{"id":50370,"date":"2025-08-06T20:53:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-06T20:53:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/50370\/"},"modified":"2025-08-06T20:53:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-06T20:53:07","slug":"bill-hader-missed-snl-50th-anniversary-celebration-because-of-anxiety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/50370\/","title":{"rendered":"Bill Hader Missed SNL 50th Anniversary Celebration Because of Anxiety"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tBill Hader<\/a> was among the handful of Saturday Night Live alumni who did not attend the show\u2019s 50th anniversary special earlier this year.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd appearing on Late Night With Seth Meyers<\/a> Tuesday night, Hader and fellow SNL alum Meyers indicated his anxiety, which Hader has been open about having, was responsible for his absence.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cYou were very open and honest after you left SNL, about the anxiety you had when you were working there,\u201d Meyers said to Hader on Tuesday\u2019s Late Night. \u201cAnd then, for the SNL 50th [anniversary], I think people were obviously at first disappointed you weren\u2019t coming, but that was the reason. And I sort of celebrated your choice.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe SNL50<\/a> special<\/a> even featured a digital short about the prevalence of castmembers having anxiety<\/a>, which Hader said he was asked to participate in.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAndy [Samberg] called me and was like, \u2018Hey, so we\u2019re doing this short about how, you know, anxiety, everybody had anxiety, and so it\u2019s me calling you, and dah dah dah dah,\u2019\u201d Hader said. \u201cWhen he told me about it, I was like, \u2018I don\u2019t know if I want to do that.\u2019 He\u2019s like, \u2018Why?\u2019 and I\u2019m like, \u2018Because I\u2019m anxious!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI was like, \u2018I don\u2019t want to do it,\u2019\u201d Hader added, laughing, before launching into an impression of Samberg trying to get him on board.<\/p>\n

\n\tBowen Yang ended up playing the role meant for Hader in the anxiety sketch.<\/p>\n

\n\tLooking back at his time on SNL, Hader also marveled at how Meyers and fellow alum Amy Poehler didn\u2019t seem too anxious.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cYou and [Amy] Poehler were just, like, ice in your veins,\u201d he said. \u201cYou guys went out there, and I was, like, trembling, anxious, and you guys went out, I remember, and something went wrong, and you went, \u2018Well, something went wrong. Oh, something went wrong!\u2019\u201d Hader said, shrugging.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI was like, \u2018You can just do that?!\u2019\u201d he added, laughing. \u201cI could just in the middle of a thing go, like, \u2018This sucks! I\u2019m gonna go home!\u2019 I\u2019m like, \u2018Oh, man, I wish I could do that all the time. That\u2019d be great.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHader talked openly about having anxiety that led to panic attacks during his time on SNL, and he spoke out about it further in a 2022 Hollywood Reporter cover story<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAnxiety is always fighting those voices in your head saying, \u2018Here\u2019s all the bad things that are going to happen,\u2019\u201d the Barry alum said. \u201cWeirdly, I have a harder time with day-to-day stuff, as opposed to running a TV show.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tOn Late Night Tuesday, Hader revealed that his battle with anxiety may have also contributed to him recently having shingles.<\/p>\n

\n\tHader broke out into laughter when Meyers revealed Hader recently had the disease.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cYeah from stress,\u201d Hader said. \u201cI was like, \u2018What causes this?\u2019 and the guy was like \u2018Anxiety! I know because you always talk about how you have anxiety. That\u2019s probably why you had the shingles.\u2019 \u201c<\/p>\n

\n\tHe went on to share that having shingles involved more painful symptoms than he anticipated including a backache and a \u201ccrazy rash.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHader and Meyers agreed the name was likely part of the issue with why they underestimate the disease, with Hader suggesting it be called \u201cfire blisters.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cYou don\u2019t want blisters that feel like they have ants inside of them crawling out of your skin,\u201d Hader said.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe pair continued to discuss what they jokingly referred to as Hader\u2019s \u201crelentless maladies,\u201d which included something happening to his eye that kept him from attending the 2025 Golden Globes.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMy eye exploded,\u201d Hader revealed, laughing, seemingly at the absurdity. \u201cI have vasculitis in the retina in my eye and I lost vision in my eye and I had to get a shot in my eye.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMeyers said he saw Hader\u2019s girlfriend Ali Wong at the awards ceremony and she mimed an explosion by her eye to indicate why Hader wasn\u2019t with her.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cHe sneezed and his eye exploded,\u201d Hader joked of Wong\u2019s message. \u201cI had to get a shot in my eye, and then I couldn\u2019t go.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHader also talked about being included in Wong\u2019s Emmy-nominated Single Lady special and her current stand-up set, joking about how he was learning about her past relationships in a public setting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bill Hader was among the handful of Saturday Night Live alumni who did not attend the show\u2019s 50th…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":50371,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[33451,49,48,361,75,24135,7180,13398,34424],"class_list":{"0":"post-50370","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-bill-hader","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-celebrities","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-late-night-with-seth-meyers","14":"tag-late-night-tv","15":"tag-seth-meyers","16":"tag-snl50"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50370\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}