John Mulaney Talks to Ted Danson About “Saturday Night Live”

Speaker 1 Hey, Conan here with some news that's hot off the presses. Our Team Cocoa podcast, where everybody knows your name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson, sometimes is back for a brand new season.

Speaker 1 This season, listen is Ted and Woody when we can find him. Have some great conversations with people like John Mulaney, Sarah Silverman, Fred Armison, and more.

Speaker 1 Their first episode with John Mulaney is out right now.

Speaker 1 Here's a sneak peek.

Speaker 2 You came out of Saturday Night Live without PTSD, right? I mean, yeah, because some of your compatriots.

Speaker 2 Some of it's

Speaker 2 hard. Oh, it's very hard.
Yeah. And it's very competitive, yes, to get your material up.
And it's competitive with yourself and with

Speaker 2 the gods of show business. And I don't even mean the gods that run the show.
I mean, the sort of larger, just is something playing or not.

Speaker 2 But I recognize I had a very good experience there. I just

Speaker 2 liked having a boss. I liked fitting into a hierarchy.
I like, um,

Speaker 2 I kind of like, uh, what would be a good word? Uh,

Speaker 2 bizarre, strong-willed people. I get a kick out of them.
I liked working with some of these guys at the show who'd been there since 76 and were 90 years old and were just crazy and mean.

Speaker 2 I mean, really, like, I just got- You're not offended. No, I delighted in it.
Yeah, that's great. I don't want to name names, but so many of them are dead.

Speaker 2 But, uh, but there were just people go, you know, I remember Phil Himes, our lighting designer, uh,

Speaker 2 had started on NBC radio during World War II, as did Don Pardo.

Speaker 2 And we were doing a sketch where Fred was playing Obama, and it was like a, at one point, he gets up in the Oval Office, Fred, and he looks out the window.

Speaker 2 So we kind of needed a special treatment, I thought, of lighting on the Oval Office windows so they were non-reflective or something.

Speaker 2 And I'm explaining this to Phil Himes, and he stares at me and he goes, I lit John F. Kennedy in the White House.

Speaker 2 And I'm like 25, going, Can you do this thing where

Speaker 2 the windows don't shine? Yeah. The 50th anniversary was great.
I know you was really cool. Yeah, really.
It was so many new pieces. Spectacular.
I liked it.

Speaker 2 It wasn't just like clip packages, a lot of performance and stuff. Yeah, that was really good.
How long were you on that, working on that?

Speaker 2 Um, in conversations for weeks leading up to it, but nothing got done. And then we all flew in around

Speaker 2 the Monday or Tuesday before, and then it really ramped up. But leading up to it was funny because

Speaker 2 you just knew that Lauren was, you just knew he was waiting just long enough that it got really scary.

Speaker 2 Yeah. It was, because we saw it coming for so many years.
You had to make it

Speaker 2 disorganized in some ways so that it could all come together by the broadcast. Were people pissed off or did they like the

Speaker 2 scripted show about Saturday Night Live? Oh, the Jason Reitman one? Yeah.

Speaker 2 No, I didn't hear anyone was pissed off. I did get a physical, though,

Speaker 2 at UCLA Hospital. And I get all this blood work done, prostate.

Speaker 2 They check my liver. Everything good? Everything good.
The doctor, knowing a little of my history, goes, I don't know how this is possible, but you have the liver of a 12-year-old. I was thrilled.

Speaker 2 That's really what you want in your organs is 12. Yeah.
Yeah. Cause they've lived a little life.
But they've got some more miles. More miles.

Speaker 2 So then we're finishing up the physical and he goes, I saw that movie Saturday night. So I have a real appreciation of what your career has been like.

Speaker 2 And I said, oh, well, you know, that movie's not that accurate. And he goes,

Speaker 2 I know Jason. He wouldn't make stuff up.
And I go, yeah, but I'm telling you. I'm telling you, some of it's embellished, but that's okay because it's for a movie.

Speaker 2 And he goes, from what I'm hearing, it's very accurate. And I I go, sir, I don't, Doctor, I don't want to have this conversation anymore.
I'm trusting you with a lot of my blood.

Speaker 1 Okay, head over to where everybody knows your name to listen to the rest of John and Ted's conversation now.

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