'Saturday Night Live' Fires Noel Wells and John Milhiser Too

Two more SNL season 39 newcomers are following Brooks Wheelan out the door.

Saturday Night Live has chosen not to renew the contracts of Noel Wells and John Milhiser, two performers who joined the show as featured players last fall.

Milhiser barely had enough screentime to make an impression, so this isn't the biggest surprise in the world, unless we expect that SNL will have need of a Jon Cryer impression some time in the near future.

However, with the upcoming departure of Nasim Pedrad, who is likely to leave the show to star on FOX's Mulaney in the fall, Saturday Night Live will be low on talented female performers. In addition, one would think Wells's talent as an impressionist (Zooey Deschanel, Lena Dunham and more) would have saved her job. But apparently not, leaving one to think that perhaps SNL has a host of female talent lined up. If nothing else, the firing of Wells leaves more screentime for performers like new Emmy nominee Kate McKinnon and Sasheer Zamata (the first black, female cast member since Maya Rudolph), assuming that the show renews Zamata's contract. The jury is still out on her fate, along with the fates of fellow newcomers Beck Bennett, Kyle Mooney, Colin Jost (who took over this year as head writer and Weekend Update co-anchor from the departing Seth Meyers), and writer-turned-featured player Mike O'Brien.

Either way, Milhiser and Wells are talented in their own right, and are likely to land on their feet just fine. Hell, Robert Downey Jr. was once a Saturday Night Live featured player who got cut after a single season, so anything is possible.

Via: Deadline

Credit: Dana Edelson/NBC