Bowen Yang has clocked out from his final Saturday Night Live shift.
Yang said goodbye to the sketch comedy series with a heartfelt sketch where he played a Delta employee working his last shift with the company. While helping customers at the eggnog station, he said, “Oh, sorry, my machine’s kind of breaking down, so I’m closing my station. This is my last shift.”
“Yeah, it’s sad. I’m gonna miss everything about this place. The smells, celebrities would come through. You know, just last week, Josh O’Connor was here,” he joked. (O’Connor hosted SNL‘s Dec. 13 installment, which aired a week prior.)
Yang got on the phone with Ariana Grande‘s (who hosted the episode) character Rhonda, who said, “I wish you were home, but I’m so proud of you. All the eggnog you’ve made over the years. Some of it was great, some of it was rotten.” He replied, “A lot of it got cut.”
“You know, I also think Eggnog’s kind of like me,” Yang said, continuing, “It’s not for everyone, but the people who like it are my kind of people.” He then launched into singing a rendition of “Please Come Home for Christmas,” as he continued to help more customers (aka his co-stars) as they wished him good luck.
Grande later entered the stage, telling Yang, “I wouldn’t miss your last shift for the world.”
“I can’t believe you’re retiring,” the Wicked star added. Yang replied, “I just wanted to go out on top,” which led to Grande joking, “Oh, everyone knows you’re a bottom.”
Yang then subliminally shared his gratitude for his time on SNL in between tears.
“Oh Rhonda, I should have come home earlier. I just feel so lucky that I ever got to work here,” Yang said. “And I just wanted to enjoy it for a little bit longer. Especially the people. I’ve loved every single person who works here because they’ve done so much for me, especially my boss.” And no, he wasn’t talking about Lorne Michaels, but Cher!
“Ma’am, I just wanted to say it’s been an honor working for you, and any success I have after this will be thanks to this place. Before I go, do you have any feedback for me?” Yang said to Cher. “Well, everyone thought you were a little bit too gay. But you know what? You’re perfect for me,” she joked.
Saturday marked the comedian’s final episode as a cast member on the sketch comedy series. It was revealed Friday that he was exiting the show midseason, notably on the episode hosted by his Wicked co-star Ariana Grande.
Ahead of Saturday’s episode, Yang addressed his departure on Instagram Saturday, where he said he is “grateful for every minute of my time there.”
“i learned about myself (bad with wigs). i learned about others (generous, vulnerable, hot). i learned that human error can be nothing but correct. i learned that comedy is mostly logistics and that it will usually fail until it doesn’t, which is the besssst,” he wrote, also thanking Lorne Michaels and Grande “for sending me off in the dreamiest way i could imagine.”
Yang’s SNL tenure began in 2018, when he joined as a writer. The following year, he joined as a featured player, and was promoted to a full-time cast member in season 47. He joins a limited group of SNL alumni who left the series midseason, including Cecily Strong, Molly Shannon, Eddie Murphy, Dana Carvey and Janeane Garofalo, along with Norm MacDonald (who was fired at the time).
He earned five Emmy nominations during his tenure with the sketch comedy series, all the while his career outside of SNL began to skyrocket. Yang co-hosts the beloved Las Culturistas podcast with Matt Rogers, with the show itself expanding into the Las Culturistas Culture Awards. A spoof on typical awards shows, Yang and Rogers pop culture-centered awards ceremony aired on Bravo this year, where it will return in 2026.
Yang recently starred in Wicked and its followup Wicked: For Good, and will next appear in Tangles: A Story About Alzheimer’s, My Mother and Me and The Cat in the Hat.
More to come.
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