Comedic actor Kenan Thompson, a top star of NBC's "Saturday Night Live" program, recently shared a little bit of information with the public about the end of his marriage after more than a decade, E! News reported.
The Hollywood celebrity who rose to fame as a child actor had previously been tight-lipped about the details of his divorce from ex-wife Christina Evangeline, with whom he was married for 11 years and fathered two young daughters.
Thompson appeared Monday on the "Today" show and spoke with host Hoda Kotb to promote the release of his new memoir titled "When I Was Your Age" and some of the revelations about his life that most people had previously been unaware of.
He characterized the book as letting him "tell the whole story from A to Z" about "99%" of his life so far.
At one point, Kotb asked Thompson to expand upon his brief mention in the book of his 2022 divorce from Evangeline, whom he'd married in 2011 after the couple had dated for several years before that, and explain why he hasn't said much about the split in public.
"I didn't really want to speak out of turn on people who aren't there to tell their version of the story as well," the actor said. "So, I just kind of told my perspective, basically."
He was much more open to discussing his love for his two daughters -- Georgia, 9, and Gianna, 5 -- and how they are his "daily focus" and "sweethearts."
Kenan Thompson @kenanthompson is opening up to @hodakotb about his new memoir “When I Was Your Age” where he talks about navigating being a child actor, his separation with Kel Mitchell, being a girl dad, and more. pic.twitter.com/PbaUJDHO9F
— TODAY (@TODAYshow) December 4, 2023
Celebrity gossip site TMZ first reported in April 2022 that, per anonymous sources described as "close to the couple," Thompson and Evangeline had decided to formally file for divorce after having separated from each other more than a year earlier.
The sources further described the split as amicable and insisted that the pair simply "grew apart" but remained "great friends" and had been "successfully co-parenting" their two daughters while Thompson worked on a new show in Los Angeles, California, and Evangeline continued to work as an interior designer in New York City.
TMZ followed up on that initial report with another report in June 2022 about how the divorce papers had been filed and the marriage of 11 years was now officially over.
According to the outlet's unnamed sources, the couple agreed to 50/50 joint custody of the two daughters and were living near each other in NYC to make the shared custody arrangements easier on everyone involved, particularly the young girls.
While Thompson is arguably best known for his two-decade tenure on "Saturday Night Live," his IMDb page lists 108 credited appearances as an actor that date back to 1994 when he made his debut on the big screen as a child actor in "D2: The Mighty Ducks."
Over the next three decades, he became a star on Nickelodeon and appeared in dozens of TV shows and movies and also provided voiceover work for a variety of animated shows.
