Kenan Thompson credits losing it during rehearsal for keeping his cool during ‘SNL’ Beavis and Butt-Head skit

The April 13 episode of Saturday Night Live featured a sketch that has already landed in the history books for one of the longest-ever cast member crack-ups — and now the Beavis and Butt-Head sketch has more than 10.5 million views on YouTube alone.

The bit had Heidi Gardner playing a journalist, asking Kenan Thompson‘s expert about artificial intelligence, when he became distracted by a man seated behind the reporter: Ryan Gosling, dressed and made up to look exactly like Beavis.

Swapping him out for Mikey Day, who was transformed into Butt-Head, didn’t help. 

Gardner’s reaction was priceless — she lost her composure for nearly a minute at the mere sight of Day in his makeup, complete with Butt-Head’s braces and exposed gums. 

However, Thompson smirked but didn’t break.

He tells Variety, “I cracked so hard at dress rehearsal. I haven’t had a break like that in a while where I was in tears and I couldn’t talk.” 

He recalled, “I was frozen. I was literally quivering and then I started to panic … I can’t talk without cry-talking. … It could throw off everything!”

He goes on to call Gosling a “real one” and a “gem” in general, and commends him for pulling his weight during the sketch. “He’s a professional, so he’s playing it very real.”

Gardner recently told Vulture that breaking during the skit left her feeling anxious and unprofessional.

She said, “I tried to tell myself in between dress and the live show, ‘You can’t laugh like that again.’ I was trying to imagine seeing him in my head so I was prepared for it, but I just couldn’t prepare for what I saw. I really tried.”

Luckily, the cast can catch its breath this week: SNL is a rerun.

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