Kate McKinnon

McKinnon debuted as a featured player on Saturday Night Live on April 7, 2012. She was promoted to repertory status in season 39 in 2013. Following Vanessa Bayer's departure, McKinnon is now the longest serving female cast member.[27] She also surpassed Vanessa as the longest serving female performer in history when on May 4, 2019, Kate entered her 150th episode as a cast member, compared to Bayer's 149 episodes. As of April 11, 2020, she has been a cast member for 168 episodes.

In 2013, McKinnon was nominated for an EWwy Award for Best Supporting Actress, Comedy.[28] McKinnon won the 2014 American Comedy Award for Best Supporting Actress, TV for her work on SNL.[29] In 2014, she was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series,[30] as well as for Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics along with four of her colleagues for the song "(Do It On My) Twin Bed".[31] She was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for the second time in 2015.[32] She won the following next year, becoming the first actor from SNL to win the award since Dana Carvey in 1993.

McKinnon began appearing as Hillary Clinton on the series leading up to the 2016 presidential election. The real Clinton appeared alongside her in a sketch during the show's season 41 premiere.[33] McKinnon has said that her impression of Hillary Clinton comes from a deep admiration, and that she "unequivocally want[ed] her to win" the 2016 presidential election.[34] On November 12, 2016, which was the first show after Clinton's loss in the election, she reprised the role to open the show with a solo performance of "Hallelujah" by Leonard Cohen, whose death was announced two days before her performance.[35] After the election, McKinnon began to impersonate Kellyanne Conway alongside Alec Baldwin as Donald Trump. On February 11, 2017, she debuted her impression of Elizabeth Warren during Weekend Update and Jeff Sessions in the cold open.

• Olya Povlatsky, a Russian woman who voices her opinions on current events, comparing them to the outrageous struggles she faces in her village. She also appeared in a cold open with Beck Bennett as Vladimir Putin reading a prepared statement against her will.
• Sheila Sovage, a heavily intoxicated woman at a bar who meets and hooks up with a heavily intoxicated man or woman, played by the host, at closing time.
• Jodi Cork, one of the hosts of Women in the Workplace.
• Barbara DeDrew, a lesbian volunteer at the cat shelter Whiskers R We.
• Deenie, a.k.a. "Somebody's Mom", a middle-aged woman who attempts to recap shows she's been watching, but only knows the characters by self-applied nicknames, such as "Big Boobs" and "Mustache". She is always eating some foul concoction out of Tupperware, such as Brussels sprouts and imitation crab, which generally both revolts and breaks up Weekend Update anchor Colin Jost.
• Mrs. Santini, an apartment dweller who writes passive-aggressive notes to her neighbors. Originally performed as Effie Villalopolus on Comedy Bang! Bang!
• Colleen Rafferty, a twenty-seven-year-old woman (despite looking middle-aged) who appears in panels in which other sketch participants (mostly Cecily Strong as a hippie woman named Sharon alongside the episode's host) recount idyllic paranormal events (such as being abducted by aliens twice, having a near-death experience, discovering that Santa Claus is real, being visited by ghosts, and discovering that time travel is possible), while Rafferty experiences less enjoyable versions and invariably loses her pants.
• Les Dykawitz, a lesbian cop from the 1970s who works for Chicago PD along with her partner Chubina Fatzarelli (played by Aidy Bryant) in "Dyke & Fats".
• Debette Goldry, a senile, septuagenarian actress whose harsh experiences with being an actress in Hollywood (including the on-going issues of equal pay, sexual harassment and abuse, racial diversity in film roles, and actresses getting involved behind the camera as directors and writers) are more outrageous than what modern actresses have gone through.
• A member of Woodbridge High School's theatre troupe who make their performances obsessively and solely about social justice issues that they know very little about.
• Noelle LeSoup, the co-host of the French show "America's Funniest Cats" who appears on the American version of the show along with Joelle LaRue (played by Cecily Strong).
• Shud, a crass mermaid who is based on a blobfish, and makes sexual advances on an unfortunate marooned sailor.

Aside from SNL, McKinnon also co-created and co-stars in the web series Notary Publix with her sister Emily Lynne.[36][37] In addition to Aidy Bryant (who stars in the series), McKinnon's SNL co-stars Beck Bennett, Jay Pharoah and SNL writer Paula Pell all guest-starred in the six-episode first season of the web series.[36]

McKinnon and Lynne also created and released fantasy-comedy audio series Heads Will Roll, which premiered in May 2019 on Audible. The show features guest appearances from Meryl Streep, Peter Dinklage, Audra McDonald, Bob the Drag Queen, Queer Eye's Fab Five, and Tim Gunn. Additionally, many of McKinnon's SNL co-stars are featured, including Aidy Bryant, Alex Moffat, Heidi Gardner and Chris Redd.[38]

In 2015, McKinnon appeared in a number of commercials for the Ford Focus.[39]

In 2016, McKinnon co-hosted the 31st Independent Spirit Awards with Kumail Nanjiani.[40]

In 2019 she played a supporting role in the summer movie Yesterday.[41]