Sunny Nights proves why Will Forte's SNL legacy was always bigger than sketches

For much of the last two decades, Will Forte has occupied a particular place in television history: instantly recognizable to devoted fans of Saturday Night Live, less easily defined to casual viewers who encountered him in fragments.

With Sunny Nights, that long-running arc comes into sharper focus.

The Stan Original places Forte at its center not as a sketch performer or scene-stealer, but as a dramatic-comedic lead whose career has always extended beyond the confines of Saturday Night Live.

Before Saturday Night Live, Forte worked as a writer on Late Show with David Letterman in the late 1990s.

His transition to Saturday Night Live in 2002 coincided with a period when the show rewarded eccentricity and formal risk.

Over eight seasons, Forte became known for characters such as MacGruber, Tim Calhoun, and Jeff Montgomery, figures that leaned into absurdity rather than polish.

Those years on Saturday Night Live defined his public image, but they did not contain the entirety of his work.

After leaving Saturday Night Live in 2010, Forte moved steadily through television and film, appearing on 30 Rock, How I Met Your Mother, and Beerfest.

He also co-created and starred in The Last Man on Earth, which earned an Emmy nomination and reframed him as a writer-producer capable of sustaining long-form storytelling.

For audiences in Australia and New Zealand, Forte’s single-episode appearance on Flight of the Conchords in 2007 often served as a first introduction.

That appearance would later prove consequential. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone AU/NZ, Forte has recalled, 

“I shot that in five days or something like that, maybe even less. So many things came from that that have changed my life, like my relationship with [Conchords cast member] Kristen Schaal, who then went on to be my wife in The Last Man on Earth, all from that week of shooting Flight of the Conchords. What a great show. I love that show.”

The statement points to a recurring pattern in Forte’s career: brief moments that quietly redirect long trajectories, much as Saturday Night Live once did.

Sunny Nights and the reach beyond Saturday Night Live

Sunny Nights represents a continuation of that pattern. Created under the direction of Trent O'Donnell, the series reunites Forte with a collaborator he first worked with during the U.S. adaptation of No Activity.

Forte has explained the origins of that professional trust: 

“We had each other’s phone numbers, and it was very pleasant working with him on No Activity, but, like, it was all online. It was during COVID, so it was the online version, where what we did was basically, we’re doing voice recording with a face capture app, so they can animate with it. [O’Donnell] was so pleasant, and I really enjoyed working with him.”

The connection did not immediately lead to another project. When Sunny Nights arrived, Forte said the timing mattered: 

“We kept in touch enough so that he would reach out from time to time and just say hello, and we’d exchange texts, and then he just reached out out of the blue with [Sunny Nights]. Even though it was only, like, a germ of an idea, and I think they had one script at that point, it was like, ‘Oh, I gotta take this seriously. This is something I should seriously consider because this guy is just awesome.’”

As the scripts developed, so did Forte’s commitment. He said:

“So then a couple months later, another script comes, and it’s just as good and funny and ends on this cliffhanger where you’re like, ‘Oh, where’s this going to go?’ It was really after only two episodes were written that I had to make this decision.”

The decision ultimately involved relocating his family to Sydney during production in mid-2024.

In Sunny Nights, Forte plays Martin, a cautious American who teams up with his sister Vicki, portrayed by D'Arcy Carden, to run a spray-tan business called Tansform.

What begins as a modest operation becomes entangled with Sydney’s criminal underworld.

The role places Forte far from the rapid-fire sketch environment of Saturday Night Live, demanding sustained character development over eight episodes. Reflecting on the experience, Forte said, 

“Looking back, it is the greatest decision of my life. Marrying my wife, deciding to have kids, those are all other ones up there as well, obviously, but everything about this show turned out to be the best version.”

Later, he added, 

“We fell in love with it. I got to meet this person who will be family for the rest of my life in D’Arcy Carden.”

The production also underscored Forte’s evolving relationship with performance. While his years on Saturday Night Live established him as an agent of chaos, Sunny Nights draws on restraint.

Forte has acknowledged that dramatic work interested him long before it became available. 

“I probably would have done it earlier, but I don’t think anybody would ever think of me in that way. I just got really lucky.”

That luck was paired with persistence. Forte has said, 

“When I was coming out of SNL, I was never like, ‘I want to stretch my acting chops.’ I love doing stupid, absurd comedy, you know? Anything anybody would let me do was great.”

The opportunities that followed, including Nebraska and Run & Jump, gradually shifted perception.

Today, Forte remains connected to Saturday Night Live through collaborations with former colleagues.

He is currently filming the second season of The Four Seasons, led by Tina Fey, who played a central role in his Saturday Night Live years.

Forte has described the return to a familiar ground without nostalgia. He said,

“Know your lines, be on time, that never goes away.” 

As Sunny Nights streams on Stan, it situates Forte not as a former Saturday Night Live performer branching out, but as a long-established actor whose time on Saturday Night Live was one chapter among many.

The series does not revise that legacy; it clarifies it.

Stay tuned for more updates.