Crews 
After months of coming under fire from viewers for their lack of diversity Saturday Night Live has taken heed to the displeasure and are set to make some additions to their cast. SNL producers held a secret audition recently for African American female comedians.
Back in October SNL cast member Kenan Thompson who is only one of the two African American’s on the show along with Jay Pharaoh, stated that it might be a challenge for the producers to add a female of color because black female comedians are harder to come by these days. Thompson also said that he would no longer be dressing in drag to play the roles of black female characters on the show.
Several up and coming comedians showed up in hopes of landing a spot and were tweeting during the process. Actress Bresha Webb spoke about getting the news of the audition:
“The audition came about from an inside source from SNL,” she said. “I don’t think any of us had a clue about the showcase until two days prior. It was an awesome opportunity even though it was such a short notice but, if you stay ready you ain’t gotta get ready and we were READY! Lol But we were all honored to be selected.”
SNL executive producer Lorne Michaels spoke to the New York Times on the process of recruiting its new possible cast members:
“All told we’ve seen about 25 people,” Michaels told the Times. “A lot of the people we saw are really good. Hopefully we’ll come out of the process well.” Ultimately, he may add up to two performers to the show’s current cast — but according to the Times, “he did not want to add too many women at this time because the cast already includes five.”
SNL has only featured four African-American women in its entire 39-year history: Yvonne Hudson (1980-81), Danitra Vance (1985-86), Ellen Cleghorne (1991-95) and Maya Rudolph (2000-2007).
