SNL History w/ Jason Reitman

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See terms at discover.com credit card. David, I don't know if you know this about me, but I've always been a fan of exploring new places, not like you kind of, you know, no, no offense.
And one of my best trips, listen up, is when I stayed at an Airbnb. Felt like I was living like a local with all the space, comfort of home.
You know, hotels can be a hassle. Room service and then the housekeeper.
It's a hassle. So then you go to Airbnb and you can get whatever you want, a little cottage, this and that.
It's fantastic. You have your own separate separate space so it's a great product for people who travel david yes i have friends doing one of these right now if you have a home you can airbnb it it's fantastic i mean um to to monetize your home when you're not there seems like a good idea i mean look i'm on the road a lot.
I could probably do it. It's something that people can do when they travel.
They have extra space. Or you're at a place not full time.
You come in the winter. You leave in the summer.
That's something you should think about. It's a way to get some extra money.
And it's a cool experience. Your home might be worth more than you'd think.
Yep. Find out how much at airbnb.com slash host.
Jason Reitman, Dana. Jason Reitman, who is a, I would say a friend of mine and a smart guy, a director, writer, just did this SNL movie, which sort of fell in our lap because it's right up our alley.
What do you mean that i don't understand well you used to be on snl and 1947 no yeah it was so we got a advanced copy of the movie or i was so we could watch it at home because we're running around and um it was very very interesting having been in 8h for seven years and they they made a set that looked like I thought they were filming in 8-H. Yeah, me too.
It was so accurate. Yeah, he did a great job with that.
Staircases, the actually hallway, the page desk, that whole. And then when we went back to the show or I did recently, I just saw that again.
I was like, God, it was exactly right. He's done some great stuff.
That movie is very interesting, interesting worth the watch and then he's done ghostbusters uh juno which was a smash up in the air with george clooney i think maybe and kendrick um and and so he's just high quality i i worked on something with him once or at least we talked about something and love to get involved with this guy he's just a smart good guy to hit your wagon to and and you know it was interesting because of all his resume and all the stuff he's done very successful but just never lost his fascination for this live wacky crazy idea of a tv show that lauren michaels invented basically you know going on live at 11 30 under rehearsed under everything uh you know like lauren's famous quote the show does not go on because it's ready it's because it's 11 30 so jason has a fascination with it and he tried to capture the the spirit of that first show the crazy chaotic spirit and so we talk all about that. We break it down, David.
We break it into little microscopic pieces. So here he is, Jason Reitman.
David, are you still around the corner from me? No, I actually moved from that mansion to another one. Oh, okay.
No, you live in the nice area and I, listen, I've hit the skids. I was going to email you about this.
Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah.
I moved about a mile away. It's not great.
Okay. It's not like, okay.
You should crowdsource something. I think, I think, I think people would spend money on seeing you in a nice place

see dana doesn't care it's david's world we just live in it i'll just say it i know it's a hackney cliche so how are you today jason here's the here's the most trite thing i could say to you are you looking forward to the holidays I am

are you?

I mean I'm in that

place where the movie's out

and the holidays i am are you actually yeah i mean i'm i'm in that you know i'm in that place where the the movie's out and there's nothing left to do with it and now i have to like think of something else to do okay the good news is i saw it last night i was mesmerized by it and i thought oh thank god i love it i by the way this is the scariest fucking podcast i could go on because i i haven't done anything yet with two SNLers. I'm on with two legends, two real deal who know the fucking show.
So I'm not trying to shine you on. I'm genuinely intimidated by this.
I've never seen a movie like this where I was so familiar and I got goosebumps at times. I got emotional emotional at times.
So I was realizing that David and I are in a different lane. We're experientially.
It's it's so familiar. It's different, but it's and you really captured it, though.
The chaos of it. It still is just chaotic as fuck.
So here's the common thing that I keep on hearing back from particular from anyone who worked at snl i mean crew cast anything the stairwell the stairwell between the eighth and ninth floor uh and we we literally we got that down to like the exact details like the handrail everything where anyone who's ever worked there has smoked in there cried in there broken up put their boyfriend in there, uh, because there's no privacy at SNL. And they, every time there's a character would walk in the stairwell, they said they would fuck them up.
There's a co-ed bathroom now, you know, um, and just one small bathroom for everybody. And it's down the hall.
Yeah. So you have, where is it down by Lauren's office? No, the other way it's on eight H, but just around the corner.
Oh yeah. But yeah, your point.
Yeah. There's no real privacy.
And, um, sometimes in the stairwell, you'll see a writer that you've been wanting to see for a sec. And then you'll have a little powwow right there in the stairwell.
Some writing happens there as was that in the movie jason you know what jason i will tell you just to bore everyone on 8h when you go down toward the elevators you can take a left and there's a men's room but it's bigger you know it's got a couple i would go into the stall close it in my suit or whatever for weekend update and just go over it over during the commercial and then run back because i had to get one minute minute of silence because everyone's grabbing you and there's noise and there's music and there's crowds and there's other casts so you go i just have to focus so you don't want to get out there and look at the cards and go oh my god i don't know this as well as i thought i did or something you know same thing with sketches so you go over there and cram and then come out and go okay more distractions but they they did i do the same thing while i'm directing you need a second yeah because if you're a director everyone is reaching out to you at any given moment and everyone has a question they're looking at you and they're always trying to measure whether this is a time to ask you a question and they can't do that when you're in the bathroom so i i i use my few bathroom breaks during the day as the moment to like i pull out the sides and i go what the hell am i making yeah and you forget to go to the bathroom because i go wait wait why did i come in here i just came in to study oh yeah but i will say because go ahead go ahead well just that lorne michaels in in the movie and in real life is yeah, he's that person you want to get a moment with. And so when Kamala Harris was on the soundstage, which was such an intense thing with all the Secret Service and all the energy around that moment a couple of weeks ago, they ran it and everyone was so, there was a tension because Secret Service and army men were there.
You know, flak jacket, helmet, and night goggles with machine guns. And I came out of the makeup room on eight and I saw them lined up like six or eight on both sides holding machine guns.
I said, can I go? Yeah, you can go. And I'm in the Biden outfit.
And I literally saluted them. Not as a joke.
It was just like kind of nervous energy. But we just thought, a cast member, I thought, well, we should kind of laugh a little bit while they rehearse this.
Because everyone was dead quiet. Because it got laughs.
And I said to him, I don't know if we should ask Lorne. I'm going to ask him.
But Lorne was so deep into the whole thing. He didn't want to hear any notes at that moment.
Right. Because he had a lot, a lot of stuff to think about.
That was an intense night. So you really, I think you did a really good job capturing Lauren's obsession with the show, you know, basically.
Especially then. Yeah.
But still now. And not knowing what it was and not, you know, I thought, you know, you could have, I had no idea what to expect.
And there's not a lot of just like set shot. It really moves, which is an understatement.
There's tons of throwaway lines and there's laughs all the way through, but they're so run over. You got to pay attention.
And there's just, it's movement there's no like real static not that many static shots i did love willem defoe and lauren in the elevator just a side just a side two shot i like that sometimes when directors don't not waste time but going for like this shot there's just so typical up, close up, back and forth. I like things playing like you have to just pay attention because that's, you're like really watching people talk and you can understand it.
You don't need to be close up with them, close up with them. So that I liked and I liked just seeing every cast member played and who's playing them and sort of forgetting it and just thinking it's the real Chevy.
It's the real everybody. Very cool, though.
Very cool. Thanks.
I didn't know 90% of that. You know, that first show, it all takes place if people don't know.
What is it? The hour and a half before the show. How obsessed were you both with SNL before you auditioned? Finally a question for us.
Thank you. When I look on it now, like I met Lorne in 86.
So he'd done five years. He had his sabbatical and came back.
But it still seemed like it was 100 years in my mind because of my college years watching the original Saturday Night Live. And so it was still like this monumental thing to actually try to get on and i auditioned a couple times i auditioned once at the comedy store a cattle call with comedians doing five minutes with no mc and i followed sam kennison no way at midnight in kennison prime i died a thousand deaths wasn't that special where i was gonna show you as a director you must you know it's very it's difficult but you landed it you're doing actors or comic actors improvising throw away doing comedy for film you know there's that to try to get it integrated so it feels really poppy but there were some some ones that i really noticed that just like felt real felt spontaneous that was all just the you yelling at them or just one camera i'll tell you how we made it and and and and how we even got into this in the first place you know um i look i i grew up obsessed with snl and and i also grew up around some of those actors because my dad is obviously directing some of them.
But when I was a kid and I would watch it, every once in a while there would be these bumpers where you would see the crew for a second. A sketch would end, the camera would pull back, and sometimes you would even hear the director from the control room and they would be like, you know, this actor, go here, this actor, go here.
And you'd see the crew and the moment that happened i went i want to know who the fuck those people are like i want to how is this thing being made because i was obsessed with the concept that on tuesday you start with nothing and by saturday you have a finished show and uh and when i right after i directed juno uh my agent asked me what do you want to do next and i I told him, I said, look, I had two dreams as a kid. One was to, one was to direct movies and the other was to be a writer for Saturday Night Live.
And, uh, I said, you ask Lauren, if there's any chance he'd let me come and write even for like a week. And Lauren was really kind.
And he said, yeah, yeah, you can come to space camp. And so I went, I spent one week there.
It was one of the greatest weeks of my life. And I think it was coming off of that.
I thought, all right, I want to, I want to make a movie. It's not, it's not as much like a celebration of the comedy, but like a celebration of how this show is actually made.
And the fact that it came so close to not ever existing. Yeah.
Yes, it is. I'm doing it now just sort of a guest, I suppose, doing Biden and stuff.
And yeah, you can't prepare for it. You go, I'm going to do a lot of standup or whatever.
You can't really prepare for it because it's changing every second. They throw you out there.
You're kind of like, there's the cards. You're trying to be loose, trying not to push, trying to land it.
So it's, it's, it's, it's intense. It's just still really intense.
Well, I mean, that's actually, I was really curious because when I was, when I've been watching you do this recently, I go, I wonder if you feel like you're falling back into how comfortable you were back in the day. Does it feel like day one for you? Or does it even feel feel further out of reach because it's something you used to feel comfortable doing and now you have to jump jump right in with a new cast new set of writers um that's that's a good question i'm actually podcasting on my side i i'm on your podcast no but uh that i'm i'm it if to me it's always solving the puzzle in the moment if it's my character like what is the musicality or rhythms i have to hit what are the chops what are the and um the first time i went out there it felt familiar but it still was right as you're about to they're going to push you out you're going to enter a scene there still is okay i'm not on camera to 10 million people i'll be on it in a second right i've got this little moment don't push have fun so i i fell into it pretty pretty quickly but i still have um i'm not completely where i was when i stepped off in 93 that was another level because you're doing four or five sketches a show.
Did you guys ever get to a point where? Oh, I can't even imagine. You have to go an hour waiting for your one moment.
All week. Dana's waiting.
If you come back to host, it's the opposite. I think the first time I host, I was in 13.
I've never been in more than three sketches, I think, when I was on the show, or maybe four. Oh the show or maybe four but Dana was always packed in a lot but I was sort of used sparingly and so

13 overwhelmed me and now Dana's waiting for one so all week and it's maybe one paragraph you go

Jesus I gotta know there's no second take if that show I always say if it had second takes it would

be so much better because if you could just pick from one because sometimes you walk into a sketch

and you're like like on a scene in a movie sometimes you go you know what can I come in again

Thank you. takes it would be so much better because if you could just pick from one because sometimes you walk into a sketch and you're like like on a scene in a movie sometimes you go you know what can i come in again you know i just i'm not in the right space i came in a little early let me and on those you just go in and go oh fuck it's not going right and we just this is the one let me ask you so would you rather kill it rehearsal kill it dress and know oh my god somehow I have to replicate how well that worked.
I don't know exactly why the magic happened. Or would you rather hit it at like 70% address and go, oh, I know exactly how to take it to 100 now.
Definitely the second one, 70%. It's a horrible feeling when it goes just perfect address.
Because you know, this is never going to be that good again. It's more than horrible.
It's sickening. Also, you want to be good enough at dress to where you get on the show because you don't want to save too much because then it gets cut.
And you're like, oh, fuck. I really laid down on that.
But you know, some of these sketches, you know we're going to get on. There's some that just kill, but you're like, oh my God, I just hope it does table read kill, rehearsal with the crew, and then dress, and then air.
And it's hard to keep it going every single one and have it work. And for me, it's like I try to tell myself it's not literal.
The cue cards are just suggestions. Because when you get out there and you have this part you have to do, you can kind of just sort of rush just slightly and not really connect with the audience.
It's sort of a ballsy move to take a moment or extenuate a beat just a little bit,

because that keeps it alive. And the audience senses it when you're having fun and surprising

yourself. Do you get to have fun now when you're doing it, Dana? Because I have to imagine first

time around when you're a cast member and you have no idea what this guy is. You don't

Thank you. when you're doing it, Dana, because I have to imagine first time around when you're a cast member and you're, you have no idea what this guy is.
Like you don't know yet that you're going to have success in films. You don't know yet all the other things are going to happen that you're going to be like an all timer.
Um, so that's always going in the back of your head of like, Oh, like, is this going to work or not? I'm wondering for both of you, like to go back now, does it feel feel like I am who I am now? I can go out and have fun. Or is it just as high pressure? I need to get a win.
I need to crush it. I would say it's both.
It's a little bit I'm playing with house money. I understand that.
In the beginning, I didn't know I was with Phil Hartman, the Phil Hartman, or the Jan Hooks. We didn't know where it was going.
By 93, it was feeling pretty good. But now it's still the thing.
If I'm doing Biden, I'm trying to get the language and sort of ride the wave if it comes to me. If I'm doing, no joke, I'm not getting around here.
My eyes get big and I hold that, then it's still kind of the same process. So both things are true.

Playing with house money, you know I'm way down the other side of it.

It's kind of like you would say to Steven Spielberg,

is it any better now or is it any easier now?

He's still just trying to solve problems.

Is that what directors do?

David, how often do you miss it?

You know, everything is so different than SNL that I liked. i liked it because i had a good fun batch people and i i'm glad i kind of stayed close with them but i don't miss as much because it was it just i just remember sort of the hard parts and i also remember the great parts you know you forget it's like surgery you're like happy after but during it God, it was tough.
But I'm just happy it happened, and I got six great years out of it, and then it got me on something else. Then trying to stay afloat is the next big challenge, because you could do your own show, and it doesn't work, and then suddenly all your heat's gone, and you're not doing anything.
It's hard not to fall off a cliff after. How often are you talking to current cast members about that? How often do they reach out and go, hey, it's all going well.
I'm on the show. I feel confident.
I'm getting on every week. What happens from here? I think Dana gets it more because they ask him about impressions and what to expect and these kind of things.
But when we have them on the show- I'm with people that are really young. Yeah, and right now he's with people that are really young that are – Yeah.
Some haven't even been on a sketch yet. They're just like, what am I doing here? Because there's so many casts.
It's very frustrating for sure. I'm sure I feel for them sometimes.
50 years in, you got 200 cast members before you or whatever. When I was on it was really it was the original which is probably the best or whatever the best means or the most potent and then of course eddie's years in piscopo and then the billy crystal year then the stranger and then so it seems young and it's it's history when i was there now but omaha omaha dana that's what peyton manning used to yell out oh yeah omaha steaks did he yell steaks too i don't know maybe i don't know omaha steaks you know david you may not know this delivers the world's best steak experience brings people together more than 100 years of family-owned expertise as get this amer's original butcher.
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Some people follow the rules, but where's the fun in that? I'm Soraya and this is Rule Breakers, the podcast where we celebrate the rebels, the misfits, and the ones who make their own way. Every week, I sit down with the biggest rule breakers in sports, entertainment, and beyond to talk about the wildest moments, toughest lessons, and why breaking the rules might just be the key to success.
Follow and listen to Rule Breakers with Soraya, an Odyssey podcast available now for free on the Odyssey app and wherever you get your podcasts. I was going to ask you, because what's interesting to me is, okay, now we've got to cast these people you know yeah and i wonder when what when was it down to like three people or was it instant like the gentleman i you know it's hard for me to connect the names like a gentleman who plays dan ackroyd yeah yeah landed so well a lot they all did really i mean i was laughing oh that's billy crystal yeah yeah i was laughing the whole time you know so i mean look a few things are happening i mean one i'm approaching this as a movie and um and i'm thinking about this as this this is a movie specifically about the 90 minutes leading up to the first episode so the movie like the a concept from the original concept which is always the movie starts at 10 p.m with lauren michaels out on 50th street looking for andy kman.
The movie's going to end. Last line of the movie, 1130, live from New York on Saturday night.
So in knowing that, it's not about how do we tell the whole history of SNL. It's not, oh, how do we recapture Chevy Chase? It's going, okay, who is Dan Aykroyd at 11 p.m.? How vulnerable he is? How scared is he? How confident is he? On the first show, where is he right in this moment in time? Right before the world changes.
There's a moment where SNL doesn't exist. And then there's a moment where it does exist.
It's a shot of launch. It's like it's the first walk on the moon.
Where is everyone's heart at? Where is Lorne Michaels when he's actually vulnerable? Or maybe the last time before he becomes as confident as he is. And what is this strange group of people? Some that worked, some that didn't? I mean, geniuses like Jim Henson that have like, you know, it's not going to click, it's not going to work, are in the same room as people who are literally just, they, like I always said, this is a, this is a shuttle launch.
Like that's what we're watching. So with, so with Dan Aykroyd, it becomes a question of, you know, not can you do Bass-O-Matic, but rather, can you capture his energy and his verbosity as in his intelligence and his vulnerability? And Dylan O'Brien, who, you know, Dylan O'Brien's like a heartthrob.
Dylan O'Brien was, you know, in like Maze Runner and Teen Wolf. And like, you know, I don't think people think of him as a comedian, but understood that Ackroyd's on the spectrum and understood how Ackroyd spoke and also understood Ackroyd's sex appeal, which I think no one else did.
No other actor came in and understood that like Ackroyd could get it. Like women loved him.
That's an important part of who he was. And so- It's and charming and and so smart and and kind of willing to play both ends of the spectrum of comedy of being like uber confident but also weird uh so uh we interviewed every living person who was in the building october 11th 1975 so uh and not only the cast not only the writers, but costumers, production design, members of Billy Preston's band.
We interviewed Howard Short, Paul Schaefer. There was NBC pages we literally got a hold of who could just give us a taste of like, what was it like? How were people acting? How confident or unconfident were people? And that's what leads to the casting.
Not, can you nail the Chevy Chase fall? Or can you nail Gilda Radner doing Rosanna Danita? Or you hear a random story that actually did happen and no one knows about it. Just some page tells you, oh, I don't know if you know this, but over by the elevators, then you're like, oh, we should put that in.
It's great texture. It's just something that did happen.
It's weird. And then because you're moving the camera through this whole, there's always, you know, everyone has to be good because, you know, you got to know when the camera's hitting you for the movie, not the show.
But, you know, when you're going through the hallways and you go into makeup, then you pan in, you're going to the host dressing, then George Carlin walks past and you're like trying to catch people going, oh my God, is sort of the chaos of it all it's hard to be uh the idea was to drop you in it like we wanted the audience to feel not like they were being presented a movie but rather i just remember the first time i was there it just felt like holy shit i'm here and everyone's moving past me and as people i recognize people i don't recognize and being at snl no one sits down like you're not allowed to sit down it's just constant movement and that's what i wanted the audience to feel is like layers of action and so we tried to give 30 different characters actual arcs but sometimes they're the foreground sometimes the background but literally every actor works every single day. There's no trailers.
You're just there. And we rebuilt the entirety of 8H, eighth floor, ninth floor.
It's all one 360 set. That looked great.
It looks exactly. I thought it was real.
I'm like, oh, they must've built this, but there's so much shit they'd have to put in here. Like those makeup rooms and the wardrobe and everything and all the things in the walls.
And I'm just like, god damn because it was like in real time one time you moved and i go they're on that side okay oh they're coming by where we used to put catering along the wall oh they're coming back so it was real and that in that respect like it didn't even matter i guess but it does that if someone knew it they go because i would see like herb sergeant yeah still that was still there with us. He lays out.
Oh, I didn't realize that. Herb was there when you guys were there? Yeah.
We took his office. Update.
Update writer. He's in charge of update.
And he was like, kind of grousy. But after about a year, he moved out of that office and me and Farley moved in.
Oh, yeah. And then Sandler and Rock Rock took the back part it's like a small two little offices with with the door between them but you have to go through ours so that was four of us crammed where he had all these papers and shit just doing updating and newspapers but yeah I saw him I think I told Dana before this I saw Audrey Pert Dickman yeah I was working with because she was there with me and she was there with no kidding.
Yeah. Right.
And, uh, I was like, Oh my God, was she there from the beginning? Cause you could see, was Joe Dixow in that? Was Bobby Van Rye? Yes, Joe Dixow is day one. In fact, uh, is great.
Um, Ackroyd. So we were finishing up this last Ghostbusters movie that I produced with Ackroyd and I showed him the model of the whole set and I you know I interviewed Aykroyd

a bunch of times and finally I was like hey

can you give me an impersonation of

Joe Dixow for the actor who's gonna play

him and Aykroyd just like just

jumps right in that doom in it

and he like just starts doing the whole thing

and then I was like what

about Davey? How about Davey Wilson? Can you give me Davey

Wilson? Davey Wilson and he starts

doing like Davey Wilson and like this isn't gonna work. What? You want to put what? Where? Yeah.
You want to use, I don't know. Yeah.
How about that? Between dress and air meeting, Davey Wilson's got a script out right next to Lauren's desk. And it's that bindered script that says, starting live in a circle.
And he's like this. And he goes, well, we're going to have to jump.
We're going to have to put gap girls right after. And he's like, I don don't think we can get camera i don't think we can do it and he would laugh and smigle and yell at him come on baby he's like why you're asking too much here but i didn't know davy was there from the beginning how stupid am i the well i think uh there's something about lauren's i'm not sure part of it is loyalty and you guys know this better than I do but someone told me once Lauren has the same routine every day because he thinks if he did it differently tomorrow morning he wouldn't wake up Lauren Michaels and I thought that was really interestingly said and when I, the first time I to SNL, I was probably a teenager, just as an audience member.
And I remember the fear I felt. And I couldn't even understand why.
I'm like, I'm just sitting in the audience. Why am I scared? But then I started checking with other audience members, and everyone felt the same thing.
We were all scared as I started to count down. But then I went later uh to write for a week and i got to wander around and it started to hit me i was like oh nothing's changed and the more people we would interview nothing physically nothing changes the the turnover of people i mean there was people that we were interviewing that had literally been with the show since pretty much the beginning like like art department people had worked back from like at least like episode two or three so i think there's a consistency that there's a recipe that lauren seems to believe in and i think it's the reason why every other sketch show that's been popular is is comes down to the few people that were at the core of the cast.
And yet there's something about the DNA of the show that allows brilliant people to come in and out of it. Writers, actors, musicians, like anything.
But the recipe remains. I think that Lorne Michaels never, never wavered.
You know, there was it should be an hour. It should be pre-tape.
We should change the theme. We got to get rid of that song.
We don't need the, you know, for years and multiple administrations of overlords. He has stood the, stood the test of time.
He really does believe in it. And these are the off-label things that I don't know you would know, but basically when you take unknown people and you put them on a show, which right now there's unknown people who just got on Saturday night.
It's a de facto reality show. You're watching them grow and get confident.
That's really interesting. I believe, or putting a football player, Joe Montana is going to host a live 90 minutes show doing.
So there's a reality element to it so it's so compelling and then the band plays and they break big bands and i got to see raw arbison and neil young standing there and so then you have those moments so i think you're right it's the dna of it and lauren never wavered he's right now because i'm watching your movie and then i'm just flashing back to last week when lauren would suddenly appear at 8h and was you could tell he's uncomfortable where the rehearsals going he's trying to think how to fix it what should we change so it's an extraordinary thing that it's a 50 year and going going going it blows my mind yeah i i think people like jason you're right about when i like when they pull the camera back and they go to commercial and they start ripping down a set and you're like, the set's that small? Or, you know, anything. You just look, it's more you're learning.
You're like, oh, it's right there in the front or, oh, that set was over in the corner and they all get up and sprint out. And that part is very cool to watch.
I grew up on sets and I grew up just wanted to be on the trucks. Like I wanted to be one of the crew.
I wanted to be one of the dudes. I love that they would say off-color jokes and I just wanted to hang.
And when I watched SNL, I got a very early feeling that there is a brilliant ensemble in front of the camera. We're all aware of that, but there must be a brilliant ensemble behind the camera that's performing some sort of chaotic ballet that allows this show to exist.
And when I got to see it in person, I just couldn't fathom how you write all night Tuesday, you do the table read Wednesday, and then in the middle of the night on Wednesday, there's already someone painting a wall, hemming a dress, creating a wig. And then it goes right up to the last second.
And it's the most thrilling thing I've ever been present for. And that's what I wanted.
I wanted an audience to experience like, because it's very easy for people at home to go like, I'm going to turn around at 1130 and

see what they do. And then after be like, yeah, they did a good job.
They did a bad job or like

whatever. And it is an extraordinary piece of choreography in front and behind the camera to

pull off that show. And they are constantly bending the boundaries of what can be done

on live television. And that started literally with the first episode.

And I think there are two things you captured really well. One is to your point about the

Thank you. can be done on live television.
And that started literally with the first episode. And I think there are two things you captured really well.
One is to your point about the crew. By the time the read-through, you got some laughs there.
And maybe you're not blocking Thursday, but you're blocking Friday. And you're just kind of going by the crew.
And the crew is often just casually kind of right. Yeah, they're America.
You're running the lines and either there's silence or there's five or ten teamsters or just regular people laughing. And it gives you a little boost.
And the other thing was watching the film, I want to give it away for the people who are going to watch it. You can't give it away because it's tactile.
You actually can't give this movie away. I already told told everyone what the last line of the movie is and that's kind of the beauty of it yeah i loved the build-up watching the build-up to the tension is it gonna go on are they gonna show a carson rerun i just love that i love the johnny carson phone call whether it's real whether it's real or not i don't know but at the last second they're either gonna go to carson or go to that what now has gone for 50 years so you built that so beautifully i was right in the moment even though i knew what the answer was going to be i was like god damn are they going to put carson on i'm riding that i'm riding that train emotionally so every single person is so invested on the show and the cast and crew to something that doesn't really matter yet it's it's nothing it's also everyone's pretty defeated in a weird way because most people are saying this is some dumb thing we're going to do in two weeks we're going to look for another job and so you couldn't say to someone now when you work on the show you go well at least we have a job at least this is picked up at least it's there's a different vibe but then it's like why are we working this hard for this shit and i love seeing the board of how many i love when billy crystal caught the board right he's like holy shit what do you i mean you can just eyeball it and say that's a three-hour show like just for the audience the board today is where the sketches go up and they're honed down there might be 10 or 12 of them and and and jason's movie there's a board in the hallway on 8h not up in lauren's office right with like 50 sketches three musical acts a magic show they're like wait who the fuck is getting cut because you know who's getting cut before you go in but you're like oh wait that guy was it and they all treat jim henson like shit which is funny he's such a genius and everyone's like get the puppet guy out of my way and then you know and then they stop putting them in compromising positions you know ben big bird over you know elma or whatever yeah that was funny one thing i wanted to ask you is like the you know when you're watching it and so they're there right now they don't know they're on Saturday night live.
Yeah. Like I did 10 years later.
They know it's late. They're getting paid.
They were, they, obviously they were found by each other and they're smoking weed and, and, and rabble rousers. And they were sort of, they were sort of more aggressive than people would be now in a way they'd be more deferential because it wasn't a hit show and they knew lorne lorne was younger than chevy chase he was a contemporary appear so you captured that too i mean how much of that vibe was part of your thinking and rebel the rebellious thing especially especially belushi you know uh i think it was rosie schuster who told us that what it felt like every night was that feeling.
If you broke into your high school, that if you broke into your high school over the weekend or overnight and you're just running around and like you own the place. And, and that was, that was echoed by everyone we talked to that during the day, Rockefeller center is a, is an office building with people in suits.
And then all of a sudden, it's Thursday and it's two in the morning. And Aykroyd somehow stole a set of keys and had literally a key to every door in the building.
And it would just go and like, just in the middle of the night, he'd go find fun places to go, find places to smoke out. He had found this one shaft on the eighth floor that if you open it he could like exhale into it and uh and that was his way of smoking but um i i what i what i love is actually the the idea that they they were a bunch of kids and and how young they were that akroyd was 23 and lorraine was 21 and belushi was 26 and like they were genuinely kids and you know I asked Ackroyd it's like you know what were you gonna what were you thinking right before you went on and he said you know I was thinking I still have a snowplow up in Toronto so I had a job waiting for me it's fine yeah he still likes that stuff he's still very real dude like that I mean oh my god he'd rather talk about ghosts and things paranormal he lights up what a sweetheart by the way tell me about it uh but um when those guys

come by the show jason when i was there he'd come by like i had i interviewed accurate for spin

magazine or something yeah like a collab but first of all couldn't be more generous and sweetheart

He's Canadian But it's such a

Legendary thing

When you're on the show

And someone

Thank you. lab but first of all couldn't be more generous and sweetheart but it's such a legendary thing when you're on the show and someone that used to be on that you'd watch comes through the hallways and he comes in the office oh yeah oh yeah this one this is old herb sergeant you know you know don't be in a hurry to leave the show all right sir fair enough sir yeah he has an extraordinary memory and he can and he and everything's right on tap for him and that was an interesting thing between people because some people didn't remember anything or they they clearly would you know had made up 50% fabricated their history um akroyd has an exceptional memory and and will hold to it oh yeah but it's weird now because now we've shown the movie to them you know like all these folks like that we interviewed have now watched the movie and watch themselves be like i sat in a screening with like billy crystal revisiting like the worst night of his life um oh wow what was that like yeah i mean it's what's interesting is you know so billy obviously gets cut on opening night and billy crystal has had as bad successful career as a human being can have sure and he talks about that night like it happened yesterday he gets still stays it has to sting wow wow wow uh yeah i mean so we we were looking for a script from opening night we kept on asking everyone everyone we interviewed because there was stuff there was like a sketch that got cut that we always wanted to read and we just want to know what it looked like nobody had it not lorne not anybody finally we asked billy hey is there any chance you have a script from opening night and he goes i think i could find it an hour later i found it so we go to his house he pulls out the script and he starts leafing through it and he just goes there that's where i was supposed to be.
Deeply emotional. Oh, it'll kill me.
So we scan the script and anytime someone has a script in the movie, it's Billy's script. Like a physical, like the physical script.
Like anytime a character is like going through pages on scene, it's like in our movie. That's Billy's script that we actually, that we scanned.
And he went back three years later and then had this killer year with Christopher Gessen. You look marvelous and all that stuff, you know? Yeah.
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Did he ask to see the movie or did you ask if you could show it to him? So this is what happens. So I've done two movies about real people and this is what inevitably happens.
Like you interview the original person. All they want to know is who's going to play them and if they're attractive and how tall they are and then and then they watch the movie and they just can't they can't figure it out like there's just silence after they're just freaked out by it they're freaked out by watching themselves um it's emotional thrown back in time it's like yeah billy was really into it lorraine loved it um garrett loved it i think i think for garrett it really was i think lamorne did an extraordinary job as him and i did too he really kind of sounded like him he kind of that was like uh yeah he was on this podcast and is very memorable as one favorite.
I mean, he's amazing. I ran him three days ago with that thing and he was sitting there.
Oh, this guy. He was super sweet still.
You know, I do impressions of people and I do kind of have empathy in terms of you with these actors and watching people play them. Is that how people is that how people see me you know it's a little vulnerable yeah yeah am i missing the way the world yeah yeah so i thought i thought lauren wasn't very pushed i liked it he wasn't like no you know they didn't you guys didn't do that it was very kind of thrown away because he's a little canadian you know he's a little he's got something you know that's a little uh unique to lauren and back then it was a little softer so i did like the guy that played him i thought he did a great job he's the kid who played you know gabriel lowell played spielberg in the fablemans and so he's now played two of the most iconic jews of all time and i think there's something about gabriel where he has this look in his eyes where if he has a vision, you know somehow he's going to accomplish it.
And I don't think that's saying you could teach somebody. I think he just has that.
That tracks so beautifully throughout the whole film. He was born.
Where's Waldo of the film, the Lorne character? Like, oh, what is he thinking right now? And, you know, nonverbal acting is just a skill set that some people have. I think Michael Keaton's, you know, naturally gifted at it.
And Gabriel, he is too. No lines, just looking at a board and thinking, you know, you really wrote it with him, that character, I think.
For each character at the end of the day, I tried to identify just one thing as far as the casting. So, you know, it was an ego that needs to be humbled you know with belushi it's a guy who thinks that somehow going on television will be the end of his life you know uh for gilda it's obviously the overwhelming empathy you know uh for char garratt it was uh who am i like what's my identity who the hell and by getting out of that one idea instead of it being an impersonation it became all right this is this is the one thing this is what the one thing you want in this film and it just gave him son to chase did belushi really i mean i i heard belushi didn't like the bees that's true right but did he really have a problem with that he's sort of a bigger actor than this show? I wouldn't think that of him.
I would think he's just a goofball. This is what I understood is, one, he wouldn't sign his contract.
And he went missing on opening night. And he definitely had animosity with Chevy.
And I think the reason was really clear. what was brilliant about that first show is that no one looked like anyone on television.
Belushi didn't look like someone who should be on television. You know, Gilded did not look like someone who should be on television.
And Chevy did. And I think what upset Belushi was that when you look at who Belushi was on stage at Second City, and in the National Lampoon Show, he was a star and he had found a place where he could 100% be himself and people would respect his genius.
And now he was going to be on television and Belushi knew Chevy is going to be a star. And the network kind of identified that from moment one and Chevy knew it.
And Chevy was like, this is where I'm going to get my win. That's why you know we have this line in the movie where uh he's like oh is this an ensemble you know he yeah so i think well also it was revealed obviously later on i guess people it was obvious in the beginning that you're at home base in 8h that means you're in the center of the studio you really can play to the audience and camera.
It's the perfect position to be in where Chevy was. And then you're going right to the audience and you can drop little ad libs in, you can break out character bits, stuff like that.
And then obviously he broke so hard. I was just going to ask you quickly about two subsidiary characters that people wouldn't be household names, Michael O'Donohue and Rosie rosie schuster who helped me put together church chat so i was interested how what a big part of uh that year she was as lauren's wife their relationship was shaky or something well i i fell in love with rosie as everyone does you know i all i'd been hearing was that everyone falls in love with rosie and then gill and i gill's my writing partner we got on the phone with rosie and i think you know we wanted to fight after yeah after the call we just felt so head over heels for her and she was so funny she was easily the of all the heavyweights we spoke to she was easily the funniest person we spoke to who like just consistently made us laugh and said things out of nowhere they were highly original and And what I think really interesting about her was that look i mean look this cast is in right this group of writers and cast are challenging all these social mores and the way that they're doing television the way they do comedy and but also for lauren and rosie who their marriage is coming apart they're seeing other people they're still married to each other They're working with each other that they were taking this 1970s nuanced look at love where it's like, she's fucking Danny.
They're still married, but they respect the fact that they make each other better. And that's all that counts.
Like they make each other funnier. They make a better show together.
They support each other. They understand each other.
Who gives a shit? And Lauren didn't give a shit um that was really clear and speaking that was that yeah the hippies day or whatever the new new kind of looking at everything basically days and including comedy and i think that's what what's so cool about that moment is you have a young people who are going we don't have to do it the same way that anyone else has done it before and like that's kind of what the movie is about it's about the moment where one generation just rips television out of the hands of another because they say your time is done like that's why we have milton burrell in the movie like milton burrell is there representing an entire generation of old tv that this group goes no i'm sorry we're done with you that was a brilliant because i read it it wasn't exactly true um jk simmons as milton burrell is magnificent the character's hilarious well milton exposing himself is true he didn't he may not have exposed himself to chevy but he exposed himself to a bunch of other people i think he wanted that out there exposing himself to people it's hysterical i mean so the first person we heard about was why bell

and he had exposed himself to swy bell and someone's chain in someone's dressing room and then the more we talk to people the more people i would find out you know even jeff ross jeff ross came to our premiere and after he goes oh yeah yeah milton showed me his dick i didn't get me too got May 22. That's how big it was.
Well, I mean, to have him in there, and also, I wasn't quite sure. I may have lost track of it.
I love when Spade doesn't like a joke. He's like, oh, no.
I'm going to let you know how much I don't like that joke. No, I like that the guys with the big dicks want to show everybody.
That's so funny. My friend used to accidentally send his huge dick picture to girls and go, oh my God, sorry, not for you.
No, that's okay. Well, I just think of hydraulics.
I mean, there was a prosthesis in your show and it's like you're extrapolating. How does that really get to a place of excitement? It seems like it's just too much weight.
It's very funny. This is a very naturalistic movie.
We shot on 16 millimeter. We tried to do everything old school.
There's only two visual effects in the film. And one of them was retouching Milton's penis to make sure that the skin color and shine match JK skin.
Only in the movies. And as far rosie schuster being there in 86 and being assigned

to me i had a church lady character for my stand-up to develop it i i didn't know she was

his ex-wife and i noticed that she would always call him dear in meetings yes dear i love that

oh dear i know yeah she called him she was good in the movie oh well rachel senate that actress

she's off the charts.

I don't know of another actor who's had as

Thank you. I know.
Yeah. She called him.
She was good in the movie. Oh, well, Rachel Sennett.
That actress is great. She's off the charts.
I mean, I don't know of another actor who's had as strong a debut. When you think about her first three films, you know, Shiva Baby, Bodies, Bodies, Bodies and Bottoms.
I mean, it just lights out good. And she's.
Yeah. She's a killer.
Yeah. She was charming.
Yeah. She seemed just in the pocket, totally natural.
And Michael O'Donoghue, who you brought up earlier, obviously is one of the reasons why the show was genius from day one. Again, I think it's this other thing about Lorne, is his understanding that a show could hold the tone of Jim Henson and kind of the delight of a comedian like Zoya Bell with the dark nastiness of o'donohue and knew that that somehow this is a show that's going to occupy enough space where all these voices can live together uh and and tommy do is the guy who played o'donohue and that's a really tricky role i think that's one of those things where it was great from the outside you don't see how hard it is to be able to say that kind of nasty shit and still be a likable character.
And there's very few actors. Like Billy Bob was someone.
Billy Bob Thornton was a guy who would like. He could literally say anything.
He'd still like the guy. And it's such a tricky thing to do.
Yeah. Interesting.
Yeah, we heard. Well, Lorne is very clever about that.
I don't really know how his brain works, but it's at a high level of really absorbing. I mean, I was the thing i say as i came back to the young people but loren's an ai who's downloaded the show so it's general so he can blink stuff he can look at something and kind of go well if they're supposed to be older we have to make them older or whatever there's the essence of things very quickly we'll figure out out what's wrong, what might be better.
And you see him. I've been there many times when the show is a little flat and, and I can tell he's a little wounded, but going to go on to the next one.
And then when it goes well, he's just a little lighter, but it's an intense life to do what he's done and is still doing it. And it's going to keep doing it after the 50th.
What newsflash? I was about to, I, I, you just dropped that. Like it was nothing.
Um, I'm curious with both of you, do you remember early moments where you understood why Lauren picked you? Like, uh, where, like, did it ever become clear? I was like, Oh, this is what he saw in me. And this is why he knew I was special.
David, I'll let you go first. You know, it was, I wasn't a big character guy.
I just did standup. And I think, uh, he liked the way it was written, even though I wasn't even a headliner.
Um, and when I got there, I was a little over my head, more than a normal over your head, because I wasn't writing sketches for characters, and I wasn't doing crazy stuff. And that wasn't something that was on my even radar.
It was so high above me that from Arizona, I couldn't think, oh, one day I should be on SNL. It didn't even cross my mind.
I was saying I should be like a manager at Bennigan's was like the ceiling and so when you get to you get at the highest place and you're the lowest level it was hard and i was always feeling about getting fired and getting when obviously was having some troubles especially first couple years but when we had loran on he goes and by the way david you were never in danger of getting fired and i was like it's just weird to hear him say that because that's all you're thinking for six years. And just have him say it out loud because it was a little rocky road, but got through it.
But shit, I was just like, oh, I don't know what he saw. Maybe this didn't look like everyone.
You don't know what. I wasn't a huge jumping off the page guy.
But he did say also during the podcast i i always i always knew you were funny which is high praise from the guy who's it's nice to hear just that simply that we always knew you follow up question yeah is there a person who makes you more nervous when you answer the phone and then someone goes i have lorne michaels for you oh is there is there any person who would actually make you more or is that the person who would make you the most nervous hearing oh he's on the other line uh it definitely is something that you might avoid especially if you're there if you're there and you're part of it it's the ultimate boss going oh my god the godfather's calling or when even to this day though i'm saying even oh yeah i can see if they go one wants you to come up i feel like lauren's uh emotional interface i'm just making up these words i'm just more used to it this time around so i kind of want to give him a hug and tell him a joke and be silly uh but for years when i was on the show you know because lauren had this thing walking down the hallway still with the show you know that kind of stuff and uh you're still here he was intimidating i mean he had told somebody recently or that he had to create sort of a wall between himself and the cast or else they would have eaten eaten him alive right um you know so yeah he's an intimidating character but you know if you go to the yankee game you know he's kind of, I mean, yeah, he's an eclectic personality. There's sort of the elusive Lauren and erudite Lauren.
And then there's the guy who wants to get a hot dog and go to the game. Also, that stuff, you're not as fearful now because you did it.
And so now I just like to see Lauren and laugh with him and try to make him laugh and goof around. As much as possible.
But you feel like he's so observant and so smart that he can just see right through you right and he kind of knows where you're going wrong um never leave a hit you know he always has these lessons never leave a hit uh on what happened to me was so unusual and bizarre and just happenstance that i had done the church lady character in my act but but I was doing 70 minutes of standup and it was just a few minutes of it. And, um, so then decided to make it into a talk show with Rosie Schuster, you know, and then it just scored huge.
And I was an accident. I didn't know it was great that it was a talk show on home base.
I didn't know it was great that my character is funny. And also Phil Hartman and Sigourney Weaver could come on and be funny.
And I had Jan Hooks and Phil Hartman scoring.

So I figured out at some point,

that's what Lauren loves.

It's a sketch that at home base,

a reoccurring character with a catchphrase,

and then guests can come on and be funny as well.

Right.

Yeah.

And so,

and then I did chop broccoli,

that show and a few other things.

Oh, my God.

So,

I didn't have groundlings

up in San Francisco,

so I just was a sketch player

doing stand-up.

And in the small rooms

it would work,

and the bigger rooms

would be harder.

So,

I didn't really know

I was a sketch player.

But when I got on there,

I figured out,

well,

this is where I belong,

you know,

doing characters

and sketch.

But I was trying to do it

as a stand-up.

So, that was a freakitude to have that right up front. This is a message from sponsor Intuit TurboTax.
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Is there anyone these days that you fight for to laugh more than Lauren? Like, is there a person that you want that you try to make laugh more than Lauren? You feel the way more when they laugh more than Lauren? No. My first show back doing these little sets of shows, I was reading Biden in the read-through.
And I didn't really have it, but it was kind of coming on to me, thisiden non-sequitur thing and guess what and by the way the fact of the matter is and so i was throwing it in it wasn't in the little draft of the script i'm just throwing it in and i saw lauren's shoulders going up and down because that means in the corner of my eye and so that was that was a big when the shoulders go you know. Yeah.
The read-through laugh of Lauren is unreal.

Like when you're on the show and everything matters and you're at read-through and you wrote a sketch and it's your lines and you're saying it.

And then you see him just buy into the sketch and start cracking up or slap the table.

You're like, holy shit.

Oh, my God.

Oh, my God.

The week I was there, I wrote three sketches.

That's a lot.

No, no, no. They didn't make it.
I did for the table. That's a lot.
No, no, no.

They didn't make it.

I did for the table.

That's a lot of writing, though.

You know, it's hard to do.

Yeah, but I've been wanting to do this for decades, and this is my one chance.

Like, trust me, I had stuff in the office.

So I made so many rookie mistakes not realizing, oh, fuck.

That's never going to work at the table reading.

He's going to be reading all the stage directions.

And there's multiple locations.

Why did I do that?

I saw all these things.

Too many sets.

Oh, yeah.

I made that mistake.

God.

I wanted so many do-overs.

I got a sketch on.

But oh, my God.

Who was your host that week?

Ashton Kutcher was the host.

Gnarls Barkley was the musical guest. And now you know exactly when it took place.
Sure. It's great then.
Well, how fun. What's your point? Lauren is like a coach, you know? And you were a high jumper, right? In high school.
How the hell do you know that? Who just, who slipped you that weird piece of paper? I wasn't. It must be you.
I just, I just at least had a perfunctory look at your Wikipedia video. I assume we would mostly talk about this, but I love track and field.
And I remember Dick Fosbury and stuff like that. But Lauren is like a coach that you want to please.
And I had a button down coach when I was in high school. Very not big with the praise.
You'd have to just go fantastic. But Lauren, he would just give you a little, if you dismantled the room, like really scored, you might walk by him and he would just tap your shoulder and give a little pat and kind of nod his head.
And that was like a huge, huge win, right, David? If you kind of acknowledge. Oh, I think three years, and I did one Hollywood Minute at read-through, and he goes, he turns the sketch, he goes, next sketch.

And he goes, I think you found your voice.

All right, we're going to do Wayne's World.

And I was like, and then two weeks later in the hallway,

he goes, maybe Hollywood Minute this week?

I go, you're asking me to do a sketch?

Oh, my God.

Oh, David, that must have been extraordinary.

Oh, man.

That must have been goosebumps.

By the way, I was just talking about the rare gift to say cruel things and for people to love you for it and it's like you're literally one of the handful of human beings on earth who can do that and you can say these things and people love you for it and like you can't teach that it's just like it's just in the dna i'm not really a mean person that That's the funniest part of the whole thing. It's like, you just think of these jokes and go, Oh, that'd be funny.
But you're not like, I fucking hate these people. You just go, isn't that the truth? Like when you think about the few people who do this, like if the few greats who are like, they know how to just cut you to the bone and be funny.
Most of those people are not mean people. Like Don Rickles is not a mean person jeff ross is not a mean person yeah yeah yeah uh no both yeah uh like the real assholes are not funny they're just yeah yeah you're right yeah yeah it's because you always have to find the fine line where it's not too rough and sometimes i would go too deep and caught myself a dress or something and i don't think they're gonna buy that that.
Well, when Chevy came on this podcast, I'd seen him. I knew enough of seeing him over the years.
He was very generous to me when I was at Lorne Michaels' house before I got on the show, but I was out there and he loved my edition tape, saw something in me. But Chevy loves to say the thing you're not supposed to say yeah to the extreme where it can go wherever it wants to go i have an example for you uh and i've known i've known chet in my entire life i grew up you know that's right uh like with with his kids and stuff and like 20est americans ever created and so so chevy comes in to watch the movie and he's there with Janie and they watch the film and he's in the group and he comes up to me after and he pats me on the shoulder and goes, well, you should be embarrassed.
What exact Chevy thing. You couldn't even write it better.
Yeah. Funny.
Well, he knows that's, that's funny. Like, okay, that's the most, That's the roughest thing you couldn't even write it better yeah how funny well he knows that's funny like okay that's the most that's the roughest thing you could say to a director in that moment right up there and alright you know and I'm trying to balance it I'm trying to balance it because in my head I know alright I'm getting a Chevy Chase moment that's 1000% only for me right now and from a comedy a comedy point of view, that's really pure.
And that's kind of that's kind of cool. But also, I just spent like two years of my life recreating this moment.
So that and trying to capture Chevy perfectly. And also, even in the ego, find the humanity and give him a moment to be loved.
No, none of that shit play. He's not talking about that stuff.
It's A, a funny thing to say, but then you got to look at the meter and go, what percentage was real? Was it all a joke? Or was there a little bit he's not happy, but you just don't know when he leaves and you go, ah, well, he saw it. I think the key is if you can, just say yes to everything.
At one point he goes i had a way bigger career than you guys we both went of course you did so if you go back in time he says you should be embarrassed i'm completely humiliated and then the air goes out of the blue and then he's more like hey it wasn't that bad you know but you always say yes um have you seen my cock and he would go like this like was it a hundred times yeah and then he would go like that he went on video which is horrible because everyone would have he was so funny with all his visual craziness you know dana we we're gonna let we we have to wrap up with jason who's a fucking stud but we can just mention his great other things he does we won't go into him totally but we just just so people know knows the up in the air was great is this when you do it at the end of the show you like you're like oh by the way this is who this guy was no we well i know we're going to introduce you we separately we're going to introduce you and say all this but but i want you to hear that i love this went full saturday night live i thought we could it could have been about your high jumping in high school. Apparently it could have been how you frequent STK in Hollywood, but we didn't want to spend the whole time on that.
That's in your Wikipedia also. By the way, William Defoe too loved every minute of William Defoe as Dave Tibbett.
I don't think I've ever been to STK. That's kind of, that's exciting.
Frequence Los Angeles Stakeout STK as does Channing Tatum. Does it really say that? By the way, that's a really interesting way to do advertising.
I never thought of that, but anyone can update it on Wikipedia. You can just go to the most famous person you can think of.
That's your favorite restaurant. That's hysterical.
So if you own a restaurant, you're just going to be like, and Beyonce, you know, you know, always seen at Cheesecake Factory. The problem, which I've said before, is if people hear something, they have a hard time thinking it's utterly untrue.
So on the Wikipedia page, it said I had a previous wife named Leah. It's probably still there.
So people go, so you were married before Paula to a woman named Leah. No, noah no no it's all made up well you must have known someone named leah nope it's all made up but you must have had someone before you know no it's a 100 some nerd in their room and it's still there you know so i did it to myself dan i said i collected gerbils we just put it in one time and then it was such a mistake because in the middle of heavy interviews they're like you know my son has a gerbil and i go i don't give a fuck and they're like but don't you love you and i when did that start i go what i forget i go oh right right i gotta get that out of that it's like for one laugh that's richard gear remember the gerbil up the butt and people will go well he must have had at least pet gerbils.
He must have sat on a gerbil. No, it's all made up.
No, but come on. This is not going to turn out well.
I know, right? I just did it again. Dana, thank you.
Jason, you're stud. Aside from everything else you've done.
Nice hanging out. I love talking about SNL like that.
And what a fun movie to watch and just be thrown back into that crazy world. Did a great job.
One last thing before we go, the Franken and Davis characters really made me laugh. You know what's great? So those two actors, they did something I hadn't experienced before.
They auditioned together. And that's what made it work.
They already knew each other. And so they just did the bit together.
And it was like, oh, I believe them as a duo. And I was like, why don't more actors do this? That was so smart.
Now that Julia Child bit, did you see like, I don't know if you saw the movie, but at the beginning there, you know, it's chaos and they show on the side. Nice, David.
They show on the side, Frank and David. It's just one of the crazy things is one of the most memorable sketches of all time.
Julia Child yeah they just walk by we got this thing we just want to do it's blood and lauren's like sounds great moves on and you're like oh my god that's everyone knows there's a lot of details so for the for a big snl fan which i'm presuming like your listeners are you know way bigger fans than i am yeah uh they like like we have colon blow in there like there's all sorts of little details. If you start actually, if you start looking in the background and stuff, there's all kinds of fun stuff.
And then obviously Easter eggs. Cause colon blow was a 10, 12 years later.
Yeah. That was when I was there with Phil.
God damn. What a great one.
I'll have to watch it again. Yeah.
Okay. Thank you, Jason.
What a stud. What a stud.

Thanks, Jason.

I'll talk to you later.

Enjoyed it.

Bye.

This has been a presentation of Odyssey.

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Fly on the Wall is executive produced by Dana Carvey and David Spade,

Jenna Weiss-Berman of Odyssey, and Heather Santoro.

The show's lead producer is Greg Holtzman.