Did you know Robert Downey Jr. had a brief cameo as an actual cast member of Saturday Night Live? No, this isn’t the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s latest plot twist—it’s just 1985 calling to remind us that even Tony Stark has his awkward “figuring-it-out” phase.
The now-59-year-old Hollywood heavyweight joined the iconic weekend sketch show for the 1985-1986 season as a repertory player—which is fancy talk for “full-time comedian-in-training.” He even graced the stage again as host a decade later in 1996. That’s right, RDJ took a whole ten years to emotionally recover and return to Studio 8H.
But wait, there’s more! RDJ recently popped up in the docuseries SNL50: Beyond Saturday Night, where he dropped some wisdom nuggets about his time on the show. Spoiler alert: it sounds like a crash course in professional humility.
“I learned so much in that year about what I wasn’t,” he confessed. (Translation: “Comedy is hard, you guys!”) But he also admitted, “There’s not a more exciting 90 minutes you could have, whether you are any good or not.” Ah yes, the thrill of live TV—where dreams are made, and punchlines go to die.
Back in season 11, RDJ shared the stage with some future legends, including Joan Cusack, Randy Quaid, Damon Wayans, Jon Lovitz, and Anthony Michael Hall. Imagine that group chat. However, SNL creator Lorne Michaels had a vision—a very young vision.
“I wanted to go younger,” Lorne explained in SNL50. “I perhaps went too young, but I wanted to go younger. The Baby Boomer generation had dominated the show for 10 years, so I decided to clean house.” Translation: Lorne hit the comedy reboot button and accidentally assembled the Breakfast Club’s weirder cousin.
While RDJ’s season wasn’t exactly Emmy bait, it’s clear he left with some valuable life lessons—mainly that sketch comedy is not for the faint of heart (or the iron-suited).
