Fly on the Wall with Dana Carvey and David Spade - RE-RELEASE - Lisa Kudrow

Episode Date: September 9, 2026

Re-surfacing this lovely episode!

We are Dana and David. You can figure out which one is which whenever you. Dana and David. Okay. You got it. It's kind of weird. I'm his older brother from another mother. Do you have any doppelangers in show business?

Like, you know, you look like or someone saying, you know, people tell me I look like you. No. Well, yeah. People that come up and say, oh, my only question. Oh, okay. But wait, listen to this. Years ago, I was at a restaurant waiting for someone and the hostess came over and said, are you famous?

I'm not doing the accent. I said, She said, are you Dionne Warwick? Are you? I heard the kid a lot. I used to get David would give me. I would get David. And then I aged out of that.

And then they say, do you know David Spade is my latest? Did you know him? Oh, no. What do you mean? I go, yeah. Did you? You're like, are you like everybody's kid's sister in a way, kind of? You look a little like my sister a little bit.

Oh, really? Well, I mean, you know Levitts, both of you. John Levitt. Yes. Of course. The one and only. Yes. I grew up with John.

He and my brother are best friends. David. David. Yes. I've heard so much. you about this. It'd be interesting to hear it from your point of view. Yes, the real point of view. John's, um, let's say eccentric dad, you know, I've met a few times and, uh, David's encouragement to him. Yeah. And then you being the kid sister coming out of, out of the blue,

going into show of this. So go ahead. Go. You have, you have 30 minutes. Um, yeah, that all sounds right. Yeah. Well, explain John then to John now just as a personality. There's no difference. That's hilarious. I will attest to that. There's absolutely no difference. At 10-year-old, John, did you meet him at 10 or 12? They're six years older than me. If I was three, they were nine. So you met that far back? Yeah. He was at our house all the time. I mean, so at home. He could

just walk in, go to the kitchen cookie drawer, grab stuff, you know. And he called. Do you have any brownies? Oh, you don't have the other cookies? Yeah. Lisa, sorry about your attitude. Yes. When did this guy come in?

I mean, the 40s guy. Was that there when he was like 10 or something? Hello? Well, I don't remember when I was three. Okay. So when you were eight, he was 14. Yes. Yes, because he would call up and we shared the kids shared a phone.

And it would be, and like, hello. Oh, hello. Is this Lisa? Yeah, hi, John. Do you want to talk to David? Wait. And he would do some very long bit. I can't sing.

I just get David. I just get David for you. Yeah. That's just terrible. Always funny. Always has spin on a joke. And then, wait, you get older. Didn't you go, but was he?

No, I didn't. You didn't get older? I'm kidding. That was it? That would be bad. John Lovitz. So we were like, didn't you go to improv the same place he did or no? Well, yeah, because then when I graduated college, I told him, yeah, I think I'm going to try acting now.

And he said, oh, okay, listen, okay. Because look, you know I studied in college and everywhere. But the place I learned the most was the groundlings. That's where I learned the most. You have to learn improv. It's listening and responding. It's the most important thing in acting. And he was right.

And they wouldn't let me take classes because I hadn't performed or done anything since junior high school. Do you have to have a res a little bit to get in there? I don't know. This was like 1985. You have a beginner's class, right? And that's kind of you... You have to audition for those. What?

Yeah. I know. Our viewers are freaking out right now. Jeez. Yeah, I thought they were just sort of screening, you know, but they wouldn't even let me audition for the ground. Did you have as a little kid, did you have any kind of whimsy in your head like maybe, maybe I'm funny or maybe I could do this?

Was it a secret or did you tell your parents? You tell David. Or is it just? No, I mean, yeah, as a kid, I did want to act. I thought, yeah, I did. And my family, everyone was funny. And I was the youngest, so I was the least funny. How many kids?

Three. Okay. Five in ours. I had three older brothers and a younger sister. Funny parents. Were you the funny one? Or was other ones? Everybody was funny, but that was,

more my specialty because I was doing little impressions in the early 60s. Oh, gross. Attention seeker. I was an introverted extrovert or an extroverted introvert. I see you as a kindred spirit. I don't think you're on or I don't see you as always on. No, no, no, no. I'm not always on.

But when you're on, you're funny as hell. Oh, thanks. Well, there's evidence on time. Wow. We've got some evidence. Let's look at a clip. Let's go to the tape. Season five of Friends.

Go to the phone. You've lost your bicycle. The exit is breathtaking. No, but I also would imitate Lily Tomlin doing Edith Ann. Oh, my gosh. Of course. I would, you know, like, I would offer my entertainment services at school. I offered to go from.

class to class. I worked out with like scarves to do like the dream, Tevia's dream from Fiddler on the room. Oh, yikes. And I offered graciously. You pitch this to a teacher? To my teacher. I said, I said, I put together this thing. Should I just do it for the class? And she went, sure. And I did. And I said, now I can do this for all the other classes. I've got my back. And I can go like, what was wrong with me? something's wrong. Or how wonderful. How wonderful. That's how I look at it. Like be so confident, you know, and she went, sure, go to the class. She's like, kill five minutes of class. I don't care. Were you consistently confident throughout the grades? Did you have years where you're the star and other

years you're a little down? Or was it just consistently you were like one of the most popular little kids? No, I don't think I was one of the most popular. I mean, in grade school, I was confident. And yeah, I had friends. And I was like, I'm going to start a David Cassie. fan clubs. The ones invited and the moms would come. Everyone talked to me like I was an adult. I didn't understand. But everyone treated me like I was a little older.

And I think it's because of my brother and sister and being older and I had their, I stole their sense of humor and their jokes. You know, I was going to say that because I was going to say, I'm three boys in our family. And I have to say there's everyone's a little bit funny. and I'm more like a research paper, like a compilation, because you can always borrow like from your life. So this happened with Chris Barley, like his brothers would go, that thing he does is mine. It's like, well, he got on TV and he's reaching for straws at a certain point.

He's like, that thing was funny. And, you know. Yeah, he had the guts to take it public. Yeah, most people aren't using it actively. So you just go, I can borrow what my mom says. You know, it's like, it's funny to me. but so you're like, yeah, you've got little things here. And your parents were funny.

Is that you said? Yeah, my dad was very funny. Yeah. That's a big deal. He was really funny. That makes it fun to be fun or try to make him laugh when you're a little. Yeah. Well, I mean, I didn't make anyone laugh.

Oh. But, you know. Sadly. I thought you were killing it at school. At school. Yeah, at school. Oh. At school.

Tougher crowd. Did your brother ever put you? in a sleeping bag and then tie it off and leave them there? No. Oh, well, that happened to my wife, so I was just curious.

Oh, shoot. No, no, David's, no, they were good to me. I mean, unless everyone was fighting, you know,

but for the most, because, I mean, didn't siblings always try to kill each other? Yeah. Most of my child with three older brothers was cut it out.

Yeah. Just cut it out. Stop. Yeah. But mostly it was rough and tumble, fun. I mean, we had movies that were touchstones because there was no VCRs or anything. If what was your, like my sister was obsessed with Splendering in the Grass with Bady and Natalie Wood.

Oh. And it came on once a year and she commandeered the television. Did you have stuff in your formative years that was just mind blowing besides your crush on David Cassidy? Which my wife also had a mad crush. Yeah. I think I did. I did. I played David Cassidy on an SNL's guy.

Oh, that's right. Oh, wow. You played everything on an SML sketch. Very well, by the way. That's so much fun. But my sister, you know, she's the oldest. She's eight years older than me. And we would watch Father Knows Best and leave it to Beaver reruns.

And she had to sneak leave it to Beaver because my father, when she was younger, wouldn't let her watch it. because that's bullshit. That's not what people are like. That's not what a family is. Stop it. Yeah. That's pretty advanced. Oh, because they were too nice to each other.

Yeah, they were too like formal and nice. Oh, gee. Well, gee, whiz. Like, that infuriated him. Well, golly, Wally. Yeah, that guy was the original Garth. I just figured out. And I have the same birthday as Jerry Mathers.

Oh, really? He kind of talked like Garth, didn't he? Well, golly, Willie. I don't know what you're doing. By the way, and the Mathers lived in our neighborhood, and Sean Mathers was in my class. Whoa. The younger, younger brother of Jerry, yeah. I always sort of, you seem a little more, you just always seem very together to me.

That's why people feel like you're older when you're younger, because something about, you seem like you're very together and suffer no fools. Oh, yeah, I don't know. But you've suffered some fools along the way. I think I'm generous with fools. I won't get two right here. Well, you've been generous to me so far. I won't connect the dots. No, I've been nervous to do this because you guys are legends.

Crazy. Oh, good. Yeah. Has anyone called you a legend yet? Yes, I think so. No. Nobody? Not even John.

Not to my face. No, yeah. No, John certainly hasn't. But John's been very sweet. and generous and good, I have to say. He's very proud of that. He loves to tell the story. Yeah.

And I said, do this and do this. And then she went there. You know, he loves to be the person advising. Yeah. So a role that he really enjoys. Yeah. He loves that story. I've heard so much.

It is helpful. I've definitely talked to your brother, David, but on the phone a few times where John has put him on, say hello to David. He's a doctor. It's May West. It's 1940. these, I mean, it's both, but anyway, it's just terrible persona. It's nice to have someone that's in the business that you could ask questions to like, Saturday Live is a huge deal. You're just

auditioning and then you're like, what's it like just doing this or just auditions and readings? And, you know, I don't know how to cold read. Like when I started, I had no one really to go to. It's good to have someone that's been there. Yeah. Well, I mean, and the good thing John said was groundlings, listen, respond. Don't take them personally because some of them are kind of unhappy. And that was true. I saw that. I saw it because then he got on Saturday Night Live and there were one or two groundlings because I thought, you know, it's okay to say.

So what brought you here? I said, oh, well, I grew up with John Levitts and they went, oh, okay. So bitter that he got on Saturday Night Live. Oh, bitter and envious. You know, that is the thing about show business no matter what. Except maybe Eddie Murphy or something. Most of us needed a break or hadn't something. or something had to happen.

Yeah. And there's whimsy to that. And you know people, I know so many stand-ups, great stand-ups, not famous, had good careers in the clubs, but just didn't get, did some pilots, went on the Tonight Show, but didn't get that little turn. Yeah. So it breeds weirdness. Right.

Then why not me? Or that wasn't deserved if someone else got it and I didn't, which is, that always mystified me. It's like, what do you mean? I mean, even if you think it's all luck, then, you know, why not them and not you? This time. How about you just think this time? I used to go on showcases at the improv like Dana did.

Like they'd say, we're going to bring a cat. They're doing a sitcom, whatever. They want to look at 10 comics, and this is sort of the look, female, man, whatever. And we'd do it and someone would get it. And I'd always be practicing going, why them? Just in case I didn't get it. And then, but it's true. like it's like it's hard to complain when it's in even playing field like you all went on in front of

them yeah and they go that one and you go wait how do I figure out how I'm the victim here I'll figure it out though and all you can control is trying to get better it sounds like a hallmark movie but all you can control is just try to get better yeah how we made your mother is the how I met your mother rewatch podcast with me Josh radner and Siri's co-creator Craig Thomas well our guest today is the great Bob Oden Kirk I want to tell you, that cast, Allison and Kobe and Neil and Jason and you, you were so upbeat and gung-ho. The spirit that you guys had was like, I actually thought it was like, are you being, are you mocking this? Are you being sarcastic?

Follow how we made your mother wherever you get your podcasts. Did you have nightmare auditions before friends that humiliated you and made you think maybe it's not going to happen? No, not the auditions didn't make me think it's not going to happen. happen. But I had one nightmare audition. I finally, I was so excited because I got to audition for Larry Sanders with Gary Shanling. Great. And then whoever else was in the room. And I thought, okay, great. I'll improvise a little too. And I think, and I don't remember exactly what I did, but I scared Gary. I know that.

Was there sides, or did he just do his thing of, I'll say something like this and you say something like that? I'm trying to remember because I was just sort of the character was, Janine Garoflo ultimately did it, which is right. Oh, that was there for a full-time character. Yeah. And I remember, because I knew how to audition, I had a great cold reading class and audition class, which was just, you're not there to make friends, you're not there to chit chat, you're there to do the audition, be polite and everything, and then just get going. And so it's sort of, I said something and he, Gary made sort of like a joke and I played along as an improviser with the,

sort of like, oh, now we're in a fight. You know what I mean? I see. Yeah. And he just went, okay, should we read it? And I said, yeah, absolutely, yeah. We did it. And he said, okay, well, thank you. And we'll be in touch.

And I went, all right, thank you very much. And I walked out and I'm walking down the hall. I heard the door open. And I turned around and he was there going, okay bye bye we will be in touch we really will and I think I went okay I thought what did I scare him what happened what did I do I was playing oh they didn't know I was playing

did you ever run into Gary after friends and everything and he does he remember did he ever remember that I forgot to ask him but I did run into him I ran into him after we had our first day of auditions for this HBO show I did called the comeback. Come back. Oh, yes.

And HBO and Chris Albrecht and Carolyn Strauss, they had no idea what we were pitching, just write it. We wrote it and they said, we still don't get it. Why don't we just shoot it? Because back when you're Michael Patrick King, who I was working with in Texas City, we'll just shoot a pilot.

Okay. Great. So when we had the auditions for the pilot, that's the first time they saw me as the character, because it didn't read. on the page like it was hilarious. But then they saw me doing it. And so after that, I went to something, I can't remember what,

and Gary Shanley was there and he went, oh, I talked to Chris Albrecht today. He said, you're brilliant. That's good to know. That's really good. And I thought, oh, good. So, yeah, I didn't feel like bringing up, I think I scared you.

Yeah. I think that was smart. I mean, Gary was really complicated, and he was harder on himself than anybody else. And I was doing Larry Sanders once. I did it a few times. And he just writes on a piece of paper and just hands it to me, you know, between takes. And it just says, I hate myself. He's funny, but it was just.

Yeah. The torture. Comeback was also like, it was sort of like a curb type. That was type, that type, right? It wasn't improvised at all. Oh, it wasn't. It seemed like, oh, acting. That's because of the camera stuff.

Maybe it was like that. It was sort of like handheld or something. Cinema Verite, the office did it kind of. Yeah, it was right after the British office. Oh, right. But just before. There was one before the American office. Yeah.

What's going on? You know nothing. You are nothing. Sorry, you can't get, you can't ever get him. him out of his last golden gloat you cannot get that out of your mind it's one of the great moments in television when he says you know nothing you are nothing thank your god and fuck off and now the show anyway when you do the comeback to you so that is it looks like it's right after friends so yeah it was right after friends and it's with uh you said sexist city Patrick king is that

Michael Patrick King yeah and so you you get to that must it must have felt fun a to do something new and to do something sort of a little looser and a little rougher on the edges, right? Maybe. And it was something no one had seen before. It was meant to just be raw footage from a reality show so that you can see just the folly of this woman thinking she's going to control it. It's her show. And, you know, just throwing herself into a meat grinder to stay in the spotlight.

Yes. Yeah. And not really understanding what a reality show actually is. And that was before Housewives. There was just Anna Nicole and the Osbournes. The Osbournes seemed like the first one I remember that went huge. Yeah. Yeah.

That was an inspired idea at the time. It was. It was very interesting. I think people would talk a lot about it because it was just, it's always great when you get an idea a little bit out of the blue that everyone goes, oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. No, that was very, it was, that was very rewarding, I have to say. Because you've done this six seasons and said, whatever, you did all that with the live audience,

which brings its rock and roll and all its pressure. And then you do this whole new thing. It must have felt really good. Like, oh, yeah, I can also do this. Yeah. It was a different tone. Yeah. Yeah.

And luckily, while I was doing friends, I was doing independent films a lot, which was fun, because there are no stakes at all. Yeah. Yeah. Especially in your day job as friends. Yeah. Oh, darn. I hope it does well.

We have one to go back to you. See you guys in 26 weeks. In fact, I thought, and when I'm done with friends, I mean, I'll just do independent films. And then they went away because. And now it's all live streaming. And now it's all. Streaming.

Yeah. You might as well. Bring it up. No good deed. Oh, yeah. Ray Romano, who was on this podcast. Oh, yeah. We love Ray Romano.

That was a been fun. Yeah. He's a gentle giant. Like, I was surprised how self-deprecating he is and how open he is because he's a big guy. Yeah. And he does not wear that on his sleeve at all. He's just very real. Yeah, he claims to be insecure and, you know, well, and he might be, but.

We were talking once, and I said, but you're not mean to anybody. Like most insecure performers find someone or something to blame everything on, right? Oh, yeah. We didn't give me the right lines or, you know, that stuff. Or some stooge to shit on occasionally and just little put downs. Yeah. Leverage their power over, you know, that character. Right.

But that's not Ray. He doesn't do that. And he said, oh, no, that's because. I think I'm to blame for everything. I just blame myself. I think he really sinks into these things. He's not just doing it to kill time. Like we were doing the Mirage, Dana knows we were doing like both of us.

Not sort of residency doing stand-up, but he gets into like these indie movies and like this thing. It's just good little things and he really puts a lot of heart and soul into him. It feels like to me and wants them all really to do well, like really into it instead of just like, I'll do this. a week on this if you pay me. It's more like, let's get into it. Yeah. Yeah. No,

I think he has a reason for everything he chooses to do. Mm-hmm. Yeah, you had a Luke on there. I was just watching it in the other room because I hadn't seen it. And I go, oh, shoot, let's go check it out. And I was, there's Luke and there's, everywhere you turn, I was like, oh, good. Oh, Dennis Liri I saw. Oh, yeah.

And how fun. He used to be, I used to know him a little more in the old days. But so how fun is it? That's a fun thing to do. and you did it for and it's on right now because I'm watching it right now yeah on Netflix it's on it's on Netflix right now and will you introduce the premise I I research let's let's let's the premise of the show which is very interesting me yeah yeah you oh yeah okay I could do it but I think it's tough to explain I mean there's a couple who's empty nesters they're

selling their house and um right so far seems to I know it seems to be The details we get into later. There's some secrets. Yeah. Surrounding the house and their life there. And then you have the people who come to the open house and desperately want this house and whatever's going on in their life that somehow intersects with this couple. Yeah. And the producer of Dead to me, which had its own, I love that show.

Yeah, I did too. And I thought, whoever is the mind behind that and also Christine Abilgate. Yeah. The name of her partner was so good. It was also on this show. Linda Cardalini. Yeah. Yes.

It's always phenomenally good. Always phenomenal. Always. And so I'm assuming the sensibility overlap, different storyline and everything. But I did see one of the clips where you're in the kitchen and you're kind of waving the knife around. Yeah. He goes, put the knife down.

And it was just very smart. dry, weird, but real kind of dialogue. Yeah. Like, just put the knife down. Well, I'm not going to stab you. Yeah. I saw kind of the tone in that moment, you know. Yeah.

Yeah. I think we kind of played with that one, Ray and I. Sure. All good. They're taking advantage of that you can sort of, let's make it real and surprise ourselves in the moment. Well, it's nice if they trust you to let you, you know, and aren't to like, but no, the script.

Yeah. I don't think people listening know that it's not always the case to have the gift of running with something. Sometimes it's script, script, script, move on. And you go, do you want me to try something? They're like, nope, we're good. Yeah. And so when you see it, it always feels looser if you just feel a little more into it.

And take advantage of the digital cameras. I mean, going back for just a second on Shanling, he had three 16 millimeter cameras. on shoulders. So there was a single on me, single on him, and a two shot. So every take was its own take. Every take could be improvised, overlapped. It was all there every time. And so I just wondered, did they have a camera on Ray and a camera on you?

Or was it? They go, well, that was a good improv. Can you repeat it? We'll come around on you. Or do they manage the shooting? I think there were two cameras. And we may have done it more than once because we did it probably did it once. and then it was, yeah, do that thing again, I think.

I don't have a good memory for that stuff because once I'm done, I move on. No, none. No, no. When you, when this thing comes about, do you, does it perk up your ears because of the dead to me part of it? Like, though, this is, this person did this, so you're already sort of intrigued and then you want to read it and then you're more intrigued. Is that sort of the way it goes? It should have been, but actually it was, it was, so this is, so this is, so this is, something exciting, we think, said the agents. It's, um, they said a limited series on Netflix and

it's Liz Feldman who did. I said, dead to me. I know who that is. I love that show. Yes. And playing your husband would be Ray Romano. And I went, he wanted to work with Ray Romano. Oh my God. That's been like a dream. It's like, well, dreams come true. Um, and so far Linda Cardellini is in it. And I went, what? That, yeah. I could work with Linda. So I said, I guess I should read it, but do I have to? Because it's yes. Do I have to? And did you have to? Yeah, no, it's a good thing. I read it because I read the first episode. And then I had a meal

with Liz where I had a lot of questions. And I went, I'm basically saying yes to what has my character done? I'm not sure. we leave it at that. Did you have a read through? Did you get everyone, when everyone got together, did you read the pilot in a room? Yeah. I always find that, and I haven't done that much of it.

Very nerve-wracking because, like, you know, she's going to bring it, man. Are you kidding me? We got the A-Team here. Oh, God. You're thinking, what's the puzzle? How am I going to say these lines? Well, that's how I felt.

That is exactly. I felt like. Everyone usually is nervous at that thing. Yeah. Everyone's nervous. Yeah. Well, because also, I mean, young people get nervous, too, because they weren't. around in the days when you would do a read-through at a pilot and then get fired.

Based on the poor performance in the read-through. I've been in a pilot, they don't even do that many read-throughs anymore and what should I do. But when I read for this pilot, it was like basic ABC, whatever. And then they go, read-through is great. And the next day, you're like, hey, where's this guy? Oh, they got fired. There's a new person playing them. I'm like, from yesterday?

What happened? From the read-through? Yeah. They're like, oh, they bombed. I'm like, they did. Like, you don't even notice. You're like, what are they looking at? I don't even know.

That's what scares me. Like, how about a rehearsal and a run through to see if they bombed? Yeah, let's see. Give them one more goddamn swing at it. Like, it's terrifying. You hired them. Yeah. It's a quick, it's quick decisions.

It's all. And then what was your first day of shooting with Ray? Did you have your scripts in your hand? Let's get it on its feet, people. All right, quiet, everybody. All right. Lisa. Number one.

Number two, we're going to run lines. All right, go ahead anytime. Let's go ahead, mark this one. And then you do it five times a row. There's little titters from the crew, and then less and less, and then finally just dead silence. All right, we're ready to shoot it. Your confidence is totally. We beat it to death.

Let's shoot it. Yeah. Beat it to death will be the sequel to No Good Deed. Beat it to death. Dead to me. No good deed. Beat it to death. That's so good.

That's funny. I wanted to make it clear for your listening audience. Yeah. Well, we won't give too much more away of that. Titles are tough. But it's on Netflix right now. Yeah. And all eight shows are available.

You can binge it tonight if you want. And it is good. I mean, it is bingeable. Someone was talking about it the other night. It's got like an 89% of rotten tomato. Yeah. It got 102% rotten tomatoes. Yeah.

It's fabulous. Extra. came in. I want to ask you a little bit about Romie and Michelle because I know you get it a lot, but it's such a big one, especially when it came out. And you must still hear about it all the time. It was such a cool one. You still have the Halloween costumes, girl.

I love it when you do something that's a Halloween costume. It's so fun. Yeah. Yeah, that is fun. And when was that? What was that? It was 97, is it said? 97.

Yeah. May 96. Movie haydays. That's right around when movies were like such, it's so fun. How to do opening weekend? Wow, it was number two. It was in variety. Even my mom would go.

It looks like it was number one. I don't know. Titanic. Something with a car chase in it, I think. I don't know. Fast and the Furious. One. That was before Titanic.

The Vin Diesel story. It was a doc. Yeah. But I remember doing talk shows for that. And it was like, you know what I like about this? Jay Leno, actually, who's very nice. And well, I'll say it and then you can DJ. He'll do Jay Leno. And he said, you know, I like about this that it's two women, but it's not, you're not man bashing. You know, it's just, it's two women and you're funny and it's fun. And it's not against men. You know, you're not man bashing. You know, it's just two women. And you're just two women. And you're just two women. having fun. You're not bashing the men.

It's just a great little movie, you know? I mean, I thought it was tremendous. I thought it was no man banishing at all. I'll say it one more time and then I'll let you talk. No man bashing and the whole thing, you know, you gotta be careful with the man bashing because you don't know what you got in there. I got a little silly. That's so funny, but I mean, yeah, but it wasn't about men.

It's a big victory that was, that was your victory. Listen, we didn't do a man bashing. Was Thelman Louise man bad? I'm thinking of a man. There were abusive men and predatory men. Oh, yeah. Oh, in that way. So Thelma Nuis had Brad Pitt seducing Sarah Saran,

Susan Saranid or something. But they were escaping a bad husband. Another bad guy, yeah. Okay. It's as if like, right, that's not fair because that never happens. Yeah. Wait, no, it happens a lot. I mean, if a woman would have a lot of people like to see.

Quite a bit where the estranged husband is not happy and he has a weapon. Right. I mean, if a woman is missing, who's her husband, who's her boyfriend, you know, that's the first place you look. But it was just funny to me that it still needed to be contextualized. Like, in relation to men, yeah. Yes. Yeah. And it was very, you know, what I get about most of my comedies is,

you know what I like, it's so fucking dumb. That's what we need. Yeah, but we do. I know. I love it. Believe me, I'm doing one right now. It's hard, but Rovonne the show was, was clever, cute, fun, and a smart little comedy that, you know,

and then I don't know, so you do it and you don't, you might not expect a lot. You don't know what to expect. It does well, right? Yeah, I don't expect a lot. It did fine. It could have done better if it weren't rated R. Oh, was it rated out? Oh.

PG-13 is the way to go. Interesting. I thought that was a huge mistake and it was to save. Oh, for that movie? I don't remember one thing R about it. What was it? Gin Giroffalo said fuck off, I think, two times or three times or something. Over one and you get an R, I think. And the big stand was, I'm not changing Janine Garofalo's fuck-offs.

And I went, I don't think she'd mind. And I think she wouldn't care. If it's holding back another 50 minutes. If it's like 40% of the net profit, what are you going to do? Unless it's just a cause, make a movie called Fuck Off, You know, and do that. 14-year-old girls would have gone maybe more than once to the movies by themselves to see it. I mean, those would come over and over. Because they all wanted to be those characters.

I watched it, and when I heard R, I went, okay, who do you think this movie's for, though? A hundred percent. I can't, I would never. Right. Who goes over and over? You get lucky they go over and over and that's young women would have gone to see that. Yeah. I thought that was a mistake personally.

A thousand percent. My God. PG-13 is the move. Remember Greece is the move? PG-13 is the move. But I don't know about that. Grease is the word. Have you like, so you grew up in the 90s as a star.

I'm sorry. Greece is the move. It's the move. John Travolta was an incredible businessman. I think he got he got some publishing on that and also on, because he came around and hung out. He's a super nice guy. Oh my gosh.

He's the guy in show business, potentially I've ever met. I mean, we all went to, we all went to Bruce. No, Tom Hanks' birthday party up at, in, up on, whatever, the planetarium. Oh, Griffith Park Observatory. And everyone was there. And you'd say hello to someone. You could tell they're like, oh, my God, I'm talking to you right now.

But Springsteen's over there. They were panic trying to. And Travolta just wanted to hang out with us and talk about airplanes. Because I have a fear of flying. He goes, you know, on airplanes, only as safe as its maintenance. But anyway, he was just a great. He is a great guy. He's a great guy.

Yeah. So I always see that picture of his house with a 747. driveway. I made it big because he pulls out and he goes, going to work on. 747? Yeah. In Orlando 7.07. 707 from 1950. But yes.

Yeah, I flew on his plane. Oh. You did? And he was flying it. I did a movie with him. What was it? What was the name of the movie? Like 99.

The fever? No. Yes. You don't remember me? Michael, the angel. the Angel movie? No, no, no, no. But Nora Ephron directed it.

It was called Lucky Numbers, I think. What was it called? I'm looking to see if I have anything. You're looking to see if anyone was in it. But anyway, it didn't do well. It won Nora Ephron, John Travolta movie. God, dang, Nora Ephron, too. It didn't do well.

But I got to work with him and he is the nicest. Yeah, it's something about him. Mm-hmm. Because it's not about him. Yeah. And he didn't, like how big he was. I've always found it was interesting that Tarantino, because he did the talking dog movies with Kirstie Allen's up.

He was like he was so. The talking baby. Yeah, talking baby. And he was so huge with urban cowboy and all around us. And then Tarantino, you know, the studio is like, you know, you want Travolta, really, you know? And he said he knew, because he. would walk around L.A. with Travolta, and it was still stop traffic.

Yes. People would swarm. Good looking, tall. But what about Sarnat Viva in Greece almost back to back? And you go, I think it was back to back. And the hugest hit. And then another monster hit, both with music, both crazy. Right.

And then Urban Cowboy. And then Face Off. And then. Oh, yeah. Face Off. And Michael was huge. Everything. Michael was huge.

Everything. And Luke was talking. I mean. And then Pulp Fiction kind of put him in this other kind of lane and then he went from there. But anyway. Yeah. John, if you're listening, you're always welcome to come on and we'll just talk about. Yeah.

A Deborah Winger. We'll say, what was that all about? That's urban cowboy. Yeah. I saw your, on stupid Instagram, I saw your urban cowboy with Debringer sketch and you played Trowled like two days ago. And that was, I'm talking, Dana. And then Lisa, I saw.

I even forgot that. I did. Oh, with Deborah Winger. Yeah. Friends. Friends is so big. I saw an Instagram today about you guys splitting a check.

And I saw it an hour before this. I'm like, splitting a check. Well, you were like in the real show. Oh, oh. You're deciding.

It was show 108. 6.9. Oh, yes. 106. Yeah, that one. That was a great one. That was one of the good ones. Yeah.

And you're deciding what to pay. And I'm like, it's still. I mean, you don't have to talk about it too much, but it still keeps going and going. Yeah, it does. It does. The gift that keeps giving. Did you ever wear a disguise, like at peak Friends of Mania?

It's too famous. Too famous. Did you ever, did any of the cast ever wear a disguise? Not that I know of. Yeah, okay. No, I don't think so. I mean, also, it wasn't so bad for me because I'm married to a person who's not in this business. So there's no sort of interest in, there wasn't any interest in, how's that couple doing?

Oh, out there with the tabloids. So you're not on Daily Mail a lot, I've noticed. And is that a disappointment at all? No. I don't follow you. You kind of think everyone's out in the tabloids, but it's really kind of similar characters a lot. And then you realize, oh, so many people are not pursuing. that path of celebrity within their career.

And you forget about them. You forget they even exist. Yeah. Just their work, you know. Yeah, that's okay, too. Yeah, some lean into it and some of you can't totally avoid it, but some really lean into it and some tip off. More people tip off than regular people know.

Because really, are they at the bowling alley and there's five photographers there? Like, why? And also there are certain restaurants. if you go to them, no, there will be paparazzi there. Yeah, they'll call it out. But then, to be fair, there are some people and, you know, if something's going on in your life, you know they just stalk you. Yeah, they wait in front of the house.

To, yeah, see where you're going to go and what you're going to do. That's definitely legit. Yeah. That does happen, I think, to a lot of people. For sure. That's horrible. You know, to be nice to people who don't know what show business is, is and you're at some school function and they sidle up and hey how do you how do you make that

friends type show you know what do you what do you know those kind of nice sweet people are really just interested in wanting to say the right thing yeah they just you know well we rehearse a lot yeah i didn't get a lot of that but you know what i get a lot of oh yeah i don't know i didn't watch uh that show why did they always say it's they really want to let you know and i always say, oh, sure, yeah, no, a lot of people. There are plenty of people who, you know, didn't watch TV or it's like, no, I mean, I watched, okay, I liked Seinfeld a lot. But, and one time it was, and it's a good friend too who said, but that was, that was more of a,

that was more of a girls show, wasn't it, friends? No, I don't think so. Was it? You know, I asked my husband, he's like, no, it was for all guys, too. Three of us were guys. Yeah. Some people liked Wayne's World. It wasn't my cup of tea.

I'll tell you that. Who? No. Has anyone ever? Oh, yeah. You just get all kinds. I guess you get all kinds. Oh, yeah.

No, I don't watch those kinds of movies. We go to the art houses. It's not my thing, you know, but I guess some people really did like it. Are you from Canada? I think so. I'll have to check my driver's license. But, yeah, it's a showbuss it's just a funny thing. And when you get inside of it, you just see all the,

how the gears move and the insecurity. And, you know, you're on a sound stage somewhere and it looks all greasy and ugly and stupid. And then you see it later in the film, it's all shiny and color corrected. And so it's a show. I think there are people who just want to let you know, like, I'm not a fan so you can trust me.

Yeah, that's true. I'm not after anything. Right. I don't want anything. I'm not a fan. I couldn't care less that you were famous and on TV. I just like you. I don't care about it. is the number one person that cares about celebrities.

That's the first telltale sign. And do you host fundraisers? Do you do that kind of stuff? I have for things I'm involved in, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Do you have, do you have, do you have like, stick? You don't know.

I always let them go. Do the things in grade school. Yeah. Tavia's dream, everybody. Dana, when I was on Just Shoot Me, it was right around the time of friends. And when I heard they were getting favored nations, I was hoping it meant all sitcoms. So we'd all get the same whatever they got. Turns out it was not.

No, that was hard to get. Oh, yeah. Well. I mean, they wanted nothing more than for us to split up. Divide and conquer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whoever thought of that was smart. Keep the team.

Yeah. It was Courtney or Schwimmer, depending on who you're talking to. Yeah. But Courtney's pretty smart. Yeah. About stuff. She'd worked a little, she, I don't know her trajectory exactly.

I remember from the Springsteen videos when she rocketed out, you know, right? Right. She probably may have a little more experience. Well, she was on family ties and then she was Ace Ventura. Right, right, right. But I think the first minute she made any money, she bought a house. and then was flipping houses and I think made more doing that. If I had her money, I'd love hearing that.

I love when show business people leverage their income and make money. Yeah. And take care of themselves. She's so smart. I mean, also just like with blocking, we would block scenes and you'd be stuck. And Courtney would say, well, you should just stand over there and you do that. And that way it's easier. And she was always right.

And she was also the one when we were first, like, shooting the pilot or I don't know if it was then or got picked up. She said, listen, y'all, I did Seinfeld. They help each other all the time. Like if you think I could be doing something funnier, tell me. You got to tell me. And we need to help each other out. So that set a tone that I think carried through the whole 10 years for us. That's really cool.

Yeah. Otherwise, it can get, you know, I mean, David, you've been on shows where it can get tense amongst. Casts don't normally love each other. Also, if things happen or someone gets more money or someone gets more jokes or something, there's always trouble. Even photo shoots are weird sometimes. Yeah. So many little things you don't see coming and you go, oh, itchy, itchy. Yeah.

But you're always. On SNO, it was different. Sorry. I was saying like, and just shoot me even though it wasn't obviously a friend's show, but we did about seven years. And George Siegel, Wendy Malick, we had all done stuff. Yeah. And also had good and bad things. And so everyone was like at a point where like we're really lucky.

Yeah. So it was a little easier to get through it all. Okay. Because we appreciated it. We were like, hey, this is going to go away tomorrow. And so I think it might be harder for you guys because when you're, one, you're, one, of your first things, if not your first thing, is so monstrous. Yeah.

I don't know how you think nothing else could be like this. It's too good. You go, and then I'll do this and it'll be it. And then it just seems like it's a weird, weird world to deal with. Yeah. I mean, we did all fully appreciate. That was the other rare thing. Because we would check in and check each other all the time.

you know um and we had to answer to each other if we were going to create a disturbance you know like i got to do this is that all right with you guys if i leave early and my stand in does that you know it was it was it was it was great to be accountable everyone was accountable to everybody else and then we'd all go off and like they'd let us which was really nice go do a movie and you know you come back and shoot your pickups and stuff. And everyone would say, well, I'll tell you one thing, movie making is for the fucking birds because no one's running up offering me a sandwich there, here.

Raycraft service and, you know, we rehearse most of the time. The more you do it. It's like the more you do it, the more you get paid and the fewer hours. I think it was either David's paid or Tony Dan Zan. that told me that he got it down to 17 hours. I don't know. It was not a week? A week, you know, just for the read-through of the thing, the blocking.

Just... Will and Grace got pretty tight. They were across from us. And they got very... I was jealous. I'm going to lunch. They're all driving away in their porches. I'm like, hey, guys, this is a half day.

And I'm like, no, this is their whole day. And I'm like, you're joking. Wow. Well, I think also they had Jim Burroughs. Yes. Most of them, right? Mm-hmm. So yeah, I mean, they knew what they were doing.

And then they probably had early run-throughs. Yeah, early run-thrus are great. Yeah, the writers like it, right? They write a draft. You run it through. And then they don't really need you for a while. Like, okay, now we're just going to go work. It falls on them.

But at first they would have us do the run-throughs at like five because they wanted to be in the writer's room most of the day and then come see it. But then they'd have to do all the rewrites that night. Oh, right. up really late. We got ours down at 1 o'clock on like a Wednesday that shoot on Friday and then she come in, rehearse, go through everything once

run through and you split. But did you do a Monday read-through or a first day read-through whenever you shot? We did the first seven years, I think. And then they had a... We also would shoot. They'd have a start

at like six or seven at night on a Friday. How late you go? till like two in the morning. Oh shit, really? Yeah. And it took six hours to shoot our show. They did a lot of rewrites because the audience, I guess, would get tired of a joke.

So, oh, okay, well, maybe. I don't know. They just wanted it to be as good as it could be. We'd have hair and makeup changes. Yeah. That busload of youth prisoners in the audience. They would go, hey, they'd be. didn't like it. I'm like, well, we liked it all week. We can't totally go by them. I know.

I would think it's a, this is for a television audience, though. Yeah. It's not the people that would come here. Yeah. And also, you guys had more pressure because it's a bigger, it's probably a little more overthought because it's a big deal. How does this fit in? Well, people like this show. I could see that going a little longer. It took, I mean, it was sort of notorious for taking a lot of time to shoot. Would you get fidgety? No, no, and luckily we were all, you know, young. And you knew it was your hard night. You know ahead of time.

This is going to be a little. Yeah, and we knew. But it got to me when I was pregnant and felt like I had a flu for seven months. And then to be there two in the morning, it was, that was a little too tough. My husband had to come drive me home a couple times. Sure, I get it. And then I think we just said, how about we? start earlier.

Someone got that. Where was Courtney earlier? Yeah. Yeah. And we were told, yeah, I don't know if we can get the audience. For friends? Really? People can get off work if they have tickets to the show.

And people fly here on vacation. To see the show. For sure. Pretty sure. So we would. We started earlier and then we'd have two audiences. Oh, you, oh, wow. No one can sit for that long and watch, six hours. Fucking jelly beans. Pizza. Pizza is the stock thing that goes out. Yeah. Yeah. The audience warm-up guy,

that guy gets burned out. Can you imagine six hours he had to keep everybody? I would hear it. They'd go, hey, and there's David Spade. Come say hi. And I'm like, don't make me come on. I'm running my line. Really? Yeah, but dabado do. And then they say, hey, do this. And then, but you know, you feel for the crubs. And would you? I'd go over.

Yeah, yeah. Because they're there. They're super tired. I don't even know if we gave him pizza. I don't know what happened. This guy had a million. Six hours. Oh, yeah.

We had to give them pizza. Give them something. Let them live. A hard candy. A butterscotch wasn't going to be enough, I don't think. We got a bowl of Skittles. Don't forget it's at the bottom of the stairs. Skittles.

Don't go crazy, though. When did Peak TV end? I mean, was Big Bang Theory the last water cooler show? Or was it Friends or Will & Gray's? Maybe it was the last kind of big, big network sitcom. I think so. Now you get like maybe 800 people or whatever it is. It's a best been renewed with a 1.1 rating.

Yeah, 0.8. Yeah. Amazing. But I think they want one. to try to make multi-camera work again, just because, you know, it's on a stage. It's not as expensive to shoot, and it traveled really well.

Something about it works. It's been working for years. It's been working for 50 years, so 60, 70, like... It can, but you know what? It always seemed to me things that didn't work were usually missing funny people and good jokes. Right. Good joke writers. You know?

I need it. It's pretty basic. It's good. It works, you know. It is basic. But, you know. Modern family was a good big one too. That was one of them.

Oh, yeah. But it wasn't in front of an audience. It wasn't. Oh, that's right. That's right. I don't know. And it also had the docu-sitch. You're like, and also that's not really what we're talking about right now.

I'm like, yep. I just get, what documentary is this? Yeah, I know. Who's watching this 10-year documentary about this dumb family. I've been in situations on a movie where the brain trust is around the camera and there's a take

and they're beside, they're bent over like it's the funniest thing and I go we're so fucked. It's over. The brain or daily as they used to have. The brain trust is like, oh my God. You're like, no, this is death. You can tell it's bombing. It's bombing.

Although I have to say I'm not a great judge. Like when I see something and I think, oh, that's too broader. I don't know if that's very good. And then it's, you know, the audience's favorite thing that's ever happened. There is that element of comedy where you're like, really, that was the one that killed? Okay. Yeah. Or you do a show. Like a movie and you go, I remember some movies I did where I go, this was the scene that tested the highest, just because it's like one shot. But when people watch it for 10 years, like a Romeo Michelle type movie, some of my movies,

they go, these are my favorite things. And I'm like, it's not what it was the first time when it came out. It switches, like, they see it so many times. Now they like this and like that. Yeah, yeah. The real throwaway jokes and that kind of stuff. Yeah. But initially, the big jokes are like the easiest ones to get. Yeah. After the movie, they go, did you like that one? And everyone goes, sure, and they're like, okay, that's your favorite scene. All right, we're going to fill out our card today. It's a scale of one to five and just, you know. Remember what we talked about. Remember what we talked about earlier? And thanks for participating.

And we're sure I appreciate it. What's a word of David Spade's character? Stupid. Okay. Well, that's not one of the choices. We're going to have you just write them down on your card and hand them in to the front. If you thought the dog was cute, we have another special card to put it on. Exactly.

That's exactly what those test screenings are. I know. Who would you want to see more of? Yeah. Who should we cut out of the movie and fire immediately? Lisa, thank you for talking us. We'll let you go. It's very nice to have a long chat with you.

No good deed. No good deed. Thanks. Thank you. On Netflix now. We enjoyed it, Lisa. We'll see around campus, as they say. All right.

Bye. All right, listen, if you're enjoying the fly on the wall, of course, hopefully you are. Click follow. We don't want to be desperate, but obviously. You obviously smash that goddamn button on your favorite podcast app. Smash it. Leave a review, a good one. Leave a five-star rating, nothing else.

Whoops. And maybe even share an episode with a friend. If you're watching this episode on YouTube, please. Subscribe, Dana. What do you think? I'm gonna tell you this right now. Hit me now, believe me later. Fly on the Wall, believe it or not, is presented by Odyssey.

And executive produced by Hold For It, Dana Carvey and David Space. and David Spade or David Spade and Dana Carvey. We don't write this stuff. Heather Santoro, Greg Holtzman, and Leah Reese Dennis. The show is edited by Evan Cox with production support from Phil Sweet Tech. Talent Production and Booking by Sophia Lippor.