Marcello Hernández isn't quite ready to bid farewell to Domingo—or any of his other iconic Saturday Night Live characters. "I'm here, I'm here, I'm here," he reassured Justin Sylvester of Live From E! on the red carpet at the 2026 Critics' Choice Awards. (Check out all the stars in attendance.) Cue the collective relief, especially after Bowen Yang's midseason exit last month.
But Marcello, who joined SNL in 2022, noted that he's still having a blast. "I'm having fun, bro. It's a wild job, and you get to meet so many wild people—and I love it," he told Justin.
Saying goodbye to Bowen was tough, but the 28-year-old comedian appreciates the level his former castmate rose to on every occasion. "I look at it like sports," Marcello explained. "That's a guy who put up numbers. Consistent, always delivering big sketches and he had a distinct voice, and everybody loved him."
"It's for a reason," he added. "He's a hard worker. I saw him behind the scenes grinding every week. It's a guy to learn from, for sure."
While Marcello, whose Netflix special American Boy premieres Jan. 7, wasn't up for an individual award yet, SNL is a Critics Choice Award nominee for Best Variety Series, while alum Ego Nwodim is up for Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series following her exit from SNL after seven seasons.
Marcello is scheduled to present, and he was admittedly excited to see "so many people" at the ceremony being held at The Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, Calif. "I saw Rhea [Seehorn] from Pluribus—I freaked out! I have my whole family here now," he said. "Everybody, dude. It's funny; you watch all these shows, and my mom is a serial series watcher. So I'm trying to get a couple of selfies for her—I'm getting it done."
