Kenan Thompson reacts to Morgan Wallen's Saturday Night Live exit: 'It felt so abrupt'

Kenan Thompson has admitted Morgan Wallen's early exit from the Saturday Night Live set on the weekend felt "so abrupt".

After serving as the musical guest on the late-night sketch comedy show on Saturday evening, the country singer could be seen leaning in next to Anora actress Mikey Madison, who was making her hosting debut, and whispering something.

As the credits rolled, Wallen stepped off stage and walked past the camera in front of him.

The moment sparked a lot of debate on social media, and on Monday, long-time SNL castmember Thompson conceded to Entertainment Weekly that he was puzzled by the Whiskey Glasses hitmaker's behaviour.

"I don't know what goes through people's minds when they decide to do stuff like that. I don't know if he understood the assignment or not, or if he was really feeling a certain kind of way," he said. "It's definitely a spike in the norm. We're so used to everybody just turning around and high-fiving us, everybody's saying, 'Good job, good job, good job.' So, when there's a departure from that, it's like, 'Hmm, I wonder what that's about?'

"But Saturday I guess it was just different because it just felt so abrupt. And it was already such a small grouping on the stage anyway. So, it was just like, 'Oh wow, that was pretty visible.' You know what I'm saying? It was a pretty visible thing," the 46-year-old continued.

A short time after he departed SNL, Wallen posted a photo of a private jet with the words, "Get me to God's country," written over in bold white text.

Accordingly, Thompson had questions about that message too.

"The 'God's country' of it all is strange because it's like, 'What are you trying to say?' (Are) you trying to say that we are not in God's country? We're not all in God's country? We're not all under God's umbrella? That's not necessarily my favourite," he added.

Representatives for SNL and Wallen have not yet commented on the 31-year-old's controversial exit.