46 of the most memorable characters and sketches in ‘Saturday Night Live’ history

• Over the 50 seasons of "Saturday Night Live," thousands of sketches have been performed.
• We've picked the 46 most memorable sketches or characters in the show's history.
• The Blues Brothers and Wayne and Garth got movies out of their sketches.

Not every "SNL" sketch can become iconic, since there have been so many of them. That's what makes these sketches so important: They've stuck around in the public consciousness for years, sometimes decades.

Some have become so popular that they've received film adaptations, made frequent appearances on the show — some so frequent that they had to be retired — or become full-blown memes.

Ahead of the 50th anniversary special of "SNL" this weekend, we picked our favorites, from Buckwheat to Opera Man to Gilly to Domingo.

"The Coneheads" was one of the very first iconic "SNL" sketches. The premise? A bunch of aliens with cone-shaped heads trying to live on Earth.

The Conehead family even received their own movie in 1993, called "Coneheads." It starred the original performers, Dan Aykroyd and Jane Curtin.

Watch a Coneheads sketch here.

"I can see Russia from my house!" With that one sentence, this sketch starring Tina Fey as Sarah Palin and Amy Poehler as Hillary Clinton cemented its place in comedy history.

It's easy to forget that Fey had left the cast of "SNL" three years prior to this 2008 sketch — her impression is just that inseparable from her "SNL" career. Fey went on to reprise the role multiple times over the season, and she won an Emmy for her work.

Watch "Sarah Palin and Hillary Address the Nation" here.

"Mister Robinson's Neighborhood" starred Eddie Murphy as a crude version of Mr. Rogers, teaching kids about what it was like to live in a rougher part of town.

Mister Robinson was one of Murphy's iconic characters that he reprised when he returned to host the show in December 2019.

Watch "Mister Robinson's Neighborhood: Ransom" here.

Kristen Wiig's Gilly is a notoriously disobedient elementary school student who always says sorry by the end of the sketch.

Gilly became so popular that Wiig eventually had to "retire" the character, as she thought she was getting overused, per Entertainment Weekly.

Watch "Gilly: Class with Rosario Dawson" here.

Looking for some tips on exploring New York City's hottest clubs? Look no further than Stefon, played by Bill Hader.

Notorious for breaking on camera, Hader incorporated covering his face with his hands into the character so he could subtly laugh at the ridiculous things that Stefon would say — made worse by the fact that Hader's friend and writer John Mulaney would switch up the lines last minute to make Hader crack up.

Watch "Stefon on Halloween's Hottest Tips" here.

"Wayne's World" appeared over 20 times throughout "SNL" history, with Mike Myers and Dana Carvey as Wayne and Garth hosting a public access TV show in their basement.

Wayne and Garth became so popular that the sketch spawned two movies, and brought many phrases into our cultural lexicon, including "Excellent," "We're not worthy," "Schwing," and "That's what she said."

Watch "Wayne's World: Aerosmith" here.

"Lazy Sunday" was the first digital short ever on "SNL," and essentially helped jump-start YouTube.

The sketch has a simple premise: two guys walking around New York City having a lazy Sunday. Need we say more?

Watch "Lazy Sunday" here.

The Blues Brothers, played by Dan Aykroyd and Jim Belushi, are still popular today.

The Blues Brothers also received their own movie in 1980 and a sequel 18 years later, "Blues Brothers 2000."

On "SNL," the sketch involved Aykroyd and Belushi just getting on stage and performing blues music while wearing their trademark suits and sunglasses. The movie was a bit more high-concept, adding a criminal element and a plan to help the orphanage they grew up in.

Watch "Blues Brothers: Soul Man" here.

Another iconic musical sketch is "D— in a Box," starring Andy Samberg and Justin Timberlake.

The premise is pretty self-explanatory, and the song even has helpful lyrics on how exactly to put your … appendage … in a box.

Watch the Emmy Award-winning "D— in a Box" here.

A wedding crasher named Domingo took the internet by storm in 2024.

What do you get when you combine Ariana Grande singing off-key on purpose, the smash hit of 2024 that was "Espresso," and the infinite charms of Marcello Hernández? You get this sketch, which introduced us all to the one, the only, Domingo. He even made an appearance at a Sabrina Carpenter concert!

Watch "Bridesmaid Speech" here.

Nick the Lounge Singer, played by Bill Murray, will forever be legendary for giving the "Star Wars" theme lyrics.

Nick, a lounge singer, appeared 12 times across 10 years of "SNL," and always with a different last name depending on his surroundings — he was "Nick Slammer" for a performance in prison, "Nick Rails" for a performance on a train, "Nick Winters" at a ski resort, etc.

Watch "Nick the Lounge Singer Sings 'Star Wars' Theme" here.

The best way to spot an "SNL" fan is to shout "more cowbell" into a crowd, and see who laughs.

This sketch, which parodied MTV's "Behind the Music," has become one of the most famous — and perhaps overexposed — sketches in the show's history. After seeing Will Ferrell's tiny shirt, Jimmy Fallon constantly breaking, and Christopher Walken demanding more cowbell, we can't hear "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" the same way again.

Watch "More Cowbell" here.

Mary Katherine Gallagher, played by Molly Shannon, is an extremely emotional and volatile caricature of a Catholic school girl.

Mary Katherine's most famous tic was, of course, sticking her hands under her armpits and smelling them whenever she got nervous. She was also prone to showing off her underwear and falling a lot. She reprised her role in the movie "Superstar."

Watch "Mary Katherine Wants to Join a Gang" here.

"Black Jeopardy!" is a recurring sketch hosted by Kenan Thompson as Darnell Hayes, where the categories vary, except for one: White People.

This isn't the first "SNL" sketch to make fun of "Jeopardy!" — more on that later — but it has created some iconic moments in recent history, such as Tom Hanks appearing as a Trump supporter, and Chadwick Boseman in character as T'Challa, aka Black Panther.

Watch "Black Jeopardy with Tom Hanks" here.

"The Californians" is an extremely niche Los Angeles-based spoof of a soap opera, in which everyone can't stop talking about highways.

The Californians were made up of Stuart (Fred Armisen), Karina (Kristen Wiig), Devon (Bill Hader), plus various other cast members and hosts who wanted to join in. All of the characters speak with a thick Valley Girl accent, making it hard to understand anything they say, especially when they're upset, which is always.

The Californians were so beloved that the "cast" reunited for a Volkswagen ad in 2025, 13 years after it first debuted in 2012.

Watch "The Californians: Stuart Has Cancer" here.

Dana Carvey's smug and pious Church Lady hosted her own talk show, "Church Chat," which she used as a way to call out the sinful guests.

Church Lady is one of Carvey's most beloved characters, and appeared as recently as 2024, a full 37 years after her debut in 1987.

Watch "Church Chat: Satan" here.

Opera Man was a frequent guest on Weekend Update during Adam Sandler's tenure on "SNL." Sandler played an opera singer who sang the news.

Opera Man returned in 2019, when Sandler returned to Studio 8H for the first time in over 20 years, not a moment too soon.

Watch "Weekend Update: Opera Man and His Brother" here.

Perhaps the most iconic "SNL" sketch of all time, Chris Farley played Matt Foley, a motivational speaker who cautioned kids about living in a van down by the river.

While Farley played the character numerous other times, the "Down by the River" sketch remains the gold standard of "SNL" comedy.

Watch "Matt Foley: Down by the River" here.

"The Delicious Dish" was a recurring NPR sketch, but the most famous segment included Alec Baldwin talking about his "Schweddy Balls."

How impactful was this sketch? Ben & Jerry's named an entire ice cream flavor after it, and Ana Gasteyer and Molly Shannon reprised the characters in a 2024 commercial for Capital One.

Watch "NPR's Delicious Dish: Schweddy Balls" here.

Natalie Portman's squeaky-clean image was challenged by these two sketches of her rapping about snorting heroin, having sex, and cheating on tests.

Portman has rapped twice on "SNL" — both sketches are equally iconic, and spawned plenty of GIFs in their days. The sketch is so beloved that when she did it again, Andy Samberg made a cameo years after he had left the show.

Watch "Natalie Raps" here and "Natalie Raps 2" here.

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Author Of article : Gabbi Shaw

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