In an interview with ‘Hart to Heart’, a Peacock series hosted by Kevin Hart, comedian and Lonely Island member Andy Samberg reveals that he left Saturday Night Live in 2012 for his mental health. While Samberg found success on the show performing skits with his fellow cast members and Lonely Island collaborators, he found he was “falling apart in his life”. Behind the scenes, “Physically, it was taking a heavy toll on me and I got to a place where I was like I hadn’t slept in seven years basically,” Samberg said.
Writing stuff for the live show took up all of Tuesday night, the table read was on Wednesday, and from that point on he had one day to come up with a digital short. Working on the show meant four days with no sleep, for seven years. “So I just kinda fell apart physically,” says Samberg. He goes on to say that it was a difficult choice to leave the show, “The craziest thing about working there is once you get going, if you’re just in the shower and you have an idea that shit can be on television in three days, which is the most, like, intoxicating feeling.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Samberg talked about the origins of The Lonely Island and how the trio got hired by Saturday Night Live. Following the exit of his Lonely Island collaborators Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone, he was left in charge of making the shorts, which he never pretended he could do without them. He shares, “We made stuff I’m really proud of in my last two years, but there’s something about the songs that I can only do with Akiva and Jorm. It’s just how it is, we’re just a band in that way.”
Despite being told by Show’s management that they would prefer he stayed, in the end, Samberg felt he had to leave to regain a sense of mental and physical health
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