The 12 Greatest SNL Cast Members of the ’80s

It’s hard to believe that Saturday Night Live almost got the ax in the 1980s, but it’s true. In 1980, after the fifth season, Lorne Michaels took a hiatus from running the show. Most of the SNL cast members left with him, and thus began the messy run of Jean Doumanian.

She didn’t last a year, new NBC president Brandon Tartikoff saved the show from cancellation, and Dick Ebersol took over.

Michaels returned in 1985, but there were multiple massive changes to the cast. Again, it was salvaged, and so here we are. For this list, we considered anybody who had the majority of their run on SNL fall in the 1980s.

Murphy’s hiring was the true coup of SNL cast member hires in the 1980s. Without him, there is a real chance the show would have been canceled. Hired in 1980, Murphy was a teenager when he became, at that point, the youngest of SNL cast members. He would come to dominate the show in terms of sheer airtime, and once even once served as a substitute host while still an SNL cast member.

His four-season run features such memorable characters as Gumby, Mr. Robinson, Buckwheat, and more. Murphy had star presence. Indeed, in 1984, the year he left the show, Murphy starred in Beverly Hills Cop, which was already his third starring role in a movie.

SNL’s brightest star was en route to becoming perhaps Hollywood’s brightest star.

Only two Doumanian hires survived the start of the Ebersol era. One was Murphy, obviously, and the other was Piscopo. He did not end up having the career of his castmate, but Piscopo was no slouch as an SNL cast member.

He was at least as good an impressionist as Murphy — Piscopo’s Frank Sinatra is perhaps the definitive impression of the iconic crooner. He stuck around for four seasons, and still speaks with respect and modesty about his excellent run.

Lorne Michaels is Canadian, and Canadian comedians have not been rare on Saturday Night Live, but Duke was a 1981 hire by Ebersole when he was revamping the cast. Notably, Catherine O’Hara, another SCTV cast member, had been cast on Saturday Night Live, but decided to leave the show before ever appearing and officially becoming an SNL cast member. (There’s a story that O’Hara was freaked out by Michael O’Donaghue’s antics, but that seems increasingly apocryphal.) Thus, Duke was hired off of SCTV to replace O’Hara.

Duke was solid for four seasons on SNL, finding a few successful recurring characters. She’s not on the Mount Rushmore of SNL cast members by any means, but in the 1980s, lasting for more than one season and being able to create some memorable characters counted as a major success. You may recognize Duke from her recurring role as Wendy on Schitt’s Creek, where she was reunited with, yes, Catherine O’Hara.

Gross is, interestingly, the sister of Michael Gross, of Family Ties and Tremors fame. That’s quite the successful family. She was able to quickly establish herself after being hired by Ebersole. Ebersole, for whatever reason, axed “Weekend Update” and rebranded it as “SNL Newsbreak,” but Gross served as a co-anchor on that. Gross did a lot of impressions, and was the go-to female impressionist during her time on the show. Were some of those impressions questionable by modern standards? Of course!

After leaving SNL, Gross had a solid career as a character actor and voiceover actor. You may know her best as Mrs. Quick on Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, but she also lent her voice to Animaniacs and Hey Arnold!, among others. She also had a small role in Tremors 3 alongside her brother, though oddly she was never on Family Ties.

Louis-Dreyfus was barely in her twenties when she was cast on Saturday Night Live in 1982, and she only lasted three seasons (literally every single Ebersole hire was out after the 1984-85 season when Michaels returned). She has said she felt a little in over her head during her time on SNL, but she did have a couple notable characters, such as April May June the televangelist and teen correspondent Patti Lynn Hunnsucker.

Was JLD a work in progress on SNL? Sure, but we’re still talking about Julia Louis-Dreyfus. She is one of the most-talented comedic performers of her generation. She would go on to win Emmys galore thanks to Seinfeld and Veep, among others.

The skill, unrefined as it was, was there. Also, while working on SNL Louis-Dreyfus met Larry David, which proved crucial to her career. Brad Hall, who JLD married in 1987, was also a cast member on SNL at the same time, but they actually met at Northwestern before either was hired on the show.

Ebersole’s last gasp for the 1984-85 season was to hire a few notable faces, instead of trying to find future stars. He brought in Billy Crystal, Christopher Guest, and also Short. It was an interesting gambit, though it didn’t really work from a ratings and stability perspective. All three had their moments, but Short was the one, even as a one-season wonder, belongs on this list.

Short is built for sketch comedy. He loves to be broad, but he is so good at it. Plus, he had already done time working on SCTV, and brought some of those characters with him. Short already had Ed Grimley and Nathan Thurm. He’s a funny guy, but he’s not subtle. That’s ideal for sketch comedy.

We’ve knocked Doumanian and Ebersole a bit, but Michaels’ first season back was also a flop. Eight of the 11 people he hired only lasted one season. However, the other three are all on this list, and they includes Nora Dunn. She spent a full five seasons on the show, making her the first cast member to dip into the 1990s we’ve mentioned (though by that we mean the 1989-90 season was her last).

Dunn’s character Pat Stevens managed to prove popular even in that 1985-86 season, and she also had the Sweeney Sisters, Ashley Ashley, and a litany of impressions. Dunn was the heir apparent to Gross in some ways, in terms of being a quality utility player, which is vital to an SNL cast.

She also made a splash by boycotting the episode hosted by Andrew Dice Clay. Rarely have SNL cast members had the courage of their convictions when it comes to hosts.

Dunn would disappear into characters and impressions. Jon Lovitz was always Jon Lovitz. Both styles can work. There’s a reason why there was a “Best of Jon Lovitz” special done. He was funny, but in a way where the Jon Lovitz of it all always popped through.

Lovitz loved to ham it up, and he chewed a ton of scenery with his big, broad characters like the Pathological Liar and the Master Thespian. When Lovitz wasn’t mugging for the camera, he somehow had the palpable vibe of “I’m not mugging for the camera.”

And yet, it didn’t matter, because he was so much fun on SNL! He was also well-venerated, as Lovitz was nominated for an Emmy for his first two seasons on the show.

Say what you will about Miller, a 1985 hire who lasted until 1991. He’s polarizing today, but he was perfect for the role of anchor of “Weekend Update,” and he absolutely excelled at doing it.

Miller was a cast member, which meant he did a few characters and a couple impressions, but that wasn’t his strong suit. No, Miller helped salvage “Weekend Update” and turn it into the vehicle that worked so well at bolstering the careers of Norm MacDonald, Tina Fey, Seth Meyers, and more.

While “Weekend Update” predated him, Miller really reframed what it meant to anchor the segment. This was where his verbose comedic style really popped. The guy knew his way around a joke and a turn of phrase. He is, perhaps, the definitive “Weekend Update” anchor.

Hooks is one of those SNL cast members who was talked about as being underrated so much you kind of have to call her properly rated at this point. She was quite good on the show for five seasons, running from 1986 until 1991. Hooks actually was passed over by Michaels for the 1985-86 cast, but Michaels quickly made up for that mistake, and she went on to become one of the most solid of all SNL cast members.

You can probably picture Hooks as Sinead O’Connor or Tammy Faye Bakker right away. Her impressions, and characters, managed to really stick out. Hooks was one of those people brought back after leaving the show, as she played Hillary Clinton on a few occasions. Beyond SNL, Hooks had strong roles on Designing Women and 3rd Rock from the Sun.

Alas, she passed away in 2014 when she was only 57.

Carvey was the perfect SNL cast member. That’s not to say he was the best of all-time, though he’s high on the list and if you go with Carvey, we wouldn’t argue. What we mean is that he could do both broad lead characters and subtler supporting characters. There was a balance to the way Carvey served the show.

His George H.W. Bush was not an accurate impression, but it was also perhaps the best Presidential impression in the show’s history. Carvey could do the Church Lady or Hans of Hans and Franz, but he was also a great foil for Mike Myers’ Wayne as Garth. We don’t get two Wayne’s World movies without Carvey as Garth. Carvey won a deserving Emmy for his work on the show. A true SNL legend.

Hartman was the ultimate utiltyman. He was a classic “glue guy” on the show. When he was the center of a sketch, he soared, but Hartman was also willing to be a tertiary straight character in a sketch. During his eight seasons on the show, Hartman was in a ton of sketches, but that was completely justifiable. He was always there, because he was willing to fit into whatever role was needed.

He made his Ed McMahon funnier than Carvey’s Johnny Carson, but never upstaged Carvey. Hartman’s Bill Clinton didn’t pop as much as Carvey’s Bush, but it was, somehow, a subtle impression. He made Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer work. Hartman was a sketch comedy genius. He was never the single best SNL cast member, and wasn’t always the funniest, but he was always the most important.

R.I.P. to a legend.

You might also like this list of the Best SNL Characters in Nearly 50 Years of Saturday Night Live or this list of the Best SNL Sketches.

Editor’s Note: Corrects main image and formatting.