Julia Louis-Dreyfus On “SNL” Enviornment: “It Was Very Sexist”

According to Variety, Julia Louis-Dreyfus sat down with Stephen Colbert at Montclair Film Festival’s annual “Evening with Stephen Colbert” fundraiser on Saturday. While the two discussed several topics, Louis-Dreyfus was particularly candid about her time on Saturday Night Live from 1982 to 1985.

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“There were plenty of people on the show who were incredibly funny,” she said. “But I was unbelievably naive and I didn’t really understand how the dynamics of the place worked. It was very sexist, very sexist. People were doing crazy drugs at the time. I was oblivious. I just thought, ‘Oh wow. He’s got a lot of energy.’”

At the time, she was the youngest female cast member in the program’s history.

“I learned I wasn’t going to do any more of this show-business crap unless it was fun,” she explained. “I don’t have to walk and crawl through this kind of nasty glass if it’s not ultimately going to be fulfilling, and so that’s how I sort of moved forward from that moment. I sort of applied the fun-meter to every job I’ve had since and that has been very helpful.”

It was during her SNL years when she met comedian Larry David who would give her a role on Seinfeld years later.