that group sit-down at Studio 8H, Walker—who was known for his stand-up work before joining the SNL cast—divulged what it's been like going from performing at intimate comedy clubs to appearing on of one of TV's most storied franchises. In his words:
I’m trying to take exactly what’s in front of me and figure out how to do that thing, and then move from there. I try not to get lost in the grandiosity of it because it is so huge. Sarah gave me a good piece of advice when I first got hired...
With these being SNL stars, of course Walker's admission prompted some joking from Hernandez, who interjected with:
And that’s weird to me because Sarah’s literally never given me any advice in my entire career.
Devon Walker continued, sharing that "upperclassman" Sarah Sherman had advised him to only play to the room in front of him — meaning the studio audience attending the filming of the live comedy show in Studio 8H — rather than thinking about the millions of Saturday Night Live fans tuning in from home. He added:
Her advice was basically, ‘Dude, it’s just people.’ You know how to perform in front of a room. Don’t think about the millions of people behind the camera. Just think about this room right now, and you know how to make a room full of people laugh.
The 33-year-old comic also said that, though there's a healthy amount of "productive competitiveness" amongst the newcomers, he found comfort in the fact that three of his fellow featured players joined the cast at the same time as him during that "transitional period":
I feel like if we would’ve come in four, five, six, seven years ago, it would’ve been a lot tougher to be starting out. Especially for four new people to start out at once. I feel like it would’ve been harder. That’s the cool thing about being here for this transitional period.
Clearly, Devon Walker didn't need to worry much about winning over the audience, in studio and otherwise. His appearances on SNL so far — which have included "Weekend Update" cameos about British monarchy, popping up as sports commentator Nate Burleson for a Super Bowl bit and getting roasted by Top Gun: Maverick stars Miles Teller and Jon Hamm — have garnered comparisons to Pete Davidson, an observation that the featured player has no problem with. He joked about the comedian's extensive dating life, saying, "People want to fuck that guy, so I guess that's nice."
There won't be a brand-new episode of Saturday Night Live for a bit, as the show is on a springtime mini-hiatus, but you can catch Devon Walker live from Studio 8H when SNL returns on Saturday, March 30 at 11:30pm ET (with Poor Things actor and stand-up comedian Ramy Youssef as upcoming guest host, and rapper Travis Scott as musical guest), or revisit some of the comic's past sketches by streaming the show with a Peacock subscription.
