That presumably leaves just Ben Marshall, who was promoted to featured player last season, as the lone member of the comedy team still employed by the show, although his status for the upcoming season hasn’t been officially announced. Please Don’t Destroy, as parodied in an amusing backstage short film alongside host (and fellow nepo baby) Dakota Johnson, was two-thirds SNL generational talent, with both Herlihy and Higgins being the sons of longtime Saturday Night Live writers Tim Herlihy and current Tonight Show sidekick Steve Higgins.
Herlihy, who remained on the writing staff following the PDD gang’s exit from their role creating filmed shorts (often featuring their misadventures as the lowest-status members of the backstage crew), had carved out a niche for himself on screen last season. In a series labeled “Social Experiment,” Herlihy would smugly introduce would-be educational experiments (such as surprising moviegoers with a theater full of Frankenstein monsters) in order to prove… something.
Apart from their splintered tenure at SNL, Please Don’t Destroy (who got their own, Judd Apatow-produced movie vehicle in 2023) remains a thing, as Herlihy, Higgins, and Marshall continue to perform live sketch comedy around New York and elsewhere—although not any longer at 30 Rockefeller Center.
Saturday Night Live‘s 52nd season premieres on September 26.
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