Cecily Strong

Cecily Legler Strong (born February 8, 1984) is an American actress and comedian who has been a cast member of Saturday Night Live since 2012. Other roles include the film Ghostbusters and voice work on The Awesomes. For her work on Saturday Night Live, she was nominated for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series at the 72nd Primetime Emmy Awards.

Cecily Legler Strong was born in Springfield, Illinois, and was raised in Oak Park, Illinois, an inner ring suburb of Chicago. She is the daughter of Penelope and William "Bill" Strong, who worked as an Associated Press bureau chief and is now managing partner at a Chicago public relations firm. Penny Legler Strong is a nurse practitioner, having worked extensively at area hospitals. Strong's parents are divorced. Strong grew up adoring SNL as a child, reenacting sketches with her friend and watching old SNL commercials on VHS. "I had a tape of the best commercials, and I wore it out, every day." She has stated that she was inspired by Phil Hartman.

She attended Oak Park and River Forest High School until her sophomore year, when she was expelled for bringing cannabis to school. She then attended a private Catholic school until transferring for her senior year to the Chicago Academy for the Arts, where she graduated in 2002. She then studied acting at California Institute of the Arts (CalArts), graduating in 2006 with a BFA in theatre. After graduating, Strong returned to Chicago where she studied at the Second City Conservatory and iO Chicago.

Strong performed regularly at The Second City and iO Chicago. Strong performed on a cruise ship with other Second City members for four months. She appeared at the Chicago Sketch Fest, Chicago Just for Laughs, the New York Sketchfest, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the Goodman Theater, the Bailiwick Theater, the Mercury Theater, and with the all-female improv troupe Virgin Daiquiri.

Saturday Night Live

Strong debuted as a featured player on Saturday Night Live on September 15, 2012. The next season, Strong became a repertory player and co-anchored the recurring Weekend Update segment with Seth Meyers, beginning with the season 39 premiere. Strong later co-anchored with Colin Jost, and was replaced on Weekend Update with writer Michael Che, beginning with the season 40 premiere in September 2014, partly at her own request to focus on doing sketches as a part of the regular cast. In 2020, Strong was nominated for her first Primetime Emmy award for Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Comedy Series for her work on the show.

Recurring characters

• The Girl You Wish You Hadn't Started a Conversation with at a Party, an unintelligent, unnamed pseudo-activist,
• Dana, a loud-mouthed, unfriendly retail employee who along with Niff (played by Bobby Moynihan) always insults her coworkers out of fear of being fired,
• Donna Fingerneck, The Art of the Encounter and Women in the Workplace co-host with Jodi Cork (played by Kate McKinnon),
• Heather, a one-dimensional female character from a male-driven comedy,
• Kyra, co-host of The Girlfriends Talk Show, alongside Morgan (played by Aidy Bryant),
• Cathy Anne, the drug-addicted neighbor of Michael Che (usually introduced by Che as "the woman who's always yelling outside my window"), who has strong opinions on current events,
• An unnamed blond former porn star-turned-model/commercial actress who hawks elegant items alongside Brecky (played by Vanessa Bayer),
• Gemma, an aspiring British singer with various boyfriends,
• Gracelynn Chisholm, co-host of morning show Right Side of the Bed with her husband Cory (played by Taran Killam),
• Joelle LaRue, one of the two French animal-based video clip show presenters, alongside Noelle LeSoup (played by Kate McKinnon),
• Lonnie, one of the two unintelligent kids (the other being Josh, played by Mikey Day) in the Science Room sketches.

Celebrity impersonations

Other work

Strong was the featured entertainer at the 2015 White House Correspondents' Association dinner (cracking that she was the first straight woman to do so in twenty years). She took digs at the various news organizations in attendance, politicians of all persuasions, and President Obama. She also took shots at the US Secret Service, host location the Washington Hilton, Brian Williams, Sarah Koenig and the state of Indiana.

In 2016, she appeared in a commercial for Old Navy, alongside other SNL cast members Nasim Pedrad and Jay Pharoah. That year, Strong also joined the climate change documentary show Years of Living Dangerously as a celebrity correspondent. In 2016, she guest starred as Samantha Stevens in TBS's Angie Tribeca and Catherine Hobart in Fox's Scream Queens. She has appeared in a series of commercials for Triscuit since 2017.

Her first book, a memoir titled This Will All Be Over Soon will be out on 10 August 2021. The book is mainly about grieving the death of her cousin amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Strong appeared in HBO Max's six-part comedy series That Damn Michael Che, featuring SNL cast mate Michael Che.

Schmigadoon!

In January 2020, it was announced that Strong would be leading Schmigadoon!, her own series on the streaming platform Apple TV + which is to be produced by Lorne Michaels. The series will center around a couple (played by Strong and Keegan-Michael Key) stuck in a 1940s studio musical town until they find "true love". Rounding out the cast are Alan Cumming, Fred Armisen, Kristen Chenoweth, and Aaron Tveit.

Film

Television