SNL's Beavis and Butt-head sketch was supposed to star Jonah Hill

"Beavis and Butt-head" was the highlight of Saturday Night Live's season 49. The sketch, which centered around two oblivious men at a Q&A who happened to look like the iconic MTV cartoons, spread like wildfire online and gave the sketch show its most viral clip of the year.

Part of the sketch's success, beyond the premise, has to go to the men who played the characters: Mikey Day and host Ryan Gosling. Their committment to the bit was what really sold it, and led other cast members to bust out laughing in the middle of the sketch. The thing is, the sketch almost didn't make it to air. SNL had been sitting on the idea since 2018, when it was concocted for another Oscar nominated guest: Jonah Hill.

Wig complications led to the sketch being shelved in 2018

This revelation came about during a recent interview with SNL's hair and makeup team: Jodi Mancuso and Louie Zakarian. The latter told The Ankler that they were excited to attempt the idea with Hill, but the wigs were not as effective as she'd hoped. "Even at that time it was late coming into the show, so there wasn't a lot of prep time and I wasn't fully happy with the wigs," she recalled. "Then I think we tried it again, and again I wasn't happy with it."

Fortunately, Mancuso and Zakarian got another chance when Gosling came on to host. They thought the sketch was dead in the water, but were excited to right the ship when the sketch was repurposed for the Fall Guy star. Mancuso told the outlet:

"Then they pitched it again and I was like, well, we're going to make this right. They wanted the same exact wigs as the first time. I told them that I'm not doing it like that. We need to make them a little more human."

The design of the characters had to be altered

More human was ultimately the way to go. Zakarian also noted that the inclusion of the braces on Mikey Day's face helped to bring the very distinct, very animated look of the Butt-head character to life. "Just having his lip have those braces and those teeth exposed, it really did help," he explained.

While it's fun/fascinating to envision a world in which the Jonah Hill sketch made the cut, the notes from the makeup artists made it clear that it would not have been up to par. The version we got with Gosling was the best case scenario.