Heidi Gardner, Luke Null and Chris Redd will join the cast for the new season to fill the voids left by Vanessa Bayer, Sasheer Zamata and Bobby Moynihan.
- Sep 27, 2017
AceShowbiz - There will be new faces on "Saturday Night Live" when the show returns for its 43rd season later this month. The NBC variety series has added Heidi Gardner, Luke Null and Chris Redd as featured players to help fill the voids left by departing cast members Vanessa Bayer, Sasheer Zamata and Bobby Moynihan.
Gardner is a Groundlings alum whose credits include writing and voicing multiple roles on Crackle's animated comedy "SuperMansion", starring and produced by Bryan Cranston. She also lent her voice to the "Bratz" animated series and has a supporting role in upcoming film "Life of the Party" which is starring and written by Melissa McCarthy.
Null is a musical comedian and improviser hailing from iO Chicago. He has a minor role in the 2011 film "The Heart: The Final Pulse".
Redd is the most high profile among the new cast members. He's best known for his scene-stealing performance as Hunter the Hungry in 2016's mockumentary film "Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping" starring "SNL" alum Andy Samberg and his The Lonely Island group mates Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone, who also wrote the movie.
The new additions to the cast reportedly were hired after a series of auditions and tests over the past month in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles.
Besides the new cast members, "SNL" is undergoing a major shakeup behind the scenes with new writers, Sam Jay, Gary Richardson, Erik Marino, Andrew Dismukes, Steven Castillo, Claire Friedman and Nimesh Patel.
"SNL" swept Primetime Emmys in all four comedy series acting categories it was eligible for this year, supporting actor and actress in a comedy series (Alec Baldwin, Kate McKinnon), as well as guest actor and actress in a comedy series (Dave Chappelle, Melissa McCarthy).
McKinnon, Cecily Strong, Leslie Jones, Kenan Thompson, Colin Jost, Michael Che and Pete Davidson are among the returning players. The new season of "SNL" will premiere Saturday, September 30 with host Ryan Gosling and musical guest Jay-Z.
