KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Heidi Gardner is one of the big stars of Saturday Night Live and a Kansas City native. She not only calls Kansas City home at least part time, but she calls it a big part of who she is. She also happens to be one of the biggest Chiefs fans in New York City.
KSHB 41 News anchors Taylor Hemness and Lindsay Shively got the chance to sit down with her last month at NBC’s 30 Rockefeller Center to talk to her about her Kansas City roots.
The first time Shively got to meet Gardner was when she came home years ago to flip the switch on the iconic Plaza Lights.
“That was something,” Gardner gushed. “I would always go with my mom, she worked on the Plaza.”
Garner lights up the second you mention her Kansas City ties. Her career path, which has grown considerably since she joined the cast of SNL, started in high school at Notre Dame de Scion.
“I have a text chain, it’s called ‘Scion Girls Are Number One’.”
“What’s it like to have that support system at home still?” Shively asked.
“I know how rare it is to make special connections in life,” Gardner said. “The fact that I still have that with 20-year-old friendships at this point, it’s everything.”
And she’s still able to maintain those friendships in person. When she’s not in New York, Gardner has a home here in Kansas City.
“Why is it so important to you to still have a home base in Kansas City whenever you come back to Kansas City, a place to stay?” asked Hemness.
“A couple summers ago, I lived there over the strike and it was like the most extended period of time. I've gotten to be there and in my adult life, and I was like, oh, right, this feels so good. This feels like the summer because these are the summers I had when I was a kid here."
But during football season, she’s waving her Chiefs flag in New York for her castmates and everyone she knows to see.
“If its Chiefs related, I always want to make sure I’m bringing like the best, most loving energy to the team, just surrounding them,” she said. “The steam in the shower, I write ‘Go Chiefs!’’
“So many people from work came over to my apartment and watched the Super Bowl and cheered for the Chiefs for me, like, ‘we want you to be happy’,” she said.
And you can maybe even thank her fandom as the reason SNL snagged a very special host in March of 2023.
“Let’s talk about Travis Kelce coming on SNL. How did that come to be? Was that your doing?,” Shively asked.
“I mean, I never like to take full credit for anything,” said Gardner. “I will say I was like for two years, mouthing off to producers and talent, ‘Travis Kelce, Travis Kelce,’… so and then he hosted it and he killed it.”
VOICE FOR EVERYONE | Share your voice with KSHB 41’s Taylor Hemness
VOICE FOR EVERYONE | Share your voice with KSHB 41’s Lindsay Shively
