“I literally did every character that I have,” Wiig remembered feeling on the show.

Kristen Wiig had a ‘breakdown’ her third season on SNL when she thought she had no more ideas: ‘I have nothing’

"I literally did every character that I have," Wiig remembered feeling on the show.

By Sydney Bucksbaum

Sydney Bucksbaum

Sydney Bucksbaum is a staff writer at **. She has been working at EW since 2019 and is a published author. Her work has previously appeared in *TV Guide Magazine*, E! News/E! Online, *The Hollywood Reporter*, Mashable, Bustle, IGN, DCComics.com, Inverse, *The Daily Northwestern*, and more.

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January 29, 2026 11:30 p.m. ET

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Kristen Wiig on 'Saturday Night Live'. Credit:

Dana Edeleson/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty

Working at *Saturday Night Live* is not for the weak, and even the most iconic comedians who worked on the show struggled with the high-pressure job.

Kristen Wiig recently opened up about her own issues during her tenure on the NBC series, revealing that she even had a "breakdown" early on when she felt that she had run out of ideas for characters.

On the Jan. 21 episode of *Las Culturistas*, hosted by fellow *SNL* alum Bowen Yang and comedian Matt Rogers, Wiig said that her third year — season 33, which aired in 2007-2008 — was particularly difficult because she felt that she "literally did every character I have."

Kristen Wiig on 'Saturday Night Live'.

"Three seasons in, [I was] having a breakdown being like, 'I've done every voice. I have nothing,'" Wiig, 52, remembered feeling.

Yang said he had the same experience during his second season when he realized he had done every character and sketch idea on the show that he used during his audition, and now had to start from scratch to come up with new ideas.

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"That's how you feel," Wiig said. "And then that's that hump you get over with, also, the help of other people being like, 'Can you play blah blah blah?' And you're like, 'Well, we’ll see.' And then you end up trying or doing it. It doesn't always work. And then you just like find new things."

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While Wiig previously created characters by figuring out their voice first, she had to learn a different way during her third year on the show. "It became like physical," she added. "'Let's just do something that someone stands like this,' because I was like, 'I'm out of things to do.'"

Ultimately, that way of thinking led to her creating one of her fan-favorite characters, a woman at a 1920s party who repeatedly says, "Don't make me sing," while clearly dying to sing (watch the sketch in the video below).

Despite the pressures, Wiig also called her time on the show "career-wise, like best years of my life," and that being around her *SNL* costars felt like "living with them" for seven years. She also learned that it was okay "to fail," which is "hard to do."

Wiig became a breakout star during her run on *SNL* from 2005 to 2012. She earned four Emmy nominations for her performances. After her exit, she returned to host *SNL *five times, most recently in 2024.

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