Prior to the beginning of the season, longtime cast member
Leslie Jones, who joined the cast one month into
season 40 in October 2014, left after having been with the show for almost five full seasons. Three new featured players were announced on September 12, 2019: impressionist and writer
Chloe Fineman of
the Groundlings, stand-up comedian
Shane Gillis, and
SNL staff writer
Bowen Yang. Yang is the first fully
East Asian-American cast member in the show's history. Fineman had auditioned for the show previously and been unsuccessful. The choice of Gillis as a cast member generated backlash after podcast clips of him making
racist remarks were reposted. Gillis has also made derogatory remarks about Muslims, women, and the
LGBTQ community on his online show ''Matt and Shane's Secret Podcast''. Gillis was let go from the cast only four days after the announcement of his hiring, prior to the airing of the first episode. Five years later, in 2024, Gillis controversially hosted the show in the twelfth episode of
season 49, during which he jokingly referenced his firing from the show. Later that year (early in the show's
50th season), executive producer
Lorne Michaels revealed that he was not happy about the decision, and that
NBC forced him to fire Gillis.
Heidi Gardner and
Chris Redd were upgraded to repertory status this season, while
Ego Nwodim remained a featured player.
Pete Davidson took a leave of absence at the beginning of the season, missing the first two episodes before returning for the third, due to filming commitments of
The Suicide Squad. Despite this, he was still credited in the episodes he missed.
Cast roster Repertory players •
Beck Bennett •
Aidy Bryant •
Michael Che •
Pete Davidson •
Mikey Day •
Heidi Gardner •
Colin Jost •
Kate McKinnon •
Alex Moffat •
Kyle Mooney •
Chris Redd •
Cecily Strong •
Kenan Thompson •
Melissa Villaseñor Featured players •
Chloe Fineman •
Ego Nwodim •
Bowen Yang bold denotes "
Weekend Update" anchor ==Writers==