Seth Meyers Blames Himself for 'Mishandling' Tim Robinson on 'SNL'

Niche movies and television shows no longer feel niche. The landscape for how we consume media is completely different. Gone are the days when people thought they were the only ones who liked something. You’d have to go to conventions, find and subscribe to independent zines, or seek out hyper-specific chat rooms (something I was never good at). Now? You can fire up a hashtag on social media about whatever you’re interested in and quickly connect with others who like what you like. Hell, you’ll even find whole accounts dedicated to it.

However, finding other people en masse who enjoy what you enjoy can balloon the popularity of said thing. Then, more people get into it, and it doesn’t feel like a niche anymore. But that also doesn’t mean it’s mainstream. Some aspects of it will be. It will have easily identifiable memes, even if people don’t know what they’re from. You can’t just walk up to someone and start shouting about how your shirt is from Dan Flash’s and expect them to know what you’re talking about! If you haven’t guessed yet, I’m talking about I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson.

The Netflix sketch show by the comedian and actor has certainly risen in popularity since its inception. Its bits have gone viral. He’s won Emmys for it. It even helped boost the popularity of the criminally underappreciated Detroiters. Tim Robinson has gotten other work thanks to the show as well, including a Totino’s Super Bowl commercial and a starring role in an A24 movie that was just as weird as you would imagine. It didn’t set the box office on fire. I saw it in a movie theater in NYC, and it was barely a quarter full. Regardless, Robinson’s success is undeniable, and it’s wild to think that it could have come even sooner.

Robinson was a writer and featured player on Saturday Night Live for four years. He had his moments (Roundball Rock) but never really took off in a significant way, and Seth Meyers feels kinda bad about that. The late-night host recently appeared on WTF with Marc Maron and revealed that he takes responsibility for Robinson not taking off then like he has now. “I was at SNL when he was hired as a cast member, and it did not work the way anybody who is a fan of his thought it should,” Meyers explained. “I, having been the head writer at the time, felt like I was mishandling this asset.”

I understand what Meyers is saying, but I do think Robinson’s style isn’t for everyone, and SNL is often broad. Still, he thinks it should have gone better. “Everybody knew how funny he was. At every table read, he would crush. And a lot of sketches he tried at SNL — not that many, I should say — found their way into I Think You Should Leave,” he noted. “For everybody at SNL to see him have this moment, along with Zach Kanin, his co-writer, it’s so lovely. He’s honestly the best dude in the world - they both are. They weirdly found their way into the zeitgeist almost beyond what SNL is because it’s so singular.”

I don’t know if Robinson could have had a better tenure at SNL, but it is wonderful to hear that someone I think is nice thinks he’s nice. Robinson seems like a good dude, but you never know (and, to be fair, I don’t really know now). However, I do agree that he’s taken his unique voice and pushed it into the mainstream. Maybe not completely mainstream, but anytime I see a Driving Crooner decal on a car window, I smile.