Shannon was born in Cleveland, Ohio, on September 16, 1964, to an Irish-American Catholic family.[2][3] Her maternal grandparents were born in Ireland, with her grandfather being from Cloghmore, Achill, Mayo.[4] When Molly was four years old, she and her older sister survived when their drunk driving father caused a car crash that killed her mother, younger sister, and a cousin; she and her sister were raised by an aunt while their father went through a lengthy recovery from his self-inflicted injuries.[5][6]
Before Saturday Night Live, Shannon worked as a hostess at Cravings restaurant on Sunset Boulevard and as a food demo girl at Gelson's super market in Marina Del Rey. She auditioned for her first big film role and was cast, playing the supporting part of Meg in the 1989 horror film remake of The Phantom of the Opera, with Robert Englund. In 1991, she had a brief appearance in the second season of Twin Peaks as "the happy helping hand lady", and in 1993, she appeared with minor roles in three episodes of In Living Color, the first in a fake TV commercial with Shawn Wayans playing Chris Rock, the second in a sketch with Jim Carrey, playing LAPD Sergeant Stacey Koon, and third being a parody of Star Trek.
Shannon's major break came in February 1995, when she was hired as a featured player on Saturday Night Live to replace Janeane Garofalo after Garofalo left mid-season, reason being that the experience left her "anxious and depressed", and that she believed a sexist attitude pervaded the show. Shannon was one of the few cast members to be kept (along with David Spade, Norm Macdonald, Mark McKinney and Tim Meadows) when Lorne Michaels overhauled his cast and writers for season 21 (1995–96).
She appeared in a 1997 episode of Seinfeld titled "The Summer of George", where she played Sam, the co-worker who drove Elaine Benes crazy because she did not swing her arms while walking. She also appeared in Sheryl Crow's video for the song "A Change (Will Do You Good)" and played the recurring role of loony neighbor Val Bassett, Grace Adler's nemesis, on Will & Grace, appearing in five episodes over the sitcom's eight-season run. In 1998, she played the role of Emily Sanderson in the film A Night at the Roxbury, featuring Will Ferrell and Chris Kattan who were also cast members of SNL at the time. She also appeared in Sex and the City in a number of episodes.
In 1999, Shannon starred in Superstar, a feature film based on her most famous SNL character, Mary Katherine Gallagher, the awkward Catholic school student who aspires to be a musical superstar.
In 2004, she starred in a short-lived Fox network television seriesCracking Up with actor Jason Schwartzman created by Mike White. That same year, she guest starred in an episode of Scrubs and starred as Mrs. Baker in the film Good Boy! In 2006, Shannon was featured in the Sofia Coppola-directed movie Marie Antoinette as Aunt Victoire. The next year, Shannon guest-starred on ABC's Pushing Daisies, and appeared in the film Evan Almighty. Shannon also made a rare move to drama, appearing in Mike White's film Year of the Dog in 2007. In 2013, Shannon joined White again, playing his love interest Eileen in the HBO show Enlightened, for which she was nominated for an Emmy for outstanding guest actress.
Shannon hosted Saturday Night Live on May 12, 2007, making her the second former female cast member to host (after Julia Louis-Dreyfus) and the first one to have been a cast member for Lorne Michaels (Louis-Dreyfus was a cast member under Dick Ebersol).
Shannon at the Orange County, California, Children's Book Festival on October 2, 2011, promoting her first children's book, Tilly the Trickster.
In 2008, Shannon starred as Kath in the American version of the hit Australian sitcom Kath & Kim.
In early 2010, Shannon was cast in a recurring role on the Fox television series Glee as Brenda Castle, an astronomy and badminton teacher who has a rivalry with main character Sue Sylvester.[8]
She returned to Saturday Night Live for a special Mother's Day episode on May 8, 2010,[9] and also the October 2010 reunion special "Women of SNL".
In 2018, Shannon co-hosted the Rose Parade with Will Ferrell on Amazon Prime Video in character as fictional local television personalities, Tish and Cord. In 2018, Shannon and Ferrell co-hosted HBO's broadcast of the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle as their characters Tish and Cord.[12]
In 2024, it was announced Shannon would join the upcoming fourth season of the Hulu comedy series Only Murders in the Building in a recurring role.[18]
Personal life
Shannon married artist Fritz Chesnut on May 29, 2004.[19] Together, they have two children.[20][21]
Mary Katherine Gallagher: Shannon's best known character. An odd, outcast student at a Catholic school who enjoyed performing in the choir and school plays. Shannon starred in the 1999 feature film Superstar based on the character.
Sally O'Malley: a proud 50-year-old dancer ("I'm FIFTY!") with a bouffant hairdo, who wore tight red pants and proclaimed how much she loved to "kick, stretch and kick!"
Helen Madden: an overly exuberant self-proclaimed "Joyologist", who appeared on talk shows with the trademark catchphrase "I love it, I love it, I love it!"
Veronica Kilvere: an airhead fashion model who hosts the "Veronica & Co." talk show.
Margaret Healy: a woman who enjoys doing many voices and accents.
Jeannie Darcy: an unfunny mullet-haired stand-up comedian, who ended almost every joke with the phrase "Don't get me started, don't even get me started!"
Julia Scarlett Elizabeth Louis-Dreyfus is an American actress and comedian. Often described as one of the greatest performers in television history, she is widely known for her roles as various characters on Saturday Night Live (1982–1985), Elaine Benes on Seinfeld (1990–1998), Christine Campbell on The New Adventures of Old Christine (2006–2010), and Selina Meyer on Veep (2012–2019). Her list of accolades makes her one of the most award-winning actresses in American television history, and she has received more Primetime Emmy Awards and more Screen Actors Guild Awards than any other performer.
John William Ferrell is an American actor, comedian, writer, and producer. He is known for his leading man roles in comedy films and for his work as a television producer. Ferrell has earned six Emmy Awards and in 2011 was honored with the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. In 2015, he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and was named the best comedian in British GQ.
Maya Rudolph is an American actress, comedian, and musician. From 2000 to 2007, she was a cast member on the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live (SNL). During her tenure on the show, she appeared in supporting roles in the films 50 First Dates (2004), A Prairie Home Companion (2006), and Idiocracy (2006).
Mary Katherine Gallagher is a fictional character invented and portrayed by Saturday Night Live cast member Molly Shannon from 1995 to 2001. She was considered the first breakout character from the new 1995 cast and a significant marker of the increased influence of women writers on the show in the 1990s. Shannon portrayed the character in a 1999 film, Superstar, and she also reprised the role when she hosted Saturday Night Live in 2007. Shannon first created an early version of the character when she was in school at NYU, during a comedy show directed by Madeleine Olnek. In 2024, she portrayed the character in a pre-taped video with Vice President Kamala Harris that was shown at the Al Smith Dinner.
Wendie Malick is an American actress and former fashion model, known for her roles in various television comedies. She starred as Judith Tupper Stone in the HBO sitcom Dream On and as Nina Van Horn in the NBC sitcom Just Shoot Me!, with the latter earning nominations for two Primetime Emmys and a Golden Globe Award.
Saturday Night Live (SNL) is an American late-night live sketch comedy variety show created by Lorne Michaels and developed by Michaels and Dick Ebersol that airs on NBC. The show's premiere was hosted by George Carlin on NBC on October 11, 1975, under the original title NBC's Saturday Night. The show's comedy sketches, which often parody contemporary American culture and politics, are performed by a large and varying cast of repertory and newer cast members. Each episode is hosted by a celebrity guest, who usually delivers the opening monologue and performs in sketches with the cast, with featured performances by a musical guest. An episode normally begins with a cold open sketch that is usually based on political events and ends with someone breaking character and proclaiming, "Live from New York, it's Saturday Night!", properly beginning the show.
Adam McKay is an American screenwriter, producer, and director. McKay began his career as a head writer for the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live (SNL) from 1995 to 2001. Following his departure from SNL, he rose to fame in the 2000s for his collaborations with comedian Will Ferrell and co-wrote his comedy films Anchorman (2004), Talladega Nights (2006), Step Brothers (2008), The Other Guys (2010), and Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (2013). Ferrell and McKay later co-wrote and co-produced many television series and films, with McKay himself co-producing their website Funny or Die through their company, Gary Sanchez Productions.
Steve Koren is an American writer/producer and screenwriter. Most notably, he has written for Saturday Night Live, Seinfeld, and Veep. He also wrote or co-wrote the movies Bruce Almighty, Click, A Night at the Roxbury, and Superstar.
Krista Allen is an American former actress, comedienne, and model best known for playing Billie Reed on the NBC Daytime soap opera Days of Our Lives, Jenna Avid on Baywatch Hawaii, and Taylor Hayes on the CBS Daytime soap opera The Bold and the Beautiful, and appearing as herself in the HBO series Project Greenlight and Unscripted. Allen's film credits include Liar Liar (1997), Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002), Anger Management (2003), and The Final Destination (2009). She has also guested or recurred on several television series, including CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, The X-Files, Charmed, Friends, Frasier, Modern Family, Monk, Two and a Half Men, and The L.A. Complex.
Superstar is a 1999 American romantic comedy film and a Saturday Night Live spin-off about a quirky, socially inept girl named Mary Katherine Gallagher. The character was created by SNL star Molly Shannon and appeared as a recurring character on SNL in numerous skits. The story follows Mary Katherine trying to find her place in her Roman Catholic private school. The movie is directed by former Kids in the Hall member Bruce McCulloch. It stars Molly Shannon, Will Ferrell, Elaine Hendrix, Harland Williams, Mark McKinney, who appeared in many of the Mary Katherine Gallagher SNL skits on TV, and Glynis Johns in her final film. Molly Shannon received a nomination for Blockbuster Entertainment Award "Favorite Actress - Comedy" but lost out to Heather Graham in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me.
Justina Milagros Machado is an American actress. She began her career playing secondary roles on television and film before starring as Vanessa Diaz in the HBO comedy-drama series, Six Feet Under (2001—05), for which she received Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series. Machado later starred in the short-lived series Missing, Three Rivers and Welcome to the Family and was a regular cast member in the first season of the USA Network crime drama Queen of the South.
Justin Paul Theroux is an American actor and filmmaker. He gained recognition for his work with director David Lynch in the mystery film Mulholland Drive (2001) and the horror film Inland Empire (2006). He also appeared in films such as Romy and Michele's High School Reunion (1997), American Psycho (2000), Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003), Strangers with Candy (2005), Miami Vice (2006), Wanderlust (2012), The Girl on the Train (2016), The Spy Who Dumped Me (2018), On the Basis of Sex (2018), Bumblebee (2018), Lady and the Tramp (2019), and Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024).
Kristen Carroll Wiig is an American actress, comedian, screenwriter, and producer. First breaking through as a performer with the Los Angeles comedy troupe The Groundlings, Wiig achieved stardom in the late 2000s for her seven-season tenure on the NBC sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live (SNL) from 2005 to 2012.
Shannon Woodward is an American actress. She is best known for her roles as Sabrina Collins on the FOX sitcom Raising Hope (2010–2014), Elsie Hughes on the HBO science-fiction thriller series Westworld (2016–2018), and the voice and motion capture of Dina in the video game The Last of Us Part II, for which she received a BAFTA Award for Performer in a Supporting Role nomination at the 17th British Academy Games Awards.
The twenty-first season of Saturday Night Live, an American sketch comedy series, originally aired in the United States on NBC between September 30, 1995, and May 18, 1996.
David Wayne Spade is an American stand-up comedian, actor and podcaster. His comedic style, in both his stand-up material and acting roles, relies heavily on sarcasm and self-deprecation.
Cathryn Rose "Casey" Wilson is an American actress, comedian, and screenwriter.
Nasim Pedrad is an American actress and comedian. She was a cast member on the NBC sketch comedy and variety series Saturday Night Live from 2009 to 2014. She later went on to star in the Fox sitcoms Mulaney (2014–2015) and New Girl (2015–2018), the Fox horror comedy series Scream Queens (2015), and the TBS science fiction comedy series People of Earth (2017) and 2019 movie Aladdin. Pedrad also created, produces, and stars in the TBS/The Roku Channel sitcom Chad (2021–2024).
The following is a list of recurring Saturday Night Live characters and sketches introduced between September 27, 1997, and May 9, 1998, the twenty-third season of SNL.
Cecily Legler Strong is an American actress and comedian. She was a cast member on the NBC sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live from 2012 to 2022. She is the longest-tenured female cast member in the show's history.
↑ "2016 IFJA Film Awards". Indiana Film Journalists Association. December 16, 2016. Archived from the original on April 11, 2023. Retrieved April 10, 2023.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
