While Kenan Thompson has become well-recognized for his comedic roles and Saturday Night Live characters, he nearly gave up on his acting career over one movie.
While chatting with Amy Poehler on her Good Hang podcast recently, the actor revealed that he almost quit acting because of how challenging it was to learn hockey for the family sports comedy-drama D2: The Mighty Ducks, the follow-up to 1992’s The Mighty Ducks.
“I put it on my resume under special skills that I could roller skate, but you know, I never in a million years considered hockey,” Thompson said of getting cast as Russ Tyler in the 1994 hockey sequel. “I wanted to learn, but after that first day of hockey camp, which was on my birthday, my 15th birthday, I wanted to quit it all.”
However, the Emmy winner is grateful that his mother didn’t let his younger self give up that easily.
“I was like, ‘I don’t want to be an actor. I don’t want to if this is what it’s about,’” he recalled. “Thank God my mom didn’t let me quit. Kept going back and back.” After eight weeks total of hockey training for D2 and 1996’s D3: The Mighty Ducks, Thompson said he eventually learned how to ice skate.
Poehler, who starred on SNL with Thompson from 2003 to 2008, also praised the actor for his “incredible” skating skills, saying he’s “one of my friends that skate the best.”
“I pride myself with that, because it’s not like a big known thing amongst the Black community to just ice skate like that,” Good Burger actor said in response. “There’s only certain people that do it. There’s only a few people in the NHL or whatever kind of thing… to get good at it is wild.”
The Parks and Recreation alum also recalled seeing Thompson’s skills in action on the ice rink outside Rockefeller Center after one of SNL‘s past Christmas shows. She said the actor was “skating forward, skating backwards, skating sideways, doing all the thing [and] doing 45 million tricks.”
