Fly on the Wall with Dana Carvey and David Spade - Bill Simmons

Episode Date: February 21, 2024

Bill Simmons is one of the biggest and most influential names in podcasting, media, and sports. He also happens to be an SNL savant. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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or someone close to you, please contact Connects Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. Bet MGM operates pursuant to any operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Our guest today is Bill Simmons and he is a podcast jogger knot. He is the head, I like that word. He's the head of the ringer on Spotify and it's a huge, huge network of podcasts.

He's a sports guy from Boston. He's been all over ESPN, and we go over that. But the main feature of this particular episode, which I had a lot of fun with, is he said, after a while, I want to talk about Sarenite Live. And so David and I have never been asked this many questions by a guest. And so we go over a lot of SNL stuff inside baseball. I think we got to stuff that we've not talked about

in the ways we talked about. So I really enjoyed it with Bill Simmons. Yeah, he's a deep diver. He knows everything. And the funny part was Dana, we had a lot of questions about, is the NFL fixed? And I had a lot of questions for him about sports. And I asked one. and then he goes,

I wanna talk about SNL with you guys. But, and I'm like, well, it wasn't really interviewing us. So he just talked about different favorite things and we got some backstory on him. Yeah, he's a very interesting character. He'll talk about anything, the financing and podcasting movies that he's a fanatic about and gambling, sports gambling, sports. He talks about the Super Bowl and just a lot of SNL.

He is maybe, I'd have to say, is he the biggest fan of just SNL that we may have ever interviewed. So that's interesting in itself. I itself. He knew more than anyone. And we did a pretty long one. He could have gone on, I think, much longer. But we both had to use the bathroom. So we turned out, you know, but he was great. All right, here he is, Bill Simmons. This is my setup. This is where I do my pod. So I got all my stuff behind me.

So it looks like I'm in this big and then if you zoom out, it's just like this little weird corner of stuff. And then nothing else looks like that in the room. Fake busy corner. Yeah. Fake busy corner. Yeah. I'm in an abandoned motel.

Near Bakersfield. And Dana was taken. I put it. He's like, Brie Larson in room. I'm a minimalist. I'm a minimalist. Good. I'm a real taken. I put it to start. He's taking some green larson in room. Goddamn. I'm a minimalist.

I'm a minimalist. Good one. Yeah. Everybody knock and give me food. I'm a minimalist. What can I say? God, no shit. So should we?

Wait, I have to ask Bill first. There's no way. What did you have to do with 30 for 30? I just saw this. I created it. I came up with the idea. I sent a memo. And then for like a year and a half

being my friend Connor's show, I basically came up with every angle of it and got it sold. That's in my notes, yeah. I don't wanna talk about me though, I wanna talk SNL. No. We don't need to talk about me.

Okay, I know. No, you're boring, I understand. Yeah, everybody knows you. Okay, top best athlete. I'm trying to do a mashup of Bill Simmons. Best athlete host on SNL. Oh wow. That's a tough one.

Does the rock count? What's a rock on? He's an athlete. Well, he's a movie star. Yeah, no, he's an athlete. The rock was really good. I mean, he did the Rock Obama, which I thought was one of the better presidential sketches they did in the last 20 years.

Yes, that was funny. The Rock is good. Yeah, there's Peyton Manning back in my day, Joe Montana with Walter Peyton. Yeah, but I mean, Montana was in one of the iconic sketches of the late 80s that the I'm gonna go upstairs and masturbate Which was like out of nobody could believe he did that back in the day Yes, I got Joe Montana said masturbate and you know what fun fact talk about how fun fact talk about how competitive Joe Montana is he finishes the show and he landed that sketch which killed and then he he He can't come out of his dressing room, almost like a boxer.

He feels, he feels he didn't do very well. And Joe can, can you go talk to him? He just, he just can't come out. You know, it's funny. Jesus. John Madden was good too, it was before your time, but he, uh, he came in right as he was taken off from CBS and they built, it was there in the Eddie era. Yeah.

They built the whole show around him and he was pretty good with that. I wanna say OJ hosted in the first five years and that got him in Kill Anybody. Oh, he killed. So I had to say it. I had to say it. I know it's not funny, but I had to say it.

Charles Barkley during David's era, I just missed him. Oh yeah. Yeah, he was good. Sometimes it's tough. Hey, did Joe Montana have any problem with that joke, Dana? No, I don't think so. I'll be up, his inner monologue was, yeah, I'll be upstairs masturbating. Yeah. Yeah.

There was a charm when athletes come on or non-professional actors, there's a sort of kind of stilted charm to them, you know. Right. I find that that's a big, big part of the show is having movie stars, non-comedians try to do an hour and a half of a live sketch. It's a ridiculous task. It's a great reality show. I think when MJ came on, that was about as, in the running for about as famous as he ever was. That was really when he had ascended to the A++ list and everybody was so interested to see how he would do and he did really well,

but it just felt like a moment when he was on. That changed 8-H. Everybody was flipped out. So he was Michael Jordan at that time. And he was, it's a real interesting part of being a cast, remember being behind the slats with Michael Jordan, and we're about to go out and do the sketch, and it's live, and he's not in his element.

He's kind of looking in his script, and I said, you know, just look at the card, don't worry about it. Christopher Walken does it, just look at the card if you have to. Well, and they're so used to coming through in pressure that eventually you go out in the adrenaline and it's running, and it's basically no different than if they have a big game or something like that.

I was, when I, you know, when I got to know Seth Meyers and Hader and those guys in the late 2000s, they popped on my pot. I was always so interested in the mechanics of the person coming on who hosted, who fit in right away, what actor, actress, comedian, who just kind of got the show and could have been like a surrogate cast member versus somebody who came in and was just kind of their head spinning

the whole week. And then certain people would come in and you guys that were on the show would be like, oh, this isn't easy. This person gets it. This guy, this guy or this girl could actually be on the show full time. Well, I don't, I'd be curious what those guys said. Off to top my head, like John Goodman was like a cat. He was just good at everything. Tom Hanks, of course. Tom Hanks was a great one. Yeah. Completely committed. By the way, I want to just for a second check your memory. What was the hit sketch kind of objectively for Michael Jordan's episode? Wasn't it the Stuart Smalley? Yes. Yeah, and then there was a negative thing.

I mean, I'm top, top, top percentile SNL fan that has ever been on this show, including all the people who have been on it. You're just not gonna, I grew up with the show. I was an only child. I remember every single season, everything that happened. I'm just, I'm gonna have an answer for every question you have.

I now put you, I knew you were a fan and a sports fan, but now I put you in context. So now you're one of those people, which is great. There's not that many of them that are comprehensively dug into that show. So let's, should we try to see if we can stump them? Here's the thing. I told Spade this when we did a podcast, like, um, I was born in 1969. That's literally the perfect year to grow up with the show. Because I was six when the show premiered.

I wasn't able to watch it until I was maybe eight or nine and they started running the half hour kind of highlight shows on NBC that would be like nine o'clock, nine thirty whenever that was on. And that's how Belushi was my first guy. I'm like, who is this? I'm like, eight. Like this is, how does this person exist? Started watching those.

They finally let me stay up late for the fifth season, my parents. And then I was all the way through. Eddie, when you came on, when Spade like the height of the nineties and all that, then Hartman, I mean, Farrell coming back and basically saving the show. And it felt like it was a trouble.

Uh, I've been there for every piece of it. Wow. Have you, have you, did you ever entertain going into the business of what we're in? So ironically, I did. I was, I was, um, in the mid nineties, I was writing for, uh, the Boston Herald. And China, I really wanted a sports column in the high school newspapers. it's like I have no chance this is never happening. And I lived with a guy who I'd done a lot of comedy stuff with just for fun. And we knew this guy named Bill Lawrence who I think he's a producer. Yeah, he's a he was at the time he was on the show

Friends and he had an SNL connection. And it was the year when everything blew up, when the New York Magazine, when they wrote that piece and it was when they were coming in and they're blowing up the show, summer of 95, baby. And we did this whole packet and we sent in, you know, 20 pages of stuff. Now I learned later, like there's no way anybody even saw it, but we sent it in,

we're like, this is it, this is our big break. And it never happened, but. Without, you mean without an agent or something, just sending in a packet? No, but we had like, oh, a guy knows a guy. It was one of those. But you don't know any better. I was living in Boston.

We're not supposed to, you know, we're not supposed to read them. When we were on the show, we were talking yesterday about how we had mailboxes, you know, there wasn't email. So Dana's was always full. And then Mike Myers and then everyone else is starting getting full.

But if people sent packets, a lot of people would send us scripts and stuff is full and then Mike Myers and then everyone else has started getting full. But if people sent packets, which a lot of people would send us scripts and stuff, and to this day, if you read, they can sue you. So you really can't even read it in case you don't like it. But three years later, there's a sketch like that on the show, it's very easy to think of. Yeah, so we didn't know that in Boston.

We're just like, this is it, they're gonna hire us, we'll be able to come in, We'll be hanging with Sandler. And it just did not happen. Better keep my summer free so I can go in there and prep when they call right away. What was your first sketch that was the top of that 20 page pile?

What was it? What was the topic of it? It was a big friends parody. It was the first year of friends. We did a lot. You probably saw it in the pile. No, it was a big guy. I saw it in the pile. And I told Lauren a big guy. I saw it in the pile.

And I told Lauren, it's not happening. It's all right. He'll do fine. I remember we had another one about Jesus making, Jesus coming back and like signing with Nike and doing this whole, and we were like, really, this is so edgy, this is gonna be great. Now I read it, now I'd wanna kill myself.

Well, yeah's a- Yeah, but sometimes stuff is funny anyway back then. When I even look back at sketches that are like clanking, it seemed to work then, and you just don't know. And then later you'd embarrass, but some of them actually still hold up. Yeah, we're gonna- It's funny with your era, the sketches were mean in a good way.

Like some of the stuff, like some of the Carson stuff Dana did, you go back and you watch it, you're like, ooh, man. Like was Carson okay with this? I just don't know if stuff's not mean in the same way, especially SNL, which is way more celebrity friendly than I think it was. But back then it was like, like Rob Lowe did that, the Arsenio Beckman, whatever that was,

like the Arseneo Parade, it's like, man, this is kind of mean, but it was good. That's what we all grew up with. That was what made us laugh. I don't know if there's a better way to put it, but if there's an elephant in the room, or what you're not supposed to say, or what you're observing, you just need to tease that out.

That's why it's funny, you know? And then it can be construed as mean or not mean, but Johnny was fine with it. He actually liked Carcinio. You know, he said they're making fun of, Arseneo as much as they're making fun of us. That was, and then there was one sketch that got him dinged and I was blacklisted casually from the show.

So bittersweet memories, but of course I revered Carson and I revered doing him I've never had more relaxed fun than being in the Johnny the earnest Nebraska guy That that's just a great Bilge here and now you apparently have a very big podcast called it's called the ringer. I understand, you know that We have a very big podcast called, it's called The Ringer, I understand. You know, that interviewer with that voice hasn't been replaced yet, but we've had some great people, but not no Carson yet. Well, then you did the Larry Sanders episode, which is in the bed, that one of the best seasons in the history of television season four.

But where you come on and you're doing the impression and they're trying to keep Larry from finding out that Dana has his impression of him, that he sees it. And then it's a whole cat and mouse game of whether he's gonna do it on the show. But you actually hit the mustache on in the fake teeth. You're like, I had the teeth. I had the teeth. I had the teeth.

Yeah, and I heard Gary was tweaked by it later, but I told him, I said, I'm just doing one frequency that you use in your standup. Something like, and I don't even know what he's trying to do to me. You know, it's like Jay Leno, yeah, he goes like that, but he doesn't talk like that. You know, but anyway, yeah.

He goes like this too. I do think that was different way back in the day where you would take a piece of something, and both of you guys did it. You take a piece of whatever, and then you blow it out, and now it'd become the impersonation, right? Like, Will Ferrell did that with when he was doing W. He just like small pieces of it.

It wasn't even close to being W. You did that when you did George Bush senior, same thing. Now I feel like when they're doing the impressions it's more like a dead on impersonation of somebody is the trend now. But back then it was like, I'm gonna take this one piece and go crazy with it. I'm doing it with Biden currently

because I, you know, you need to, you know, I said this yesterday, but my latest toy is so abstract. It's the only one who understand Biden is Hunter. So then I can do Biden of anything. Hey dad, what's going on? Yeah, it's just goes, goes to people, says I. Oh no, I already ate, maybe tomorrow night. Yeah, cause I said, sure. Yeah, seven thirt goes goes to people so it's I oh no, I already ate maybe tomorrow night. Yeah, because I Sure, yeah, seven thirties grade. Okay, you know, so I find for myself in high school with my friends

I don't want to ask you this Abstracting my impression of the water polo coach into madness and then that rhythm Extenduated but coming from someplace real like wills W was in a real zone, but so playful. I just like the style of it I also like people who could do a perfect impression too, but I do like abstracting it. I mean that was Hartman Like when when I was in college and we would tape it, you know, we'd have like the VCR player so we tape it we watch it the next day it was like a Sunday ritual and VCR player, so we tape it, we watch it the next day. It was like a Sunday ritual.

And Hartman did the McMahon. And we thought the McMahon was like the funniest thing of all time. It wasn't really, you know, there were pieces of it, but his version of McMahon, we thought combined with the Carson, we just like, we would be imitating, we'd be talking about, but Hartman was really good at,

he did that with the Sinatra group too. Oh yeah, oh sure. Or the same thing, like his version of Sinatra, Piscopo was like more of an impression and he would have foam in there. I know Piscopo was on your pot. I loved it. But the Heartman Sinatra was a little bit like, I don't know, a little rowdy or a little angrier

and I thought I was funnier. What about Ed McMahon doing it? All he has to say is yes and you are correct. Just those little hooks, just saying it over and over, you are correct, sir. And then when he goes, young, oh, older reference lost on younger viewers, yes. Because that was where Phil was the laugh bomb

and I didn't have to carry that weight. I was kind of doing this rhythm and setting it up and very sincere and I know that you are correct. Yeah. Old reference last time. So it was just like a magic show who's like, and then boom. But yeah, with Phil was just, there was a piece to that Carson thing though, where you were tapping into something that I think people my generation were feeling were like Letterman was our guy for my generation. Yeah. The most important things that happened to me when I was like 12, 13 was Eddie

Murphy and Letterman. And just kind of going on the ride with both of those guys from 82 to 85. And Carson, I loved Carson. Everyone, you know, for, for three generations, Carson was with three channels. Everyone watched Carson, but he did start to seem a little old by the time we got to the late eighties. And when you guys kind of crossed the beams and start to seem a little old by the time we got to the late 80s And when you guys kind of crossed the beams and went after him a little bit in a fun way But you still went after him. It was a little like when Norm went after Letterman in the mid 90s

It was the same thing where he loved Letterman But the fact that he was parroting him was like, oh, okay, we're doing this now well I would say built to that that I Kind of realized that everybody, every comedian becomes a caricature of themselves. Like am I looking at this comedian and maybe actor or whatever,

or am I looking at an impersonator? So there's just this redundancy to your character, but with Johnny, Jay Leno told me, he was guest hosting back then, Johnny was still around, that Johnny would walk down at NBC at Burbank and just yell out, they're making fun of me now, it's time to go. So that was Johnny, who's obviously was very bright,

kind of reading the tea leaves, you know. And then you never went on again, right? I didn't. Well, so what happened when you did Dennis Miller, who you were friends with, who used to be on the show. Very good friends with Dennis Miller cooking. But did the show, and then you did Dennis Miller cooking? But did he like that? Did he think it was funny?

Well, Robert Smigel writes these pieces that are brilliant, and they're little cutting. With that, because I was good friends with Dennis, I just called him and said, we're doing the cooking show, the thing, and he goes, okay, that's all right. I mean, it's hard to say no, even though you don't like it. I don't think anyone really likes an impression when they're, it's like getting a caricature, you know, on the board of the board. It's all the things you're fearful of yourself.

All the things you don't like. Right. They did me about three weeks after I left us and now I'm like, let me get out of the building. Jesus, let the body get cold. Fucking, I'm like, this idiot. Well, you had Terry Hatcher sitting next to you for the Spade of America that time. Oh, that was fun.

And I thought that was one of the best ones you ever did. And she just started doing you and it was like, oh, shit, what's going on here? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But at least I got to be there and give her jokes and things to say to so make it funny and make her at least get more of the laughs because she was the host.

But she was great about it. Yeah. That was actually a fun one because I was there. But when you did Dennis with Tom Hanks, that was fun. But Dennis is in on it. And then I think he doesn't mind. And he sort of is that way. And his voice is so perfect to do.

I think he was always cool about it. And he's so great. And it's so when you have a way of speaking that can be, it's just very unique. And I think that's ultimately a problem. It was just from hanging out with Dennis a lot and touring with Dennis and just extrapolating that attitude.

But, you know, I was standing outside a hotel, Dennis and I were playing Dallas or something. And I said, that just hit me that your whole comic motif is like life is really fucked and it's really hard. Like, because the car at the airport, they get the car gets you to the gig, right? But when you do the gig, the next morning, the car's always late, which I pointed that out to Dennis.

And then he just, he laughs so hard, me going dark, you know? They got us in, but now fuck it. Now it's a half hour laughs so hard me going dark you know they got us in but now fuck it now it's a half hour late flight's leaving you know and he died with that but I just think that attitude is still so funny to me. Billy Simmons huh? SNL cat all right got the photographic memory like a junior Kreskin here. So funny. K, Kreskin's always in it. You know, we golf once in Palm Springs and he goes, we drive all the way there. And he goes, you guys, you wanna go golf in Palm Springs? I was like a newer comic. And I go, yeah, yeah.

So he goes, yeah, okay, I'll meet you out there. I'm like, we don't wanna drive together? Like, okay. So we drive all the way out there. Two hour drive? Yeah. And then we get out there and then we're golfing. And I go, hey, how far to the green?

He goes, hey, Spud, you don't have to worry about the greens. They're fucking nine shots. All right. Hit it as hard as you can. And I'm like, okay. Because we're, I don't know. And then he hits two bad shots in a row and he goes, fuck, and I'm heading back. I go back home to LA.

He goes, yeah, fuck. I go, Dennis, don't be, this is, you're too hard to deal with. Come on, we're having fun, everything's cool. But I looked up to him so much, I couldn't really talk back to him or bust his balls too much. It took so long to get to that point. But he's still always above me, better joke, right? It's always that thing growing up.

Well, who do you look at? That's when people come on the show. I still have reverence to certain people because I got there with Dana, with all these guys because they were always the ones that I looked up to going on. And then if you ever get in a movie where kids come to you and say, hey, we watch Bench Womers or we watch whatever. And then you go, if this is anything close to what it was like when I would watch movies

and I saw someone from that movie, I would have fucking freaked out. Because that's all that mattered in my life was those movies. Yeah, we also had less choices back then. I really wonder, like, if you're like 18 now, there's so much comedy and stuff to watch, and TikTok, all these different places. Yeah, it always blended.

Like when, I think you guys were both on the show for this, the Partridge family versus Brady bunch sketch. Yeah. Like to me, that was one of the peak SNL sketches. Not cause it was like one of the funniest, but it was like, it hit this time. Everyone watching that show had the same pop culture experiences, right? So anyone I knew knew the partridge family, we knew the Brady bunch. We knew every episode of those.

We knew Charlie's angels. We knew all the early SNLs. We knew the Partridge family, we knew the Brady bunch. We knew every episode of those. We knew Charlie's Angels. We knew all the early SNL's. We knew the early light. Like we all had like the same 25 things with the same movies. So when you guys did that and it was like, oh, they're going for this. Oh, there's more cast members. Oh, they're going to have the boys crack. And I don't know how you would do that now in 2024 because I don't know if 15,

20 years ago, people like at age 22, like one sketch could encompass all that stuff. Yeah, I don't know if it exists. I mean, the biggest show currently kind of is The Bear, which is a great show. But you know, how far can it reach compared to Primetime? I got canceled from a sitcom and we were doing Mickey Rooney's show 24 share or whether it was 30 million or it's just with three channels is insane. But we actually to that sketch we had Melanie Hutzelan who was in it

and she wrote it and we broke that sketch down for like a half hour on the podcast with her just the part yeah and the how it came together the Brady Bunch mash up. Well plus Susan Day was in it which pushed it over the top. But I heard even Piscopo when he was on a couple weeks ago on your show, and he was talking about how they didn't feel like the show was doing that well. But yet eight million people were watching or whatever it was. That's what it was like. Like we had eleven channels.

So even if SNL was kind of failing, everyone was still watching it. And then when SNL started to come back with Eddie, it was like, this is great. SNL's back. And then they had the Billy Crystal season. Did you have a crush on Susan Day or not? I did. Oh my God. Come on. I mean, growing over the party family, I was like, Dana liked David Cassie, but me and you liked Susan Day. Well, then she had the LA Law comeback, which was like, all right. I was into it. And then she had the LA law comeback, which was like, all right. I was into it. Okay. Chrissy didn't talk much on the part.

Who's more attractive from that era? Elizabeth Montgomery or Susan Day? No, Susan Day. I felt like Elizabeth Montgomery was a slightly older generation. Right? They still loved it. Thanks for answering that, Bill. No, no, there was like, there's three generations.

There was like the Peggy Lipton, Bull into Monk Army generation. There was the Lindsay Wagner, Linda Carter, Cheryl Latch, Aquidsmith generation. Loved, loved, loved. I was such an easy sell, god damn. Oh, yeah, everybody. I was in all, all the above, all the above. Life Danner?

The Charlie's Angels. Yeah. Life Danner. Then we moved to the Dukes of Hazard, Fall Guy, Heather Thomas, Catherine Bach, that era. Yeah. You were watching. Then we moved to the Dukes of Hazard, Fall Guy, Heather Thomas, Catherine Bach, that era. Yeah. You were watching a lot of TV.

I was the only child that was watching sports and TV. What else was I reading books? Oh, me too. What else was I going to do? Me too. I know all those shows. David, do you find that you're kind of just looking at your email and you get all these charges?

You've just given Bing Bong $29, $31 this month. Thank you for your payment. Oh yeah, they say, oh, you just paid again. Like they're telling me I already did, like I can't even stop it. And I gotta get off of that because there's ones they tell me I'm doing these subscriptions and I don't even use it.

I mean, there's streaming service, there's fitness apps, there's delivery service, parenting apps, endless. So rocket money, they come in, they find out what subscriptions I'm actually spending money on. And this is a wakeer upper because they just cancel the ones I don't want anymore. They do it for you.

They put them all together in a list. You can look at them and go, no, I haven't seen any of those in seven years. It's a rocket money, a personal finance app. Fines and cancels, your unwanted subscriptions, monitors you're spending, and you know what? Helps lower your bills. Yeah, by an average of 20%,

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Slash fly rocketmoney.com. Slash fly. I don't know what we've lost. I was we were going to ask you just because you're heavier pulse on media podcasting stuff. Yeah. Is John Stuart's coming out in SNL and what is the influence now of political satire versus 80s and 90s? In terms of moving the needle, I like that phrase. So anyway, talk to that

if you want to. Well, it's, I mean, SNL had a huge part with this. I would say maybe the biggest. And once Trump came in in 2016, I think it just became a lot harder because when, when the real life stuff is a parody, how do you parody a parody? When you look back to acroid, I mean, you've talked about this on the podcast, acroids doing Nixon, he's got a mustache, like everything was way more loosey goosey. Acroids doing Jimmy Carter, talking about the Almond Brothers, spoke to Dubu with them. And, uh, Akra is doing Jimmy Carter talk about the almond brothers spoke to do be with them.

And, uh, Cartman does Reagan. I mean, his, the Reagan sketch where Reagan's pretending he's out of it. And then everybody needs a room. And I mean, that's one of the great sketches they've ever done. Yeah. And then once they figured out the debates, the 88 debate, I think was huge with the Dukakis and Bush and there was just just so, and Lovett's doing that. I can't believe I'm losing this guy.

I think from 88 all the way through Sarah Palin, SNL really was kind of shaping how people fought in a lot of ways. To me, like the Sarah Palin thing still makes me mad because when they had her on with Tina, I felt like that's when something shifted. And the celebrity cameo became as Important for the show as making fun of these people and that's that to me is like the line in the sand when the show

Started to change a little bit. They'd bring on they have 32 cast members then they'd bring on stars to play people and Not use the cast I would be furious I've met a lot of cameos. Yeah, that feel like it's very, it's so different and difficult to be a cast member on that show right now. If you're just coming into established players and I think it's great, I kind of wish I'd stayed a few years longer,

but people are staying 10, 12 years and then new people in there, it's such a different dynamic. Lorne is managing the best you can you know, I thought you stayed the perfect amount of time Well, I definitely because Wayne's World hit and my political impressions hit I got sort of Frequently really big really fast Maybe too big, you know, and so I had so much so much stuff coming at me. I was almost confused as to what to do But later on I realized that I have my own attention attention

Deficit disorder and sketch comedy. I was like a fish in water in that That's why I went back to it in 97 with with the Dana Carvey show Right Loaded what about I'm asking about podcast superstars with the Dana Carvey show. Smigel. Love about me. Right, loaded. What about, I'm asking about podcast superstars. What's next for Megan and Harry? Because I don't. Didn't you say something about, you've calm down.

No, I know, use a great word. I've already said something in the past. No, it's a great word. But do they, is it Hallmark movies now? What's next? What would be the best move? I mean, there's probably a huge, there's a huge acting comeback for her at some point, right? She should do that suits show. It's huge now on Netflix. You should just jump right back in.

Or some TV, like a Christmas movie where her divorced husband and they have to be with the kids, but they're stuck in the snow and then they fall back in love. Yeah, she just needs one of those. Yeah, she's back. And John Corbett could play her husband But because all she needs is one thing like that to get big ratings just out of curiosity factor and she's back in Hollywood I don't know why I don't know why she's jumping back Reason suits took off again though. I mean, of course Secret yeah, do you think? If Harry came out, I mean he did some event in Vegas where he made fun

of himself a little bit or told some jokes. I think that's the move for him. Sure. It could be on this podcast or on your spot. Or host SNL. Any kind of little, just in the lane of it being funny, he's aware of how people perceive him and stuff, I think of being, cause they're just monolithic now. We don't really know what they're thinking.

They release statements and. Here's one thing I've learned Dana, I've said, and I've had my podcast since 2007. Not everybody should have a podcast. It's okay. It's not like, it's not like a driver's license, you know, some people just can't do it. It's turning into it. It's sort of's license. You know, some people just can't do it. It's turning into it. It's sort of mandatory.

Yeah. I just want to make a note because it seems like good advice. For the people listening, you don't all have to have one. It's okay. It's not like having an Instagram account. It sounds easy and it's kind of hard. It's hard and you have to you have to have some level of expertise on something. You have to have real authenticity.

I mean, one of the reasons, like think about other reasons, your show works, you have a relationship with each other. I'd want to listen to you guys talk anyway. You have this wealth of SNL related guests, but then also other comedians that could come on that feel comfortable with you. They tell stories, I hear things, maybe I didn't know. And I just feel like I'm hanging out with you guys.

Like podcasting's not that hard, but people always over and over again make it hard and they come up with, they try to do the idea versus to look at what actually works, which is like, do I want to spend time with the host or not over and over again? It's do I want to spend time with these people or not? Or this person? And that's what works. Where do you, where do you interject? Cause my, uh, you know, people tell me about outrage, outrage. If it's outrageous, it's contagious. You know, a lot of podcasts kind of harbor in, you know, the idea of

clicks and trending, you have the hot take that gets there first. And there's that lane. We're sort of, we want to make people feel good and be interesting, but we don't, should David and I have a feud, we can cut this part out out but should we find a way to get really mad at each other but you know that that lane I mean it no you guys are good you guys are doing great spade spade every like maybe every month could just take a flying pot shot at somebody to see if it could maybe get in a couple places see if I still got it out of nowhere

jumping off the top rope flying elbow on somebody yeah I mess if I still got it. I had to know where jumping off the top rope, flying elbow on somebody. Yeah, I can mess around with that. I want to, believe me, I want to a lot of times. Instead of flying the wall, fly on the minute and you bring back Hollywood Minute, but it's part of our show, just FYI. Wait, can we talk about Hollywood Minute for a second?

Yeah, sure. One of the iconic update of reoccurring things that David did. Did Hollywood Minute create Twitter? Ooh. Yeah. How things that David did. Did Hollywood Minute create Twitter? Ooh. Yeah. How about that? Yeah. It was a precursor for sure.

It's basically Twitter. You watch it and it's just like he's throwing out these one-liners of the picture. It's like one-liners about a photo. Yeah. I think we should talk to Elon. Maybe see if we can get a cut. Got that.

I don't know. I sometimes hear old Hollywood minute jokes and I go, God damn, like some of them are pretty rough. But I think for back in the day when it was just a fawning over celebrities, that was the only hook it had. It was like, if someone doesn't really know anyone or you don't know me

and I've got sort of an innocent look and then really, hopefully cleverly. And that's another thing is a lot of the writers, I was gonna say, are trying to use me got sort of an innocent look and then really, hopefully cleverly. And that's another thing is a lot of the writers, I was going to say, are trying to use me to get through me, even through sketches, through Dana, they want to get stuff out there. Even if it's like anger and they go, you should do this because they don't have a way to do it. They go, I can funnel it through one of these clowns and get it out there. And then I'll be on the side going, yeah, fuck that guy.

And so I had to change that a little bit. You're'll be on the side going, yeah, fuck that guy. And so social media has changed that though. You're doing that on the show and it's just on, right? And people taped it, then it comes and goes. And if somebody got mad, maybe you'd read about it in a newspaper or the trades, but ultimately you couldn't even see it unless you watched it. And I think now that the last 15 years, one of the things that's changed with the show

is if something, you know, like you have some comment in Hollywood minute, be like, oh my god, then it turns into a thing, then the celebrity gets mad, they fire back at you, now people are reporting about that, and it turns into a story. Yeah, it would be before I went to bed that night. I would know what hit, what didn't, what was the problem, and then I'd have to have an answer next day, and then there'd be a feud, and then it would go back, and everyone would have a fucking comment about it. I think that keeps us now really helps it because if I don't see a sketch, now I follow them so if I don't see a sketch, I can watch it Sunday morning.

They're just like, sketch, sketch, sketch, like broken out monologue, this, that, and that's kind of a smart way to sift through to see what's going on there lately. Yeah, totally. Well, it's also interesting to see how the cast members are using, like Chloe Feynman has a really good Instagram account. And she's just like test drives different characters and stuff. And you're watching half the time you're watching it going, how is this not on the show?

I'm not watching this on Instagram, but it does seem like. It's a great little audition, yeah. It seems like there's more creative outlets than probably you had in the mid 90s where you're writing for yourself. If they say no to the sketch, you're basically like, oh shit, all I did was walk out and say goodbye to everybody at then and then I did nothing.

And then that's it till the next week, right? Yeah, that one stung. That was a little too close to home. Yeah. I think I'm getting it. Dan, it's like, I don't know how that felt. Back stage, Neland and I, when we were doing Hans and Franz, we would just giggle for hours, going back and forth and stuff.

And then it's distilled, distilled, distilled to four minutes. But with podcasting, you can do it long form. You know, I mean, we do have a second podcast where eventually we'll get around to platforming ideas. We have a video one. Oh. You guys. That was fucking shitting their pants. Yeah. We have a video one. Oh. You guys.

That was fucking shitting their pants. Jesus. Just doing characters. It's called Too Good to Be True. No, it's not. It's called Superfly. I follow there's an Instagram account that does, I'm listening to Superfly by the way.

You've done like three, four episodes. I like it, cause you're just bouncing around. Two. Yeah. You're just doing your thing. We're still getting used to it. It's harder than we thought. Well, you guys are buddies though, you're fine. There's this Instagram account

that runs all these old sketches and they ran comedy killers from New Orleans. It's a game show, New Orleans The Host. And I don't know if Dana was still in the show, but David probably was, but it's all these categories of things, whether they're a comedy or not. It's like the categories like the Holocaust,

Chattanooga, and then it goes through. And I was like, man, what would happen if they ran this now? What would the reaction be? Cause back then we were like, oh, this is great. What a great idea. This is so funny. We were all in on the joke. Now people would just get mad, I feel like. I think that's why people like Bill Burr or Shane or those guys do well because it's

just even Theo, they just say whatever they want and it's almost like back in time. And then some people go, I don't want to get mad. I just want to laugh or not laugh and not have a big opinion about it and move on. But then people get rid of them and want to get rid of them and you go, no, maybe, we wanna get rid of them and you go, no, maybe you can't get rid of people anymore. Hopefully, just if it just falls under comedy, of course we always think you should be able to do whatever you want, but not everyone agrees.

But isn't the reason you guys got into comedy is like part of what was funny is, oh, I probably shouldn't say that, or oh, I shouldn't laugh at that, but that's what was funny about it. And now the fear, there feels like there's more fear than we've ever had with comedy, but I, I agree with you that it's coming back because my son's 16 and he loves Shanguilos. And like that generation, I think is ready to see somebody kind of dance close to the line again.

Right. They, they went from the super pampered, super everyone's scared to do anything. And the new people like, hey, fuck it, let's get back to just laughing and doing jokes and not, because it's all down to like five jokes you're allowed to use. And then everyone's like, okay, I'll accept that one. That one didn't offend anyone.

It has no corners on it. It's just the most generic bland dog shit. And some of these comedy specials, they're just sitting talking like there's not even earlier. They're just like walking around, you go, is there a joke? Someone's like, ooh, I won't have an audience in mind or I won't have this. It's not just even jokes anymore or making you laugh. It's introspective. And I go, I personally would go, let's just skip back to getting laughs. I agree. What do you think, Dana? I personally would go, let's just get back to getting laughs. I agree.

What do you think, Dana? You know, you were maybe too young for this when it came out, but Blazing Saddles. So Blazing Saddles is like, it's a peak movie for me. I'm like a senior in high school or something. Yeah, sure. And so I knew that Richard Pryor, who co-wrote it with Mel Brooks, was not racist and neither was Mel Brooks.

I knew it was it. They were satirizing. All the white racists are idiots. Cleavon Little is above everybody. So, and the movie is hysterical, but yeah, you can't do it now. The difference between, like I played a Southern, a strong Th strong thermal or whatever, a southern care on SNL. And now it would be like, if I'm that guy, we've lost our sense humor about it. For better or for worse,

it's very serious out there because the stakes are very high between the left and the right and Trump and Biden. It's very, it's just compared to like Clinton versus George seeing it. So benign. And now it's all toxic. And I have to trace it back to social media, giving us a

platform and tribalism. Talk to that. I don't want to even to mention. What do you think about that? People getting, yeah, they, there's bubbles. It's like, it's, it's a combination. Social media becomes the hall police, where a lot of people on social media

are just trying to get people mad at each other and be like, did you see that? Did you see what he said? Did you see that? And kind of poking the bear on that stuff. It's also easier to go backwards and have somebody be like, oh, I dug this thing you did at your comedy set in 1993.

That's weird. You have people who are doing standup acts. I know they try to take the phones as much as possible, but sometimes when you're, and I'm not a standup, but I've talked to enough of them, like sometimes you're out there, you're testing shit and you're trying to figure out what works and what doesn't and where the lines are.

And if you're losing that ability, that becomes dangerous too, I think. But it's also hard to pry people's phones out of their hands. I mean, who's giving up their phone for two hours? You know, that's a very tough situation to say, you can't talk to your babysitter, you can't talk to anyone. And so you have to agree to do that.

If people are doing it, but yeah, what you're saying is true. If you want to say jokes that go way too far, and then you're going to be judged on that, you're like, this is where we used to practice. And then we go, okay, that one didn't work. Okay, that's too much. But it's already out there now. And they're like, though, that's your favorite joke.

And you're like, no, that was a pretend joke. I'm trying to sharpen. And now I got it, I'm going to die with it because that's where do you practice? You know, what do you do? I'm trying to sharpen and now I got it. I'm going to die with it because that's, where do you practice? What do you do? I'm with you. Yeah.

Well, you want to, comedians mostly just, you want to say what you're not supposed to say. It's what pops in your head. To take that away. We all self-censor now. Oh, I can't do that. I won't do that. We'll cut that.

Just do. You're not even thinking about it, but you are. Well, I remember the sketch, the Italian restaurant sketch with Kirstie Alley when you're the Mater D and you're just like, basically mauling the guests, which I'm half Italian. So I love that because Italian restaurants really are actually like that.

They're very touchy feeling. So you went for it. And there's that one part when the camera pans back and he's just got Victoria Jackson with her legs up. But he's like, and then by the end of it, they're just like licking the face and doing all that. I don't even know if, I'm not even positive that would fly now.

I don't know. I just don't know. It's like bread on the line. But what I would tell people if seen it or offended, whatever it is. I asked K know, I just don't know. It's like red on the line. But what I would tell people who've seen it or offended, whatever, is I ask her, Steali, can I, are you okay with this? Yeah, she's amazing. And she was like, oh, yeah.

Like she lets everything go, yeah. Yeah, some people are there to say, whatever. Let's do anything you want to me, and whatever's the funniest, and they trust you, and then it's way funnier than the people that are stiff and worried about it. That's the best. And we did it in dress where I go over to the table and Victoria goes back.

I have her legs up around my shoulders and I'm talking to everyone sort of. And then apparently the censorship people said, Hey, chill that a little bit. But somehow Smigol pretended to, or Rob Schneider, I can't remember, pretended to try to get to me before that. But that was probably once I was in that position in 8H, I go, one of the biggest laughs I've ever been, been part of was that. But to your point, couldn't do it today.

We're going to have, I don't know if we had already Sharon Stone. There's a sketch that has 16 million on YouTube where we are sort of ogling her. She's going through airport security. Oh, look, and I'm playing a man from Indonesia or something. Oh, look, oh, can we take you on? And she were taking her clothes. I don't know if we'll talk about it with her or whether you are after her. But you know, when I remember when I did the part of a spade, we

were talking about SNL, the thing that I always feel like it doesn't get enough credit for it, it catches somebody a lot of times at the absolute most famous day ever where they had whatever point in their career, but with the guest host, right? So Sharon Stone on probably like right after basic instaker, right? Yes. And she's the most white, hot, famous. She's ever going to be like right there, right in that moment.

And that's why it's so funny to see some of the social media accounts that are around SNL, right? About like, they have the ones of just, there's a Twitter account of just a guest host announcing the musical guest. And sometimes it's really funny, because it could be like, there's Steven Seagal, you know, introducing the Smashing Pumpkins.

And it's like, it's like pop culture mad libs, you know, introducing the Smash and Pumpkins. And it's like, it's like pop culture mad libs, you know, that like, there's one Amelia Westavez like saying good night and it's Pearl Jam. And it's like super young Eddie Vedder. And it's like, all right, thanks to Eddie and Pearl Jam. And there's no other pop culture artifact like that. You know, someone dug up, Bill, which I saw, might have been on Twitter was just rolling at promos,

which I didn't know they were rolling when I was there because they're just rolling and then like, and I used to write promos. So it's me, Emilio, Eddie, Vetter, Lauren talking and then going, okay. And then it's just all the talking between, I would say this, I'd hit this, we step out of frame, they try one, hey, it's Emilio Estevez and Pearl Jam. And then we all walk back into frame and go,

how'd it go? We were a second too long. Okay, take this word out. It's riveting for me to go like, there's me. It's almost like watching that Beatles thing where you go, there's something I didn't know about. And they're filming and it just a little sliver of time in one of my favorite things in the world and Just doing it and just my daily the boring daily grind of that place and you go right so fucking cool

Well for both of you, it's like all that stuff must be like these random home movies that are in your attic But meanwhile like 20 million people have seen them And they dress rehearsal and stuff. We never saw a dress on video where we, or they have it somewhere because now they're showing clips from SNL from Dress and they're showing this and they have a million things backstage. And some of the mystery's gone,

but it was fun to just run around backstage. There's no security, there's no nothing, there's no, there's people in the hall drunk and friends of friends that are there and Phil Hartman's going, move the fuck out of the way because he's got 90 seconds to get to his quick change of back and people drink, hey man, like I'm at the show. But now I think they've got a little more dialed in, but that was part of the fun of it.

There's a surreality to it. I always tell people it's a little bit like going back to your high school on a Sunday afternoon when no one's around and just walking around the halls, whatever that feeling is. So when I'm there in the 17th floor, and I would be walking along and I'll see me in Phil in a sketch or picture David, it's it's it's it's heady stuff

because experientially it is the most intense part of one's life or right up there, you know. Yeah. Because of the liveness of it and the legacy of up there, you know, because of the liveness of it and the legacy of it. That's why I think of cast members who joined this year. You know, I was lucky, but I had Eddie and Billy Crystal, Mark Short, those guys, and then also the original cast, which is like Mount Rushmore for all of us, you know.

But when you showed up, the show was in trouble because it felt like that transition year after the Billy Crystal that Martin Short and Christopher Guest that year. And then Lauren came back. He had this young cast and only a couple of them ended up staying, I think, for the second year. But then you showed up and Hartman showed up. And all of a sudden the show is the show is amazing again.

But could you feel like did it feel like that was a make or break year? You showed up and Hartman showed up and all of a sudden the show is, the show is amazing again. Um, but could you feel like, did it feel like that was a make or break year? Now I feel like I'm interviewing you. Did that feel like a make or break year for the, for the cast or did you not even sense that? Well, unless I've missed, remember this, but Diana Minot, who was Lawrence Lieutenant producer, really nice woman. I believe her saying, I was told that we had a 10 show commitment That I'm sure

Bernie Bernstein went to Brandon Tartikoff I think and just said you got to give Lauren one more shot as I remember so I was told this if we don't hit the ground running They're gonna pull the plug at Christmas so Incredibly nervous anyway, and the first sketch that I did Madonna came on for my first show and apologize for the 85 season. That was our cold open. Yeah. And then I'm in a sketch with Jan hooks and Phil and myself. And I just found out recently I was talking to Robert Smigel and Jim Downey and they just said that the audience felt safe with us. And at that moment, cause you don't want the audience to feel nervous for you

or not quite sure where the joke's going, you know, you wanna get them relaxed. So to come in with them and do that was great. And then when David showed up and Chris Rock, Chris Farley, Sandler, I felt like in those years, we were peak peak all cylinders for for us because we had the bad the bad boys kicking ass and then we also still had Phil and John Lovett's for a year and Dennis and stuff. So that was I mean that was

That was the second peak of the show. I feel like the show is in danger in my lifetime three times. The first was after the original cast left, that Jean Dominion year that you talked about a little with Piscopo, but it really felt like the, if Eddie isn't there, the show gets canceled. Like that's just, I think about it. Was that the Robert Downey, Anthony McAuliffe? No, that was before.

That was, the next one was the, so that was season six. But they had Eddie, they end up keeping, but if they don't have Eddie, I think the show gets canceled. Yeah. I think if the Dana Phil Hartman that first season doesn't work, I think the show gets canceled and it really feels like if the Will Ferrell that season, if Ferrell's not on the show and the new blood and the people they kept, but then the new people they brought in

and that season didn't work. I do wonder if they would have canceled it that year because I remember that, that was back in the day when those magazine profiles, if it was the right kind of hit piece, really felt like incredibly damaging. And that, I remember reading that New York magazine piece and being like, oh my God, the show's going to get canceled.

And then that first episode with Will, he showed up, he did get off the shed. He did the phone thing with Meryl Hemingway. And it was just like, oh, we're good. This, this guy's amazing. The show's going to be good again. Um, but I, after that, I never felt like SNO was in danger again after that. Where do you feel? Well, how, well, now that you are sort of an expert,

what do you feel about this season and this cast? And the new people? I mean, watch as much anymore, no. I watch, I still watch, I still monitor it. I think they've made the mistake the last decade of too many cast members, which I think you can always trace. The tardiness, you know. When the show is struggling.

Yeah. It's when the show is always humming, it's always smaller cast members. I've talked about a bunch of people about this who've worked on the cast. Like, it's like a basketball team. If you guys watch basketball, like... I do. If you're playing 14 players and everybody's playing, you know, 12 to 18 minutes a game, guess what?

The team's going to suck. But if you're playing, if you figure out who like your seven or eight are, and you ride those seven or eight, the team's going to be really good. And I always felt like SNL at its best, always had the eights or nine. I, I went to Lauren's office like 10 years ago and I got to do a podcast with them, which was amazing. I mean, it was like, honestly, one of the highlights of my career and I was giving him my basketball theory and his answer was yeah, but the new cast members,

that's kind of like the draft and you, it takes so a couple of years for the new cast members to have their sea legs. Yeah. And you got to have those guys ready. And that's why we have the deeper cast. I get it, but I still feel like it should be eight or nine max. I would have been tough on me. I just, I happened to be in like four things

on my first episode. I didn't even know what I was doing, but it's sink or swim. If you're slow motion, it's kind of like, if you don't like when, when an NBA player gets traded and he traded and then he comes in with a new team with a new system and he gets into his rhythm. He fits with the system. All of a sudden he's scoring 20 points.

He's a different basketball player. But if you're coming off the bench constantly and the offense isn't running through you, the same thing with SNL. If you can't get your reps in and get rid of the fear, not all of us are Eddie Murphy who I thought was a savant You know at 19 but even will fair everybody gets better the more they're out there And then the audience also discovers you gets comfortable with you So I it's it's it's pick your poison. I don't think you know, I Lauren, you know, it's his show is 50 years I he has a method to everything. He thinks of everything.

So I guess this is how it works. You get to be on the show, but you may have, we didn't have anyone not in the show when I was there with seven cast members. Right. So everybody was in every show, but now a lot of times, oh, I wasn't in it for two weeks. It's like Survivor, yeah,

because there's people that just, if you don't make it, and then they sometimes add but don't subtract. So now you add this person because you got to cover like a leading man type. Sometimes there's types. I never got that back then. But sometimes you need to fill a fill Hartman role. Sometimes you need to fill this kind of guy. And then if you don't do, or just adding now suddenly, it's just too many to keep track of it's just hard for them They go bananas, but then if they leave where do you go? I remember I was gonna leave a year earlier and then they're like what do we have lined up because It's always easier to get work when you're on SNL and then right had a movie almost every summer and then you leave and luckily

God I'm just shooting me but. But that doesn't always happen. So what do you do when you go? And so you just sometimes just stick it out and there's people there sticking out longer than we used to. I stayed six years and that was considered a hair long. Sandler Farley, Rock was three, Sandler Farley were four, no five. So I stayed one year too long

and I was like the fucking guy that went to college that came back to high school because it was Will and Sherry and I was like, I like them but I didn't, I immediately felt like, oh no, all my guys are gone and I don't know what to do with this. I don't, and so I just said, Lauren goes, stay and you can do one segment a week,

do whatever you want. And I didn't do sketches, I just did one segment a week of whatever I wanted and that was like my own kind of update. So that was where the Terry Hatcher thing was, Sean Penn gave me a tattoo. I thought that really worked. Yeah. It was fun. It was fun. But yeah, one swing to get it right. I went to the World Series, did a field piece to the Braves with Chipper Jones and some people. So, you know, some of those came out pretty funny. But after that, I said, no, I think it's time to boogie and then I forgot where this question started.

Well, I mean, and part of it is about how you build the cast, right? And everyone says the same thing, you have to have that one glue person, you know? And then you can argue about who the greatest glue person was. It's probably Phil. Phil, hard to believe. Yeah, Ackroyd's in there. Phil Harvick and Akroids. Yeah, Akroids in there.

I think there was a moment where Sudakis and Hater together were like just literally covering every possible glue thing you would ever want. And Fred Armerson too. Right. Those three, it's always amazing that we get these new peaks after Will Ferrell. And then we asked Kenan Thompson,

who's your MVP or whatever. And he said the women of the last 20 years. And I do think there were complaints about misogyny in terms of casting and nor done had some complaints about it and boy starting with, I don't know, Shry O'Terry through Tina, and I'll miss all the name Maya, and Amy, Polar, and you know, it's just Kristen, and then Kate, and now it's Chloe and others.

Yeah, but you know what though, I never thought that was totally fair, because I always felt like Jan Hooks was one of the best cast members of that entire generation. Ever, yeah. And they're always like, oh, it wasn't till this. And it was like, man, I thought-

It's taking it away from her a little bit because she was so good at it. Yeah, I thought, I mean, to me, she's in the running of one of the best female cast members in the history of the show. Yeah, and I think that- I think she's in the top five. Yeah, a male, women were not running for president.

I mean, Sarah Palin came on the scene and there was Tina Fey meeting that. And the era I was in, it was mostly men politically. There were other figures, but so that sort of evolved as well. Obviously Hillary became a big thing, but yeah, Jen Hooks, I don't know if I wouldn't call her underrated because everybody knows, but if you really take a deep dive in into her work

she was one of those can't she uh... bill who's your who's your starting five if you took out the original cast that's that's to their to good They don't count. And take us out. Yeah. Take us out. He's like, you don't have to worry about that. Yeah. I got that. Dana's got a real.

Dana is very close. He's got a legitimate Mount Rushmark. He's, he's got, I really have to say, I'll give it to Dana. Okay. Take Dana. I get people who think I, I'm just, I'm an impressionist, like Rich Little when I meet him at airports and stuff. You did the best impressionist and I go, well, what about church lady and Garth? And they go, oh, that's kind of flattering.

Okay, go ahead. I think Hartman and Eddie and Farrell. Yeah. Just all the different stuff they could do. Hartman and Eddie and Farrell yeah Just all the all the different stuff they could do They just like it's almost like instead of just naming five. It's almost like who can't be left out And I think you have to mention those three and you have to mention Dana You have to mention Dana. I Dana. You have to mention Dana.

I would have. I would have. And if you're pulling the original, if you're saying that's off limits, that's tough for me because I think Gilda was the best female cast member they ever had. And it's not a popular opinion because it was 100 million years ago and people barely remember it. But man, if you go back and you look at all the stuff she did, she was so good, so talented, so famous that she had her own Broadway show.

Like how many cast members in the history of Esenau could be like, you're so good at this, we're going to have a show called Gilda Live and you're going to do all your characters. It's like impossible. I'm not going to fight you on Gilda. Yeah. I mean, all these girls, the women today will probably be like, they looked up to Gilda, I'm sure, like we looked up to different, I looked up to Gilda too, I mean, I would watch her and I didn't realize how hard what she was doing was, I would see characters and just think that was the people. And then later go, oh, they're doing different,

I don't know what's going on, you know? I actually thought, over the last 20 years, I thought Maya Rudolph was the, was the, my favorite female cast member. I thought she could do the most. I thought, I just thought she was incredibly talented. I know she's, she has like four or five kids. Like I, like she's definitely gone the family direction a little bit, but. Oh yeah.

I think she was like, I just thought like she was one of those. She could literally do anything. Well, it's almost like you could make three, three or four packs for people. Like just my, uh, Amy, you could make three or four packs for people like just my Amy. You could do top 20. You could do top 50. And then you have Armisen and Sudeikis and Bill Hader, maybe the best. So it's just a fun game. It's a way to celebrate the show. For me, my thought about Gilda is the charisma and the likability was at the highest I'd ever seen of any cast member.

I mean, there was a- She was a comment. An adorability thing about her. She's playing a little girl on a bed. It's just herself. She's so committed. It just, there was just this kind of other level of likability or adorability,

whatever quotient you want to call it. Who do you have as your number one? I maybe you're too close to this and can't answer, but number one weekend update. Well, I have to bifurcate them in a way like, like Chevy was the original. And so when I'm watching that show, you was just, no wonder he's a movie star.

You know, he's like, he was so great. Such a good vibe to watch Chevy. Yeah, everything was funny. Everything was exciting, it was fun to watch Chevy. Yeah. Everything was funny. Everything was exciting. It was fun to watch. Dennis, Dennis did six years solo. That's why I don't, you know, when you had Tina and Jimmy Fallon stuff,

this is a different kind of idea. I do think the current two, uh, Michael and Colin, I have a great chemistry. They're, they're getting even better and looser. They're tricking each other. Yeah. So I think they're really as good as it gets. But for a solo night after night, I've never been around and David Dennis is just such a brilliant joke writer and he's a machine. So I would put him up there as the

solo. Norm only did two years. you know, it's different, right? Yeah, it was two years. Norm also had a A thing you couldn't take your eyes off of him, you know When he was doing update that smile the dimples. I mean, he was like he looked like a movie star He never played into it, but he looked like a full-blown movie star Especially in that era and then the the turns that his jokes would take, I don't know what do you call it, David,

that style of his like, oh Jay's not doing too well because he kills people. Here's whatever it was, you know. The pauses. Yeah. Pauses in like this really bold turn. So he's, it's fun to talk about. Michael Jackson says he'll never get married,

mostly because he's gay. Yeah. It's like, and then, but's fun to talk about. Michael Jackson says he'll never get married, mostly because he's gay. Yeah. It's like, and then, but they let him do it. And then it's just hard to compete with that because that's just in a world of you weren't canceling people, he would have been canceled. I mean, there's so many things he said, and then he doesn't stand up. Or he was uncancelable. People.

I didn't, maybe he might have been uncancelable. Yeah. No, no, he doesn't mind walking people. Or he was uncancelable. Maybe he might have been uncancelable. He just wouldn't have cared. No, no, he doesn't care. And even later in his career, he would just do gigs and people come, they know what they're getting. So... But yeah, can I just talk to that for a second? Because Norm's, he wasn't stoned, but his eyes were all sparkly and he had a grin on his face. I saw him go on the view once with Barbara Walters and everyone, and they're just talking about presidents or something, and he gets into a casual thing, just soft selling it with that grin of his. Yeah, the Clintons, right? I mean, you know, they're

good. I think I like them, but I think they kill, they kill the guy, right? You know, they kill too many people. That's one problem.. And Barbara Walters didn't under didn't know who he was. It was just a comedian getting bored. What are you? What are you saying? And now that I think you're really great, right? So his soft peddling, he was almost like a country guy out in the town square or something. So you they never landed hard in like a way with Norm. That was also part of his. I thought Dennis was the best,

but at Norm, Norm was my favorite. Okay. I don't know. I just felt like I didn't know if everyone was in on Norm. I didn't know anything. I'm living in Boston. We don't have the internet yet. I don't know how popular it is,

but I just knew like me and my friends, we were like, this guy's probably getting fired soon. Let's just enjoy this for the 10 to 20 weeks. This is gonna happen. That's what happens. That's what happens. Did he originate fake news or was that someone else? Did Norm say, and how's the fake news?

Here's the fake news. Yeah, I think he did. Yeah, he also did the note to self. Another interesting argument that I- Yes. People always have the same SNL arguments. Nobody has the, who are the best five people to just pop next to the weekend update guy for four minutes.

Oh, for bits. Combo. Cause that was Belushi. That was one of the things he didn't get enough credit for when he would come in and he would do different things, but he would do the guy that got super. Give me a camera. He would do the one where he would just get super mad and end up with the button. No. And then he'd go flying on the stage.

Oh, I feel like he was the first one that got crazy. Throwing his body around. And he was unbelievable. That's it. Eddie became famous. And then Sandler probably hit the hardest of anybody. Yeah. Because he could do the characters, he could do the songs.

Like when he did the, the first time he did the Hanukkah song, you go back and watch that clip, like people lose their fucking minds. Like it's like he's Leonard Skinner, seeing Free Bird. He's a professional singer. It's unreal. Yeah. Along with jokes, which is very rare and he's cute.

And then I remember when he did Crazy spoonhead. He did all the Halloween Yeah, and just just commitment. I mean Adam has that whatever whatever he has he's got it You know the super super likable charm. Yeah, the hater I think is up there too for just popping on Kate McKinnon was really good at it Just coming on playing some crazy character But it is like its own little skill set, because it's like you're a basketball player, you're just coming in and you have to make like

five threes in two minutes to get out of the game. It's terrifying, yep. Yeah, you did it. I mean, that's how you broke in, right? With sitting next to Dennis Lerner. I think I was doing like the little Hollywood minutes. Oh, that's all that was. Yeah, I guess I would come in and do those.

But even if I did anything, I talked about going to concerts or whatever, you're sitting on a desk in the dark and you're like, and you know it's coming to you, which joke, and then you slide in and the cue cards, they point and they go, like, you're up after this one. And you're like, oh, because you're in the dark

and no one's really looking at you and you slide over and then there's 20 million people, like they see you. And even when you walk by, you go, I can just run in front of that camera right now. Right. I guess that's a trust issue. It is like a rodeo thing because I remember one time you're in your on's deck and you're in the darkness and the show's all lit up and there's laughs and rah rah and I think it was Chris Rock was performing or something so I see his hair his chairs rolls out and he does his thing.

Then I'm in the shoot and it is, you have to go from just darkness and it's crew guys around you to being on, you know, so there's, there is. Dana, what about when you do, you do a good one and kills and then you kind of scoot yourself and then Piscopo, uh, I mean, uh, Joe Dixote pulls you off or whoever. And then, and then you're in the, uh, dark and you're just walking behind like a gap girl set And no one's even looking at you and you're like your adrenaline's going

But the show is still going over here and you sort of walk back to that underneath to maybe snag a few compliments Lauren and then Members and they avoid yeah And then you go back and where it's lit by your dressing to change and you're like, anybody, did it go good? Did it go bad? Like another good category is the Mount Rushmore or whatever of people who weren't even the focal point of the sketch, but somehow we're still the funniest person

in the sketch, which is like to me, Chris Farley is number one. Oh yeah. Like he's in the dysfunctional family feud. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's just like the loser K to Harvard's made me into. And he's probably like the fifth most important, but every single thing he does in the thing is hilarious. And then at the end, he runs out and starts kicking to the left and right.

I just saw that the other day. I go, what a moron. I remember walking at rehearsal. I go, you're not really doing that. He goes, oh yeah. You were on the other side. You were in the normal family.als, I go, you're not really doing that. He goes, oh yeah. You were on the other side, you were in the normal family. Yeah, I watch him. Yeah, I think we were the normal family, right?

Chris was, there was so much intellect behind all that. You know much better than I did, David, but his rhythms and sounds and moves that he would, you know, like, I mean, it just, they were so concise and you could not not laugh. Like when he would do his kind of fake laugh, like he would turn into a hog, you know, just around the office. You'd like, this is irresistibly funny.

But yeah, he was, uh, your eye went to him. Anything he was in, I once did Ross Perot writing him like he was a pig. Come on, piggy boy, let's go, piggy boy. And I was going, Chris, is this okay with you? And he goes, yo, yeah, do whatever you want, you know, whipping stuff. I know other people get mad. You can't do that to Chris. No, Chris wasn't mad.

No, no, do it. I'll do whatever you want. I don't care. I think it's funny. So how ever kill a bit. So we're headed for the 50th year. Yeah, next year. I know. Yeah. Which I think is really good for your podcast because, you know, the fact that the show's been around for a half century is... What do they do, Bill? What is this? Leave who takes over?

It's stunning and bizarre. I can't even fathom it, fiftieth. I think I'm guessing Lauren's gonna leave and I'm guessing somebody major has to take over the show. Somebody with real DNA with it. Someone NBC would approve, everyone would have to approve. I just feel like it's Tina or it's Seth if he wants to do it.

And it's gotta be somebody on that level who has that kind of chops. They're not just like, hey, we hired Bob. He's been a huge fan of the show. He'll be ticking over for Lord Michaels. Like I don't see that happening. I feel like the person's gotta have DNA. Yeah, we brought him over from Hallmark.

And they would have to, they would be warned ahead of time that half the time you're miserable. I mean, it's a tough show. Not every show crushes. There was just a lot of shows in my era where the party's a little grim and didn't really land it that night. you know, because that's why there's no other sketch shows because

the ratio of success to failure and a quick hit sketch. But I do think the fact that it's live, they tried to take that away in the 90s. They said, let's make it taped and we got to change the theme and learn to his credit always resisted. Somehow he knew about branding before maybe that was become such a thing people talk about stuck with that theme. Everything's familiar. And that's why we can interview cast members. We talked to Mikey Day yesterday. Right. He's on today and we know everything we told him that we know the offices you're in. We know

and Lauren's there. It's still but Lauren might just stay a few more years. I don't know. Yeah, who knows? Like the Patriots are going through this now. Bill Belichick just left and they hired a new coach and he's got a new coaching staff. And there's been a lot of stories about, whoa, things are so different.

And, oh, the coach talked to the media today and, oh my God, they have this, you know, they're changing this part of the office and and, oh my God, they have this, you know, they're changing this part of the office and it's going to be this now. And everybody's like, because Belichick was there for 20 plus years. Yeah. And just any kind of change feels like the most substantial change ever. So I can't even imagine with S and O if somebody else came in and was like,

Hey, I thought of an idea. We're going to merge two offices and make it one big, I'd be like, what? You can't do that. That's, it's been that way for 50 years. I don't know how you do that. Maybe Tina and Seth could make one. Lauren, I don't know. I mean, they would, Lauren is very good politically with the new regime as a universal, whoever he is or whoever the head of the network. He's really good at doing that. And how do you navigate all these cast members kind of game of throning each other, even if they love each other, it's still just your friend gets it. So I don't know, it's really hard to imagine. And Lauren has all the celebrities too. So Lauren can call someone and say,

maybe Steve Martin would be good in this, let's call him. And someone new has to be able to be dialed in. The new iteration of the show, I don't feel like should be celebrity dependent. I would go back to what the roots of the show were and go to cast members and a guest host, but not be celebrity dependent. Because celebrity and pop culture

is part of what they should be, you know, kind of skeering. I felt that, yeah, and we talked about it earlier yesterday when the podcast, a while back, but yeah, and we talked about it earlier yesterday when the buck is a lot of while back But yeah when a celebrity would come in and then in my era someone from the cast would do that impression I just thought it was dispiriting, you know For the cast and we had you so I do think this I'm gonna say at the secret sauce one of of them is watching a young performer come in, male, female, watching them trundle along,

and then become a star. You're in real time, you're experiencing it with them. And that is still the magic elixir of an unknown person being thrown out there. And you want those impressions to have some bite, and you wanna have some edge to it. And it's just hard if they're a friend of the show, friend of the show. And so you got to stay away from some people.

You can't do this politically. You could argue they should be having so much fun with Taylor Swift and Travis Kelsey, right? Like that should be... Think about if those people existed in the late 70s or in the late 80s, that would have been fodder for the show every week. But now I feel like they'd be a little afraid because oh no, she won't want to come back on if we make fun of her.

And like the other piece of it is, why is the show live at this point if there's no danger that comes with being live? Cause right, cause the reason, the whole reason they had the show in the first place was this is live, anything can happen. Any line might get crossed, somebody might swear accidentally,

all these crazy things could happen. Now it's like a safe live, which I don't, at this point, I don't know why you just wouldn't tape the show at eight o'clock and air it at 1130. It's not like, oh my God, what's gonna happen? I don't, do you feel like anyone feels that way anymore? That might change after the 50th. Maybe.

It would be better. I mean, when you can have two takes on something like on a movie, you're definitely better. Some sketches, you come off on the wrong foot and you're like, oh my God, we came in wrong and it's just not clicking. You can't save it. I wanna step back and go, let me just come in again.

And then you're like, it's too late, it's not working. And then it bombs. When something like when Ross Perot's running mate, Adam Admiral Stockdale And it was kind of goofy and then like three days later Phil's doing that I'm doing Perot and we have the car and that was just What the show does best better than anyone when it happens is the zeitgeist is all there And and but now you've got to compete with things like this, everything. And then you hit it and it's this relief valve.

And that's when the show is magic. And I think in the modern era with all the different people doing different kind of comedy takes all the time. It is more difficult, but that's still when it happens. It's, it's, it's great. It's great. It's going to be interesting when Shane hosts at the end of this month. Yeah.

You know, why do you think so, Bill? What do you think? I think there's gonna be real danger, you know? And it's like, holy shit, I don't know what's gonna happen. And that's a show I want to watch live. That's more about him than the show. But, you know, and I also think he's one of the funniest people working right now. Well, we mentioned that when we talked just casually that time. He's the

guy right now, you know, and his take, it's just, you just want to listen to him. And going back to the show and how he got fired, that's an example of a live show where you want to see it. Like, how are they going to handle it, the show, well how is how are they gonna handle it the show and how is shane gonna handle it so i'm sure they're thinking about different things but usually when the shows at its best it's gonna go right at it

you know like maybe him and bone yang will be in a row boat somewhere i don't know but they usually go right at it bill i have a don't get mad I have a sports question. Yeah, let's go don't get mad. I know how you I know your temper Because people ask me this I'm kidding is that temper? Is football allowed to be rigged? I know people say is football rigged, but then they also say it's entertainment or be rigged. I know people say it's football rigged, but then they also say it's entertainment or NBA. Is that stuff allowed to fudge and twist because it's an entertainment company instead of just sports? I don't really get that. Are you saying could the Super Bowl have been scripted because Kansas City won and they

won an overtime and Taylor Swift and her boyfriend kissed after the game? That's part of it and how beneficial that is. Or even I saw a thing with Shaquille, I've seen basketball players sometimes online saying, oh yeah, we're told the finals will be this long and who wins and Shaq saying when he got drafted, David Stern said to him, where do you want to play? Hot or cold?

And he said, I want to play some more hot. And he goes, okay. And then the day of the draft, he goes, it'll be Orlando. And then he's saying this. Yeah, that's a famous story. Yeah. I mean, that's so weird. I never heard that story. And I go, is that so the are the ping pong balls really bouncing around? Or is it, you know, I don't know. It makes me think all this stuff. And then the defense is we're an entertainment company. We don't have to

play exactly by the rules. And you go, oh, like a movie. Like we have to make it fun to watch. Yeah. I don't think they can rig the games, but I used to write about this all the time. You know, it's same thing like how you guys would do impressions of people. I would always play up certain things and have fun with it. One of them was that David Stern, the old NBA commissioner was, you know, this like basically veto Corleone and rigging all this stuff. And there was always this thing

about when Patrick Ewing went to the Knicks, it was the first time they've read the lottery, there are seven envelopes, and he's reaching down and he grabs each one. And if you look briefly for like a split split second, it looked like the Knicks one had a little bit of a crease on one of the sides. Ah, I felt it. Then there was a theory that they had frozen the envelope. So as he's feeling the envelope that was frozen, that was great. And it was like, you know, whatever, like they just put it in like a carbon, whatever.

So it was like freezing cold when he touched it. So he knew that was the one. But that was always a recurring bit about him. Same thing when Jordan got suspended or when Jordan retired, there was always a thing. Oh no, actually Jordan got suspended for a year. The shack thing, that was always a story. There was stuff they did in the late 90s, early 2000s

where the perfect team for the league and the ratings always seem to win and that like most famously It was a Philly versus Milwaukee Allen Iverson They're trying to get him in the finals of 2001 playing Milwaukee and Philly shot like a hundred more free throws than Milwaukee in the series Yeah, there was the Kings Lakers game, which I'm sure you guys remember in 2002 Where if the Kings win game six they win the series everyone on the Kings fouled out So you see stuff like that. I do think they can kind of nudge the officials to say Hey, man, we don't like how You know Shaq is being defended when they do this you got to call it and then they start calling it early and the other

Team's like wait we were doing that last game. That's a found out it and then they start calling it early and the other team's like wait we were doing that last game that's a found out yeah but yeah there's because they can't tell us these stuff players that are spend their whole life playing as hard as they can to get with it it's just hard to buy you're gonna tell players not to play hard but then you see like oh you watch all these like which I would never see a lot of chiefs no holding calls and then they just show over and over holding and you go so I mean they, the refs can't see everywhere, but sometimes if they want to, they can always find a hold somewhere because it's kind of... Oh, I mean, that's the Patriots going 19 and 0 in the

helmet catch, where if you watch the helmet catch, like four guys are holding for Eli, because he buys like an extra four, four seconds, and just holding all over the people are just getting mauled and the ref rest are like, cool. And that was the year we had spy gate for the Patriots and, you know, the commissioner's office was against them. So the Patriots fans have always felt like that game was, what's the, what's the penalty rate per game right now? Because it seems like when I watched the NFL, there's an incredible play.

And then I immediately go looking for the flag. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, a flag, the flag. I think I'll pop up. Oh, a flag! The best play I've ever seen. So I do think if you're going to rig professional sports and you want to kind of nudge it, that would be your way to do it without getting caught.

That was when the, when gambling, sports gambling really took off the last 15 years. One of the first edges the best gamblers had was the referee tendencies. Yeah. And this was an NBA and NFL specifically, where it was like, oh, this team, they call more penalties and more penalties means,

you know, this'll happen. And this is the same thing with NBA. If somebody's more foul happy, then the over is gonna hit more. And now all that stuff's kind of on the internet, people know it, but when they assign certain refs to certain playoff games, then people are like, oh, of course they assign that ref. He always calls it for the road team.

So that stuff's out there. I think it's fun. Some people take it very seriously. Well, when I'm losing millions every week on DraftKings, that's what I think about it. How'd you do in the playoff spade? I do DraftKings, but I also do a fan duel. I get with some guys and do like fantasy or guillotine leagues or weird stuff like that just to keep the fun going up until the end and

I do okay in those. I'm not that great. It's just some it's a good time killer I'm in the fantasy league with Jimmy's cousin and John Hamm and all those people where it's 11 people in the league But the winner gets to vote somebody out at the draft the next year, which I think is the single best rule So we have to show up. We have to show up and then the guy who ones like alright Dana I'm sorry you're out and you just have to get your stuff and leave and That's it. We don't see you for a year Yeah, it's great. It's really really it gets super bitter and you keep going lower and lower with people or do you add a person? No, it's the same 11, but we we have 10 people in the league every year plus the guy who got voted out

Oh, so it's even so they get to come back a year later They can't get voted out, but then somebody else gets voted out. It has to be even, Dana. You don't understand. I'm going to ask you guys a question. I felt beat up after I watched the Super Bowl. I don't think I've ever gotten that beat up. I'm from Bay Area, so I'm a Niner fan, but I liked the Chiefs too. I'm not fanatical, but I was rooting for them.

But there was some frustration and penalties, it was, and the way it ended. I was like, yeah, it wasn't satisfying. And if you're a chiefs fan, I guess it was, but it was like that new fifth quarter, I wasn't paying attention to that. It had never been in the, you know, in the Super Bowl that I wasn't briefed either for the overtime. You were confused. It was, it was one of those things people wrote about it,

but nobody actually thought it was going to happen. So then when it was happening, there was so much strategy to it that none of us had really totally considered, and the Niners ended up choosing to go first. But I was saying this week, to me it's like going second was such an advantage because you become the blackjack dealer. So the other guys going first, you know exactly what they're going to do and then you can decide what you need to do to match whatever they did, which is the advantage.

But I don't think we realized that until we watched it. Because if you get a touchdown, you're not just going for two probably because you could win with a touchdown with an extra point. The chief said that. They said that they were scoring, they were getting two. Yeah, they were going to come back and do two. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I agree.

I told my wife who was over, I said, oh no, my home's got the ball, they're gonna do four downs. They moved back so fucking easily when they came in. I was like, oh no. It's gonna be prevent defense, just and then it was just so predictable when one team is playing three downs punt or they did get the field goal

and the other team is gonna go four mentally to move the ball. Well, and then there's this inevitability with him, which I think all the best athletes have. When the door is open like that, you're like, oh, here we go. Do you think he could host SNL, Patrick Mahomes? He's kinda quirky.

I don't get it. I think I got a whole set. You know, we would do the game we thought we would do. I get a little stutter. That was pretty good. Oh, I like that. Oh, I'm sure everybody does it on, you know. No, that was, I haven't heard a lot of my homes.

That was good. I had a, I remember, it's sort of, it's like Pewie Herman. Yeah, I remember that, she's like,we Herman. Yeah. Now I'm doing Bobcat Goldflate, but that's okay. Bobcat Goldflate as Pat Behobs. As Pat Behobs. But yeah, he's a supernatural talent. A word I like to use a lot. You know, what can you say?

Well, you asked me about athlete host. I thought Kelsey was actually really good last year or two years ago, whenever he did it. I thought he was solid. I think he'd be an actor. He's with CAA. There's a master plan. I love it. It's just to make him into an international movie star. And he probably has the looks and the charisma to do that. It's just kind of, the rock did it and was open about it, you know. I'm ready for action stars again

I feel like we're in such a weird spot like the the era I grew up with Where we had Arnold and we had sly we had then von Dom showed up and yeah So go and all these dudes and we just there was a new one every year And we had like this embarrassment or riches Carl. Weather's had a chance. Yeah And now it's like it's all these Jason Statham guys. They know how to do this like choreographed kung fu stuff. And I don't know. I miss the days of just like these big dudes that we can kind of make fun of

on a show like SNL. I like Seagal. I thought he was great. I thought he was. Seagal was his first five were great. Oh, yeah, he's great. I was a legendary bad host. Anybody seen Rick Richieie and the pool hall

seen one of the great scenes. Anybody seen Richie anybody. He always played Italian dudes. He played like Nico Peretti and people like that. Even though I didn't even know what that meant when I was a kid, I just kept going, you better kick his fucking ass to it. And there's like eight guys and he walks in

and starts being a dick. And go, once in my life, I just want to be this guy. Just go to a bunch of guys that are looking at me and go, the fuck are you looking at? Just for once. And then beat this shit out of all. He was Steven Seagal when he hosted the show. As far as just this alpha male presence and stuff

and talking about how he could choke anyone out or beat anyone up, just yeah. He was the perfect guy. He was the legendary reviled host though from your generation, right? Wasn't he the least favorite? You know, there's others I wouldn't mention. I kind of liked him. It's hard to act tough when you ask for a scrunchie because he's gonna fall in love. I found it fascinating. You'd go by the dressing room during the week and you'd hear a woman in a state of pleasure. It was just really interesting, you know. Oh my God.

Yeah. What a lover that guy was. I guess so. But he was just fun to talk to. What a trip. But he, you know, he was a little offended by Hans and Franz. We had to rewrite it because he thought we were making fun of him in the read through. And then we rewrote it so that

you could beat up Arnold, you're the only one who could beat up Arnold. But I like the guy, I don't know. I like it, there's worse hosts, but you can't really name everybody, it's just too rude to name them. No one's gonna do that, you know? Yeah, that becomes aggregated.

It's like the deal email, David Spade said, so and so is the most we've ever heard. Yeah, they quote it for the rest of your life. Yeah. But Marcy Klein told us that she was the wrangler of the hosts over the years and producer. Hi, Marcy. And she, Lauren would say,

so and so in their dressing room, they're not coming out. So she would have to go in there and they'd be crying and the show's on in four minutes or just having a panic attack. And so, yeah, you kind of have some empathy for the hosts. They're doing something that's impossible, you know? Yeah, you know, one of the things, cause I loved all the books, like I read,

there's this great book that came out, I'm gonna say mid-80s, it's called, I think live from Saturday Night or something like that, but it's about the first 10 years of the show. And it was one of my favorite books. And then The Oral Histories came out with Jim Miller and Sh the first 10 years of the show. And I was one of my favorite books and then the oral histories came out with Jim Miller and Shales and a bunch of other stuff. But you'd read the history of the show and these things that happen, never

expecting YouTube's coming and all these other things where you could actually just go back and watch. So there was always that legendary story of Belushi when he was so fucked up, he couldn't go, you know, basically couldn't start. It was that I think when Kate Jackson hosted and they were up, he couldn't go, you know, basically couldn't start, it was that, I think when Kate Jackson hosted and they were like, it's 50-50 whether he, he could die in the air. If you put him on Lauren and Lauren's like,

I'll take those chances and put some on. And he's in the first sketch. So I've always read that story. And then you watch the clip and it's like, yeah, Belushi seems fine. Like he's a little, he's a tiny bit green, but it's like he's gonna die during the sketch. It sounds better. Yeah. Yeah.

So sometimes the video doesn't match up whatever the, the story was. Folklore. Yeah. Yeah. Dana, we gotta, we gotta wrap up Bill, but anything else you have something good for Bill? Any, it can be sports. It doesn't have to be, it can be anything. Well, I love sport. Well, you know, I'm a big, like a lot of people now, but I was with the Warriors mentally with Nate Thurman and Rick Berry. Oh, look at you.

And so I've always been a fan of the Warriors. And of course this era with Steph is amazing. I guess the rumor today they're trying to get, which they're not gonna get, LeBron, are they? Yeah, it didn't happen. The trade deadline was last week. And then it mysteriously got leaked today that the words tried to trade for LeBron And the Lakers said no and LeBron didn't want to go there

So obviously the Lakers are leaking this because the words are playing better and they have good chemistry And it's like oh actually they were trying to trade a bunch of you for LeBron in their heads Yeah, so it felt I thought a little diabolical get brawny. Yeah, oh they were trying to trade a bunch of you for LeBron. Get in their heads. Yeah, so it felt, I thought a little diabolical. Get Bronnie. Yeah, oh, they were trying to get LeBron, but we said no, it's like, all right, maybe. Don't you have to get the kid to get Bronnie, to get, I mean, get Bronnie to get LeBron?

Well, the kids had a rough freshman year in college. Yeah. So I'm not sure he's hopping into the draft. Ooh, sore sub. Yeah, it's a tough one. He's like five points a game at USC. Okay, this is my last question because I know you're a movie fanatic as well

because you do the rewatches. I don't like, let's forget top 10, whatever. Movies that you can revisit throughout your life. Oh yeah. So. Like, you know, I see the Godfather every year, pretty much, you know, there's ones that you just see a lot of, you know. So see the Godfather every year, but pretty much, you know, there's there's ones that you just see a lot of you know So for me heat was the movie that started the rewatch

On my podcast we just was the 20th anniversary and me and my friend Chris Ryan were just like let's just do a podcast about heat Fuck it people loved it. So we created the rewatchables and you want to do Pachino went full scream, which is amazing. Pachino is crazy in that Pachino is explained it after that. He's playing the character like the guys on cocaine. Yeah. And it's like, yeah, we know we saw heat. We know that's what you're doing.

She's got a great ass. But he eats up there. At the same time. Go ahead. And then Boogie Nights, the two godfathers are on all the time now because I think Showtime has just stripped all their library except for the godfathers and they're on constantly.

And I'm, I just couldn't feel like I can dive in at any time to those Shawshanks, a good one. Shawshanks fiction. They one. Sure. Fiction. They I mean, there's certain ones that just any science fiction in there. Not for me personally, but for a lot of people. I mean, there's a ton of comedies. I mean, you know, Tommy Boyd, I'm not just saying this because spades on this, but Tommy Boyd has become the good thing about, especially when you get older

and you have young kids and you can start showing them the comedies. It's gotta be one of the first six or seven because I don't know how old a kid has to be to understand Farley was one of the funniest people of all time and how funny that movie is, but it's probably like age four, like Fat Guy in a Little Coat, it might even be age three, but you can just indoctrinate them in that.

So there's a bunch of the rewatchable. What about me and the window watching the girl to pool? Are we rewatching that part? Yeah, that maybe like fast forward. Is that cut out of, I think that's cut out on TV. So there's even Jodor, there's stuff that's cut out and I never know it. And then I go, so there's people that are seeing these movies with a couple of parts missing because it's so rough for TV. And I'm like, they don't even know those

extra parts. I don't know. That's a bummer. One of the cool things now is like with YouTube and all these different places, like, you know, Dana's show from the mid nineties, like, I don't know, 20 of those sketches are on YouTube now. That was one of those things where if you love that show, then it gets canceled and it's gone. There's no unless you taped it on your, on your VHS, it's gone. It's history. Yeah.

And now kind of all that stuff has a second life, like shows like Freaks and Geeks. You can dive in that. Larry Sanders, which Shanling was always like famously never wanted it on DVD. He was always like very prickly about it. And now like every episode's on the Max app, you know, so you can, It's great. Nothing goes away now. We're all in, we're all little cyber bits next to, we're next to Godfather, next to everything else. It's just all there. Could airplane

be made today? Yeah. I think the problematic ones, Animal House, yeah, if you're talking about, is this movie canceled now? Which we talk about a lot on the rewatchable, it's like Animal House, Revenge of the Nerds, Porkies. I don't know how Porkies happens. A lot of stuff with women, yeah. Yeah, I don't know how Porkies happened the first time.

I don't know how you explain it. Now, much less than 83. Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Yeah, but that's a good movie though Like at least it's well written Sean Penn is so good in that. Yeah But yeah, some of the some of the 70s 80s. I think airplanes fine though. I Just think a really silly movie right now because the country's in such a bad mood if that's just joke permitted almost Just physical gigs would be a nice look

almost just physical gigs would be a nice look. It's weird that the airplane naked gun type of movie, which I was, I mean, that's what we all grew up with. It just kind of is done. And then they would do the top secret and they would do the ripoff versions of those kinds of movies, but it was like 20 years of them. Then they made the scary movie franchise. Now nobody does any of those.

Yeah. Yeah. Never know. I don't know. That's my final question. All right. Thank you, Bill. Bill, it's been a pleasure. I appreciate it. Appreciate you hanging out with us. This was really fun. I forgot I was on a podcast or even hosting a podcast. So thank you.

This was fantastic. I love you guys. You guys got a fantastic podcast. This has been a presentation of Odyssey. Please love you guys. You guys got a fantastic podcast.