Inside Late Night with Mark Malkoff - Inside Late Night: Gideon Evans & Kathy Egan-Taylor

Episode Date: March 17, 2026

Gideon Evans and Kathy Egan-Taylor have spent decades behind the scenes of some of comedy’s most ambitious shows—from The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and Michael Moore’s TV projects to Da Ali G Show, Brüno, Billy on the Street, and more. On this episode of Inside Late Night, they join Mark Malkoff to share stories from the field, including producing pieces with Stephen Colbert, Rob Corddry, Ed Helms, and Steve Carell, the challenges of landing—and keeping—interview subjects, and the art of making a segment work when plans fall apart. Along the way, they revisit Jon Stewart’s early transformation of The Daily Show, encounters with Donald Trump and O.J. Simpson, getting banned from Disney World, and the unpredictable realities of producing comedy on the street. They also discuss their podcast, Bad Elizabeth, which explores the lives of infamous Elizabeths throughout history.

from late-nighter.com, it's Inside Late Night with Mark Malkoff. Welcome to Inside Late Night with Mark Malkoff. Today I talked to Gideon Evans and Kathy Egan Taylor, former staffers from the Daily Show with John Stewart, who were here to talk about their late night careers and new podcast, Bad Elizabeth. Gideon Evans and Kathy Egan Taylor, it's nice to see you both. Hello. Nice to be here. I hope you have a power in your home.

Oh, I do. That was, yes, people that are listening, 50 hours of no electricity this past week. So thank goodness for blankets. It was pretty bad. So yeah, I had to cancel this and a bunch of things. So I appreciate the reminder. Yes, not fun. There is almost too much to talk about in one episode.

I mean, about late night and we're going to get to your wonderful podcast series, Bad Elizabeth. We're going to talk about a lot of things. But I want to kind of go through the timeline. We're going to skip around. But you were both officemates at the Daily Show with John Stewart around. What year would have that been? I'd say it was between 2003 and 2006.

But I started earlier. So I started at 2000. John had just been on the job for six months when I started. So Gideon, when you got there, is that still when John was the writers were pressuring? John to do kind of like what Craig Hillborden was doing and John was trying to make it more political and there was tension. Did you see that? I saw some of the tension, but I didn't see all of it because that was the writers. And while Kathy and I both wrote, we were field producers technically. So we weren't privy to a lot of the writers' conversations. But I remember that and I do remember there

being a bit of tension. And I think I was in the meeting where John was like, look, I'm the new host. is just the way it's going to be, and you just have to get used to it. And I think that was that. And then people started getting used to it, and the rest was history. One of the writers that was there was telling me that they were all, he said, we were all so upset that John was moving in this other direction. And then we started winning Emmys and admitting that they were completely wrong about John, the direction of the show. And it's amazing. Kathy, I wanted to talk about you working on the field pieces. What is a piece or two that you're either proud of or that was memorable or surreal and who did you work with on that and how did you make it all happen?

Well, I was fortunate enough that getting will understand this too, but when you're in field producers, you're in rotation with certain correspondence. So your numbers come up together. So I did a lot with Stephen Colbert and Rob Cordray that were really fabulous. I mean, one of my favorite ones, though, was with Dan Bacadol, who didn't last very long on the show, but this was his test piece. And I'd found an article in the LA Times, and the picture of it was a guy dressed in an Elmo suit, you know, being thrown across a cop car being handcuffed with a cigarette, you know, in his hand. And it was about the Hollywood Walk of Fame, you know, the characters that go there and people take pictures with them. And apparently Elmo was shaking down people for money and which the Superman character did not like. So there was all these, you know, problems.

So anyway, we flew to Los Angeles to do this story. It's Dan's first story. When we get there, the guy who was the Superman, who looked just like Christopher Reeve, actually, had decided that he was going to do a shoot with Jimmy Kimmel instead. So we actually had to wait the entire day until he was finished shooting. And we hung out in a brookstone and just sat in chairs, knowing about each other.

And it was a great piece. It was a very, very funny piece. But so there was a lot of memorable pieces, but mostly they remember when things went terribly wrong and you just had to fix it. And no one knows how terribly wrong they went. Because, you know, we literally would fly with our, correspondent and meet crews in the field. And sometimes people would chicken out, like your main

characters just wouldn't show up. And you have 24 hours to fly in and fly out and make things happen and also trying to make all the jokes, which a lot of the jokes were visual jokes, which writers who don't produce in the field don't realize that in order to fill up a Volkswagen rabbit filled with stuffed animals who go through McDonald's drive-through takes a lot more time than you think. So things like that. So I mean, I think the pieces I did with Steve and I love one of my favorite we did together. There was a law that they were trying to pass about there was a time there was a there's a style trend with really low hanging dreams and uh so this one South Carolina um congressman wanted to ban them because he said like um a waste is a terrible

thing to waste he didn't like uh seeing track so to speak but I remember him uh interviewing people and interviewing you know like people were very serious about this um this epidemic as they were calling it So there's many. I'll second that the idea of like things going wrong always. But yeah, I once shot a piece with Ed Helms and it was about this giant Walmart of strip clubs. It was like a giant chain that was putting out of business the mom and pop strip clubs in Baltimore. And our main character dropped out. And so we had to spend the day in Baltimore Red Light District looking for a,

a new character going to these strip gloves, and it was incredibly depressing. But those are the things that stick in your head. Were you able to pull it off with the person backing out? You still were able to do a piece, and it worked? Yeah, we had to. There wasn't, we didn't have the luxury of them just saying we're going to kill 20 pieces a year. It was like, it was kind of a big deal when a piece got killed. So there were pieces that got killed, and that would have to happen.

but it really was not something that people liked. So you just made it work. Were you both reaching out to potential people to interview? Is that also your job is to reach out? Yeah, I mean, our job also is we found the stories. We would have to pitch every Tuesday, I think, where we'd come up with story ideas and stuff like that and submit them. And then we would find the characters.

And we'd have APs that would help us with that. But we did a lot of the sort of, the sort of the legwork ourselves. And also, you know, our APs who were great, which feed us characters, but then, like, you know, we kind of wanted to vet them to make sure we had great characters, you know. Which is, I think that really sort of honed my skill on casting people was with The Daily Show. Also, I was just going to add that, like, when we were at The Daily Show, there were probably still some people that didn't know what the Daily Show was.

So that made it a little easier to book people sometimes because we didn't always, We didn't, like, deceive them, but we didn't always volunteer all the information. So later on, when the show became so huge after all the Emmys and everything, I think the bookers probably have a much harder time. Yeah, I was doing research on, I forget which one of you, but it was a religious figure that was kind of obscure, but they had no idea what the daily show was or what they were getting into. But, yeah, I guess once at the show got more established, that's interesting. Gideon, I was reading a newspaper article in 2004, and there was a gentleman. You did a segment with this gentleman who was going to vote, and they put a I-voted sticker on him, and he said that it ruined his coat, and he was, I think he filed something.

It was like to try to get that money back. How hard was it to get these people? There was a reenactment that you did, and they mentioned you in this article, but do you have any recollection of that or putting something like that together? You know, I don't have that much of a recollection of that piece. Do you remember that one, Kathy? I kind of do remember that. And it seems like it also could have been a TV Nation piece.

Maybe. Gideon, I'm going to do your quote. Getting your quote was, it's a real serious thing when people go down to the polls and get assaulted by a sticker. Oh, my God. That was your quote. That's so good. That's a good line. And usually I'm terrible with quote to the media.

Well, I do, I've actually experienced that where you, if you get a sticker and you have, are wearing like a suede or leather coat, especially. And if it's like moist out, if it kind of rains or it's humid, that will, there will be damage. But yeah, I mean, that type of story, I feel like booking probably wouldn't be that hard. Because it is just a ruined coat.

But there were, there were stories where you're trying to book right wing, anti-gay people where you where you just don't want them to know what our agenda would be, right? Kathy. Well, it's funny. Well, I was going to say one thing, I did, Ed Helms and I did a piece that was a field piece called, Why Do They Hate Us so much? It was basically about

the Middle East and we basically visited all the embassies, so to speak, around New York City. And we did get into the Afghanistan embassy and we interviewed like the General Counsel there and they were fine with it, but then Ed made a joke as we were leaving with Hamid Karzai was wearing a hat. And he goes,

hey, defraise come with that shake or something like that, making it like a fast food joke because it looks like a McDonald's hat. And then I remember it like three in the morning or something like I got an email that I had to write a letter of apology to the people of Afghanistan because we insulted Hamid Karzai and they were very upset about it. You know, and then, you know, there was, I'm trying to think of, you know, there were stories like, you know, that there were some people who knew what the Daily Show was,

but they were so right-winged, they didn't even care. Like I did this one piece about, about a, it was an ad for tourism in Philadelphia, and it was trying to get up gay and lesbian tourism and whatnot. And there was this outcry in the public there, and I'm actually from that town. So I called an ex-boyfriend of mine, who's a lawyer in the city, he knows everyone.

I said, who's the most homophobic person in the city I can interview for this? And he gave me the guy's name. And he not only said the most awful things, and we also edited together. It just seemed like he was listing things like he was really into fetish or something. And he actually wrote a personal letter to both me and Rob thanking us for being on the show. And he watched the segment. So you never know.

Did either of you feel threatened at all with somebody you were interviewing or the circumstances where something you thought could go really wrong? Definitely. Well, I actually have a story about that where I was shooting a piece with Steve Corell once. And it was a Florida town. I think it was on the west coast of Florida. kind of a town like most of Florida you're fine in if you're Jewish I mean I'm sure if you have you know dark skin it can be scary in certain types of towns but but usually I feel okay but this one town felt very like clanny to me and maybe it was just my being paranoid but we were

interviewing a mayor it was a you know a story about ridiculous laws it was a mayor who is banning Satan from the town and we would only come with one camera during those days. They probably changed it, but we'd shoot the interview of the subject of the interviewee, and then you'd flip the camera around to get the questions again. And that's when a lot of the correspondence would kind of play around and change the context, which probably wasn't very nice. But with her, she had her preacher in the interview room with me. So she probably was so preoccupied with the interview during the first part of it. But once the camera went around and the lights were being set up, you have a chance to kind of talk to other people. And she just

became aware that we were kind of making fun. And so it was really awkward. And I don't even know if we got all of the reasks. And then actually Mo Rocca and I shot in Puerto Rico once. And there was a mayor there. I don't know why it's all these mayors. But he was he got angry and Mo knows more Spanish than I do. I know almost nothing, but he got a sense that we were kind of playing around,

and we really thought maybe we were going to be killed. And there was a woman mopping the floor in the other room, and later Mo and I were joking that they'd kill us, and she'd sweep up our blood. But yeah, scary. It was a little scary. Yeah, that's an important point that Gideon brings up,

because, yeah, we did have one camera at the time. I would have to switch around for re-ask, which we would do when we say, this is just for sound purposes, but then we'd flip our jokes in there. Like, I remember interviewing this guy who was like the head of a watchdog organization for charities, and we did a piece with Rob Cordry, and we went out to some, it was basically,

it was like some MS charity where you, if you want a hole in one, you get a million dollars. And this guy did it, you know, and he actually, like, lived on a golf course. He was a great golfer, but it wasn't caught on camera, So they wouldn't honor that agreement. And so we went after that stuff.

And I just remember we tried to get Jerry Lewis involved. I think he did, he did correspond with us, but he wouldn't respond with that. But when you switch the cameras around and you have to, you know, do the re-ask. One of the re-asked was like, oh, you're head of this charity organization. Man, you must get so much tail. And the guy was like, and the thing is like, I couldn't get past it. So myself, I kept laughing. But you could tell when the wheels start turning, they're clicking.

And you're like, let's just get through this. Let's just get through this. But I think with The Daily Show, more other things like, I think when I worked with Billy Eichner on the street or with Sasha Baron Cohn, there were actual threats that were there. But the Daily Show was pretty much, the time I was there, it never got that terrible. It was more disappointing that people would bow out at the last,

like your main interview would just walk away, you know, or just not show up and you're scrambling, you know, to find replacement. Kathy, you mentioned you did work on the first season of the American version of Ali G and then you worked on Bruno. You mentioned that there were some real threats and were you present for any of them? And if so, can you share one or two of them?

Well, we did one, when I worked with them Ali G and I use my own name, you know, Kathleen Ann Egan, which is like the most benign Catholic-sounding name you can have, which was what they wanted because some of the groups they were going after. And we did have, we did one thing where the character of Ali G wanted to be invested.

with the police department. So I got the Philadelphia Police Department to let us spend the day with them and in bed with them. And also I just said, you know, I'm from Philadelphia. My family's been here for years, you know, the Eagens or whatever. And then throughout the course of the day,

Sasha, as the character was doing, you know, doing target practice and shooting everyone in the nuts and, you know, doing all kinds of crazy things. And at the end, they kind of stood, they tried to take the, at the time we were shooting on like beta tapes. And they blocked us and they wouldn't, they wouldn't let us, they said, you know,

you can't have those tapes. and we're like, technically there are property. I remember I'm having sort of a standoff with the police and all I kept thinking, and we did get the tapes, but I'm thinking anyone who's named Egan in the Philadelphia area will not be protected by the Philadelphia police anymore. And there was, you know, like even on Billy on the street,

just running around, you know, in Manhattan, some people didn't love it, you know? And our cameraman guy got assaulted once pretty badly. And because we used to go up and down 23rd Street, which was a great, great to mind for characters, but there's one guy, I guess, lived in one of the buildings and he hated us. So at one point, the cameraman, and cameraman do all this stuff, they're capturing everything backwards. You know what I mean?

And he, this guy planted his body and, you know, knocked into his head and he fell backwards. And he had to do that on purpose, which was very upsetting. So, I mean, yeah, there was other, like when I worked on Bruno, we did a cage fight for the, with an audience of 2,000 people. And we pissed off these, these mixed martial art, you know, artists or whatever mixed martial arts fight. and that was a scary walk to the bus. That was Arkansas, correct? Yeah, we did it twice in Arkansas.

I've spent a lot of time in Arkansas. It's a beautiful state. Yeah. I was going to ask you, Kathy, when you were doing the first season of the American version of Ali G. Was there anybody that you interviewed, because I know was everyone from Trump

to Buzz Aldrin to New King Reg, was there anyone that actually knew who Ali G was or they were maybe suspicious that he was that he was doing the character? I think the only one who might have been suspicious was James Lipton, which was crazy. He was funny. He did a rap at the end.

Ali J. Sasha was trying to get him to do a rap and he did it. Yeah, I mean, I think he also, like, when we were like, usually the thing is with those things, like the crew, everyone leaves as soon as possible, and I'm usually stuck, you know, like sort of, you know, making sure if everything's okay. And he wanted Sasha to hang out. I don't know if he knew him,

but he was charmed by him. And he showed him around his home and showed him pictures of his wife and things like that. So he was lovely. I mean, the one that was really uncomfortable was Marlon Fitzwater, who was the former press secretary for Clinton. We went to his house in Maryland. And it was beautiful, like on the Chesapeake or whatever. But the thing that they would do when we would interview is that we'd introduce, you know, Sash, you know, Ali, the character, and he would leave the room and he'd be dressed in his garb.

And so you would have the person could react to me like, who is in? I'm like, well, he's a youth presenter for me. England. And I could actually say, honestly, I'm an American producer. I've never worked with him before, you know, and I wasn't telling any lies. But then I would leave the room so they couldn't appeal to me if anything was going wrong. And apparently one point I was sitting in the van and Sasha came running in as and he always stayed in character all day. And he comes running and he slams the van door and he's like, you got to go. And he's like, he's his east London speak. And I'm like, what are you saying? And he's like, you got to go in there. Like, you got to go in there. And apparently one of the questions. they asked Monter Fitzwater was, do you think Hillary Clinton drinks from the Fairy Cup? And he just stopped the cameras and, like, get out. And then, like, I went in there and he was just facing a wall. And he was just, like, leave my home, you know?

And so I don't think that, I don't know if that made it to air. I don't recall, but I remember later on the day, Sasha's like, you're a really good actress. I'm like, I wasn't acting. I had no, I don't understand what you're saying to me half the time. And, you know, I don't know what these situations. So it kind of protected things. But I mean, I know from other people who worked in other projects with him and, you know, where things were worse than that.

So, I mean, it wasn't, the good thing, I mean, I was a woman, so I don't think anyone was going to take a swipe at me. You both worked with Michael Moore. I want to skip around a little bit, but there's this infamous pilot that I had been told. I've heard stories about this for years. I know nobody that's actually seen the tape. But it was a late-night talk show pilot with Michael Moore for Fox. It was shortly after the O.J. Simpson verdict. And what did you witness from working on this? Yes, I worked on this pilot. Kathy and I actually met for the first time on TV Nation,

which was the first TV project after Roger and me that Michael did. And then we became good friends there. But this pilot by Fox, came later. And I was not like in the day-to-day of the pilot. I basically did some character acting and some weird stunt segments. I played Joe Camel for a segment that Patrick Farrelly produced. And so I wore the Joe Camel head. There must be young people who don't even know who that is. It was a mascot of a cigarette company. And people thought it was immoral because it was selling cigarettes to kids.

This is all a tangent. I'm sorry, but we were going into RJ Reynolds and basically ambushing them and saying, I'm Joe Cam, they got rid of the mask. So I was supposed to say, like, why'd you fire me? You know, that type of thing. It was silly, but very funny too. And so I wasn't there for the day to day, but I came to the tapings of this pilot, and there were regular guests.

Cheryl Crow was one, I remember, and like Molly Shannon. And I think actually John Stewart was a guest on it. And anyway, so I was there one night and they interviewed the guests and they show some segments. And then there was talk of like there's going to be a mystery guest. And nobody knew. The audience didn't know. And actually, most of the staff didn't know either. And so Michael introduces the guests.

And everybody starts clapping instinctively. And midway through the clap, this guy had come in. they realize it's O.J. Simpson. So they're like, yay, what? And so he's walking in, this is not like years later. It's like months later after this really controversial verdict. He beat up his wife. And then a lot of people believe he killed her in this waiter. And so it was a really risky, crazy thing to do. But it was unbelievable TV. It was crazy. Did anyone walk out? Anybody in the audience? Yes, yes, people walked out. People had brought books for Michael to sign because I think Michael had a book out at that time. People like threw the book on the floor. And Michael even took questions from the audience to ask to OJ. And people were, it was such a raw, crazy electric vibe. There was so much craziness in the room. And I had actually invited my high school director, Rory Lance, who I had been in. touch with. I just asked him if he wanted to come to a taping of a show. And afterwards,

he was like, that was the most amazing thing I have ever seen. Because it was OJ's first interview, I believe, after he was found not guilty. How did Michael Moore possibly get, I mean, everyone in the media was probably trying to get an interview with OJ Simpson. Did he know him? Well, I think I can answer that because I was, I was Michael Moore's personal assistant. Oh, wow. So I did his film. I did everything for him. And he was one of the few people who spoke out in favor of OJ. Like he actually went on NBC News and defended him.

So he was a pro OJ person and he probably was the only one. So I think that's how he was able to get him. It was just because OJ knew he was a fan or at least thought he was innocent. Michael Moore and Don O'Mire, two people. Right. Norm McDonnell. Didn't Norm MacDonald get fired over OJ jokes? Supposedly. I know that Olmeyer denies it, but Jim Downey and Norm, I'm sure, I believe that it was the OJ jokes were definitely some of it.

I was going to ask when you, Kathy, when you worked on Bruno, I remember seeing it in the theater, they did a fake talk show with Richard Bay, who used to have a talk show, very kind of like Sprigger. I grew up in Philadelphia. Yes, I know. It was very like yellow journalism. It was like on Moray Popovich. It was the ride of like, who's the birth daddy types of ser. Yeah, he started legit. And then he actually went to Yale drama school with, I think, Meryl Streep. And so he turned into this daytime personality. So it is your job to put together a fate talk show to get audience members. Do you have to pay them to get there? This is in Dallas. Well, we did. We did. I mean, there was so much. And the thing that was kid, like, we did three talk shows in that day with three different audiences. And then at the end of the day, Sasha wanted yet another audience.

And we have been trying to get audience members for like six months ahead of time with a team of like eight people doing that. So, yeah, I think we did, I think we paid them like 20 bucks or something to come or do you want to be part of a talk show. And Richard Bay was, he was a host and he was aware of it, but he just played the host.

So everything is authentic in that film. And I knew him from growing, and I was like, I remember you growing up in Philadelphia, you know? And so he was an interesting choice, but he was great. But we wanted audiences that were mostly like people of color, and then an audience that was an all-white, and then in an audience that was mixed, and that type of thing. So yeah, it took a lot to produce those things,

and also making sure that one audience, because we had scheduled three shows in one day, so to make sure the one audience that was cleared was out of the building before the next one came in. Because between one of the taping, some woman came in and she started screaming, he wants to kill babies! Because there was a, I think if you remember in the scene,

in the film, he was showing a picture of his son, he wants to adopt wearing like a beekeeper's mask and he's got bees all around to him and like and every like ridiculous stretch. So she came and I just remember one of my associates just basically like shoving the woman out the door like shut up, shut up, shut up. But we did do like the last minute we just went on the local radio and saying we're giving away free iPods if you come to this audience. So it was just in the field doing whatever you can. And the thing that was great with that versus with the Daily Show is that Bruno had a nice budget. The Daily Show, you know, like, you know, when things get wrong, we couldn't make this. We couldn't pay anyone. We

couldn't do anything. Kathy, did you ever see Sasha Barron Cohen break on character out of character for any reason when he was filming? Um, no. No, I mean, there were points where things would get dangerous and he needed to leave or he needed to get out of there. And it was just like, that's what he would do. He would leave. Um, so, but I never saw him break character. He rather, he never broke, even when you work with him all day, particularly like when he was the Borac character and that suit had never been cleaned. And he would be borat all day in the van and he, like, he talked to you and you were just kind of like, I'm just going to not have a conversation with this person. So I never saw him break. I mean, he's very talented. There's no doubt about it. Sure. Gideon, you worked on Jay Leno's NBC 10 o'clock

show. You did some, a bunch of field segments with who was it? Was it? Was it D.L. Hughley? Yes. What was that experience like? Were you at any of the tapings? And what did you witness? No. Yeah. I hope that, I mean, I don't have as much of an inside view of it because I did it from New York. So I'm sorry that it's not as exciting as it could be because that was such a weird time and a weird show. But I had ended up at CNN at one point in my career, working on news stuff. But then also they wanted to, everybody wanted to capitalize on a daily show type thing because the daily show people said that I watch my news from it and it was all young people, the demographic. So every network, even really serious networks, want to do comedy. So CNN was like, let's get deal hugely and do a comedy show.

And they hired some really talented comedy people, I mean, aside from myself, but Hugh Fink was on there from SNL and Chuck Sclar from Conan and just and then some colleagues of mine from the Daily Show doing field pieces. And there was a lot going for other than it just wasn't great. and it just never materialized. I think if we were on the show for a while, we would have figured out the balance. But then after that show,

that was right when Jay Leno got this 10 p.m., and he was hiring correspondence, and D.L. Hugley was one of them. And D.L. Hughley, which was very nice, he was like, I'll do it, but Gideon has to produce it, which was super sweet. So I said fine. And Glenn Clements actually was my contact there.

You know him. He's great. Daily Show. There was a James Corden did some amazing pieces with James Corden. Unbelievable. He did so much great work. And I think he actually replaced me at the Daily Show after I left. He kind of used my desk. Really? Even though you think I'm unreplaceable, but it wasn't that big a deal. But anyway, so yes. So I did these segments. I did it from New York. and we did one piece about California, the budget had exploded. So we did a piece about doing a bake sale for California to save the budget. And then we did a piece Obama had put in a basketball court at the White House.

And Nixon had put in a bowling alley. So we did a piece about bowling versus basketball. And that's really all I did. But we shot the pieces. I wasn't in the studio. And then I hired this great comedic editor, Matt Davis, to edit it. And we did all these all-nighters. It was actually a real grind.

But the pieces came out great. And those pieces were great. And the show just had a weird feel to it, right? Yeah. Yeah, it was definitely, yeah, short-lived. I was going to ask, Kathy, when you were executive producing Billy on the street and you had someone like a Will Ferrell or Madonna, how long would you have with the person and how much security was around? And how did you make sure everybody was.

How did that work? I mean, the thing with Billy on the street was that was great, like with Will Ferrell, he just walked, they would just walk on the set. We did have security with us, but people pretty much left us alone. It's New York City, so people are kind of used to that stuff and they weren't so star-struck. I mean, the Madonna thing was really interesting because, you know, we got this back and forth, back and forth with her manager, who's lovely. And she was going to be performing at Yankee Stadium, so we could go during a rehearsal.

But then she sort of like, she sent us a, she sent us a, She would do it, but she had a list of comedic that she wanted him to do with her, i.e., like, wears high heels and do high kicks with his dancers and all that type of stuff, and we're kind of like, it's not going to really work if she dictates the comedy, you know? And we really took a stand, and he did, and he just said, we're not going to do that. And we did some of the things, but I just basically said, it's not going to fit if you're, you know, not doing you. So that was great. And it was just Yankee Stadium, but the thing that was amazing was being able to watch Madonna,

Madonna rehearsed the dance routine. Oh, wow. If anything, she's an amazing performer. So that alone, I was just like, this is pretty cool. So I mean, security, I mean, it was, we also had, you know, with billing on the street, you had 10 PAs running after people scrambling to get releases from everybody, you know, like hoping that they'd agree. So there was stuff like that.

It was also in the summertime. There were lots of girls and dresses. I just had to make sure everyone was okay. I was going to ask you about the releases. So I'm guessing at first you'd, at first, you'd, If they sign it, you don't pay them anything. But if they ask for money or to get them, do you start at like $50?

And how high would you go up to get a release for something that you really wanted from somebody on the street? I mean, there was one character who reoccurred throughout the season. Atlanta was her name. And this is what the name was three. She was on her way to a show. But she kept saying, I'm on, I'm busy, but she kept talking to us. And so I was the one that was signed to her.

I think I might have given her like 50 bucks or 100 bucks. You always had cash on you just in case. But she was delightful. And she ended up coming back and she really loved the experience. But I mean, with all the releases for the stuff I did with Ali G and stuff like that, we had a blanket release and we offered everyone $100 for an appearance fee. And once they accepted that, they accepted money,

then they really couldn't. And we stood with them. We made sure they looked at the release and they read it properly. And I also learned a lot about sort of legal writing. I've always approached everything now, with what I say, what I don't say, and I always have that sort of legal in mind,

like, did I lead them on? Did I bully them and did this? What did I say? Was I, you know, misguiding them? You know, like the way you'd say for a youth audience in Britain who are talking to the people, it's tentatively called the making of modern America. So we want to talk to the great.

So you just flatter them into getting there. And you had a BBC press pass, correct? Not that I, we do. Oh, okay. I think, I mean, well, he had. cards. We had a lot of things, but I can't say that all of them were official. Were you there with Donald Trump? That was mine, yeah.

Oh, can you, what stands out about behind the scenes of that? Well, it was interesting because the lawyer, our lawyer, who was new with HBO, happened to be one of the lawyers who'd worked with Trump before. So he knew the Trump personality. So when we arrived at like 8 a.m. for the interview or just set up, he was in his office screaming at someone on the phone for about an hour. And I remember like remarking to the lawyer like he's, He goes, oh, yeah, he does that, you know, whatever.

So just to set up, you know, the situation. So he went in, he looked at it, he signed the release, he took the money, and he realized pretty spot early on that, you know, this was stupid. And he kindly, like, walked off. And you see it there, like we were able to show it. And, you know, it was an idiot idea. And he held his own. He was good in it.

But when everyone's, you know, they broke down, everything. And then he just looked at me and beckoned me. And he goes, you get into my office. And so I'm in his office with him. And he just screamed at me. As he, you know, anyone, anybody, and I just remember there's a tremendous view of Central Park from his office and Trump Tower.

It's just like the mouth of it. And I just turned my mind off, thought about Central Park, and just nodded and said, yes, okay, yes, yes, yes. Like, you wasted my time. I'm an important man. And we did this before The Apprentice was on the air. So we would have never gotten that interview. And I'm the one that got the interview with them. Like, we would never book them had the apprentice been working.

He wouldn't have had time for us. Wow. Gideon, you worked untotally biased with W. Camus Bell. What was that like? Yes, that was an interesting experience. And Camau is a really talented guy and funny. And I was brought on to that show. Again, I mentioned him earlier, Chuck Sclar, who's ubiquitous. He's just done so many things in comedy. And he writes with Chris Rock. And so Chris Rock and Chuck. Chuck had seen Kamau performing, and they both recognized how much potential he had. So they all got the show going. So that was before I got on the show. That was when it was on FX proper. And Kamau was also from San Francisco, which had a pretty cool comedy scene.

And like, Aparna, I can't pronounce her last name, Not Cheril. Yeah, she was on the show. She was on it. So, Hary Konda Blue, there were all these great people. And most of them were from San Francisco. So it really launched a lot of people. I got on the show. It was after the initial success of the show.

Hopefully I didn't cause it to die. There's rumors. I'm just kidding. Yes. No, I didn't. There were other forces at work. But, yes, they moved FX decided for whatever reason to move the show onto FX. X, which basically shows Simpsons episodes, and it had nothing else on it at the time.

It was basically reruns and then that show. And it was such a weird, terrible idea, unless the network actually wanted to kill the show. And that was their idea. But I got to run the field department there, and we did some really great pieces, if I must say, there was like a piece about an Indian guy who dressed up like Captain America that Harry Condo Blue was a correspondent on. And we did a piece about cop violence, too, that was actually pretty edgy and good. And it was tricky, too.

I think, you know, there were some sensitivities. I think, like, we would edit pieces in a way that would amp up the comedy. And Kamau was sometimes uncomfortable with that. And I was like, I don't really know how else to do these pieces. You know, they're not going to be funny if we don't edit. them in a specific way. As Kathy knows, all the editing is so important for this stuff. Did Chris Rock have any feedback as a producer on the show, or was he pretty much hands off? He was pretty much hands off. He did some segments, so I was lucky enough to do a segment that I now remember. Speaking of

Donald Trump, he was in the news. This was before he was president. He used the word cracker or said, like, Cracker is, there was some controversy about Cracker. Cracker being equivalent to the N-word, and it was an absurd conversation, because obviously the N-word is so much worse. And so I did do a segment with Kamau about the origins of Cracker, and we just interviewed people in Harlem about the word Cracker, and it was very funny. And Chris had this great part in it where he's like, where he thought he knew what the origin was of the word Cracker, and we were like, actually, we spoke to a, a word expert and here's what he told us. And Chris Rock was like, yeah, a white word expert. So it was just a great line. And the piece was great. But he really was. He let everybody do their things. And yeah, he was cool. He's just such a cool guy. And so is Chuck. Oh, Chuck Sclar. Yeah,

he was, people would know him from Conan. He played David Copperfield in a bunch of pieces on Conan O'Brien. Kathy, at TV Nation, were you there in person for the shoots? You mentioned you were Michael Moore's assistant. Were you there? And what stands out, like a shoot, one or two shoots that were just, you couldn't believe what was happening? Oh, I mean, it was, I traveled with him. And, I mean, I have to say, being, that job just taught me so much.

It was so valuable. I mean, you don't, when you're someone's personal assistant, your life is not yours because their life is more important. So obviously, that's part of it. But we did things like we did, he was, Michael was after Newt Gingrich for many things. And I remember we went down to a Republican Party like picnic fundraiser in Georgia, and Marietta, Georgia.

And basically we infiltrated the picnic. And I was assigned with disguises. So we looked like voters or local people. And we did have it. And we got into the auspices of film crew. But I remember going to Walmart and just buying Atlanta Braves T-shirts and baseball hats saying, like, of course they're going to think we're locals.

So I mean, there was a lot of that stuff. I mean, the thing that was interesting, like, obviously there was confrontation and people, he's so recognizable. I mean, he's still parried and relevant in the way he looks. But, you know, he was tough. I mean, I really did respect that. He never cowered and it never escalated into any physical violence. But there was a lot of things where you feel like a jackass, like, you know, I'm running to a van right now because I pissed someone off, you know. Yeah.

The funny thing is like the things that piss people off are the dumbest things. too. Like, you could get a, like, I'm sure Gideon knows this at The Daily Show. You could go through a whole interview and you could say, you know, all the most ridiculous things and they would, you would say something about like a kitten and they'd be like, that's not cool. And you're just like, you know, like, I'm just making up a reference that way. So, but, yeah, but it was always amazing about the thing. And all the time, you would, like, interviewing people who you are, like, sort of like-minded in your politics and stuff like that. And they were kind of like the worst people to be around with all day. And meanwhile, like,

when I worked at news at NBC and MSNBC, I had to regularly, like, talk with Wayne LaPierre, the NRA, as, you know, whenever we need to, he was like my contact. And he and I would talk about everything except the NRA. Like, we talked about the space program. Like, he was lovely, you know. So it's just always very interesting about the people you meet when you meet them in person. TV Nation, Gideon, you were banned from Disney World? What happened?

Yes, yes. Well, I played this character. Do you remember McRuff the Crime Dog? Yes, of course, yes. It was like a PSA they used to do in like the 70s and 80s, and he was the street crime mascot, essentially, was animated. And he'd say, we'd take a bite out of crime. And he was kind of like Robert Stack with a trench coat. And Michael was always like, well, yeah, they have McGruff for crime, for street crime.

But what about corporate crime? So he created, I think Jay Martel, who we both know, actually thought of the idea of crackers, the corporate crime fighting chicken, who would be a corporate crime. mascot. And so there was literally an eight-foot-tall chicken costume that I wore, and it was insane. And speaking of the Borat suit that wasn't washed, it was pretty stanky in there, because if it was hot, you'd sweat a lot. And there were about two or three guys that wore that at different times, and I was one of them. And I did it for TV Nation. There was a piece we did about Giuliani that I wore and was at City Hall for some reason. But the Disney one happened at The Awful Truth, which was a later show, which was on Bravo.

And so Crackers was like this superhero that would fight corporate crime, like polluters he'd go after and like factory farms. And there was one segment we did about Disney. The character actors at the theme parks were not being treated well. They were living in their cars, underpaid, and their costumes also weren't washed. Like the guys that played Chip and Dale, the Chipmunks, like got fungus on their, you know, genitalia because the costumes were so disgusting. So Crackers was on the scene and wanted to take care of it. And so it was fun. Nick McKinney, do you know him?

He's a really good producer who worked on Michael Moore stuff. and he's actually the brother of Mark McKinney. And Nick was a producer on this Disney thing. And we all flew down to Orlando. And we went to the park. We were with crews, but we used small cameras that looked like we were just tourists. And the crew brought their kids. So it looked like we were all a family.

And we had backpacks, which had the costume, the chicken costume in it. And we knew the whole place was surveilled. They had cameras. everywhere, you know, partly, partly because there were probably a lot of pedophiles that went to the park. So for good reason, probably. But we were there just to make regular mischief. And we went into the bathroom where we knew there weren't going to be cameras. And Nick and I went to stalls that were adjoining.

And he unpacked the chicken costume and put it under the stall to me. And I wore it. And then my, as the chicken, I saw Mickey Mouse as the C.E. of Disney because that's kind of the way his brain works. So I was walking around the park just saying, where's Mickey Mouse? Why is he treating his workers so badly? And people, you saw people that were like at a pretzel stand. They were actually security guards. A lot of people dressed up are actually security guards in the park. And they kind of came to life and we're like, what the hell is going on? And we got one guy on camera say, there's a situation in

fantasy land and they started like chasing me and I start running and then eventually they kind of stop me and their kids coming up to me they think I'm one of their characters and they're asking for autographs and they have to like push them away and then they took me backstage at Disney World and it's just this the theme park is so colorful but the backstage is just bleak and like really kind of scary it's like they have their own police department and you know they're all kind of like people who failed to become real cops. And now they're Disney cops. And they were pretty mean.

And they took a picture of me as myself and then me as the chicken. And I think they fingerprinted me. And they had a trespass. They were like, you're banned from all Disney theme parks, all the Disney stores, any Disney property I was banned from. So it was crazy. And the guy was like, if you ever come back here again, I'm going to lock you up. And I mean, I was just telling a friend about this.

Years later, I brought my kids to Disney World. And I was like, I wonder if this trespass order is still in place. And should I apologize? And I decided not to worry about it. And luckily, nothing happened. Because there's so many Gideon Evans out there. It's such a common name. Exactly.

Well, they didn't have facial recognition back then. That's right. Before we talk about bad Elizabeth and I have a lot of questions. Gideon, you did a documentary. This isn't the most recent John Candy documentary, but you worked on one for stars in Peacock Productions. What was that like? What did you learn about candy and who did you speak with? I mean, it was such a great experience. And this one that came out recently, that is called People Like Me, I think, is like the authorized one, the family gave permission. I worked for, yeah, it was NBC News. It was for this network called Reels.

And it was a dream, even though it wasn't like art or like some big high profile project, I just saw it as like, what could I be doing that is any more exciting than looking into the life of John Candy? And I don't know, it was just amazing. I talked to some of the SCTV guys, like Joe Flaredy, and we didn't get a lot of the big guys, but we got some amazing people like Jane Eastwood and like John Turtle Tabb who did that Bob Sled movie. What was that? Cool running. Yeah, and we talked to like, I mean, I got a lot.

We even interviewed Oliver Stone because John Candy was in JFK. So we actually, it's a really good documentary, even though it's not like high art. Oh, we did Ivan Reitman and he had died. since this new documentary came out. So we really actually got, there were so many great things. I learned so much and like crazy things.

Like I had never known that the movie Stripes was apparently written originally for, who are those comedians who smoked pot all the time? Cheech and Chong. Oh, wow. Isn't that crazy? And apparently when Ivan, when it was written, I think Ivan Reitman wrote it, but I'm not positive.

I think the manager of Chi Chi Chi Chi Chi-Chi. and chan got that script and he just didn't even forward it to them which is such so fucked up so um god i'm blanking on names but but after uh who is the guy that that was in ghostbusters uh bankman oh harold ramis harold ramis so yeah so the movie was for chich and chang so then when they passed and they got bill murray and uh yeah they basically just decided to rewrite it so Harold Ramis got the script and then they rewrote it and it's all this stuff and working on that thing about John Candy it's always a balance of I want to honor him because I love the hell out of that guy he's just the best and you don't want to spend too much time on like

yeah he had weight problems and he had anxiety but on the other hand you don't want to ignore it either so you do have to touch on some of those other things and like the director John Turtle Tab who had such wonderful things to say about candy, but he did talk about his anxiety and how he didn't, when they yelled cut on a certain scene, he didn't want to walk back to like a certain place because he was so heavy at the time. And, you know, you hate to kind of do these stories, but it is part of who he was. And Dave Thomas had some amazing stories just about how much anxiety candy had. So it was a dream project and I just loved. And I actually, and I actually, actually tried to get Michael Moore for it because he did one of Candy's last films, Canadian

Bacon. But unfortunately, when Michael got back to me, it was too late. We were, like, wrapping up. But it was just so much fun working on that. Strangely, by first week of working with Michael Moore, he was doing TV Nation, also doing post-production on Canadian Bacon, and Candy had died, which really impacted Michael. That was very upsetting, but they had to do reshoots. And one of them was a scene of John Candy's character jumping off.

a cliff. So we're going to get a body double that was going to sort of end the movie, right? And so my first day, I had to go down to 14th Street and find a wig that looked like the back of John Candy's head and hair for this body double to wear. So that was like, so that was

yeah, he did another film after that. But yeah, that's where he actually was found. Yeah, terrible. Sorry to depress everybody. Yeah. No, I'm glad. I want to check out the documentary Let's talk bad Elizabeth. How did this podcast come about?

And you both host together, which is great. But, Kathy, can you tell us about it and how it came together? Well, Gideon and I have been, I mean, we've known each other. Like we say, we were babies at TV Nation together. We were like in early 20s. And it was at the height of Howard Stern and Robin, obviously before series and all that stuff. And I always joked that he and I should be shock jocks together. But I would be the Howard and he'd be the Robin.

And he would just like, you know, just always chime in and go like, that guy's a dick. You know, like that was our whole shtick. And so it's always been, we've always been trying to work together over the years and throwing ideas out, especially like in TV and film. And we've written scripts together. But then with podcasting, it was just like an idea that I came up with this was like, there's so many bad Elizabeths out there. You know, it's a very common name. And it was kind of even looking at like some of, like they now have on, you know, like the real nightmares on Elm Street, which are just titles where they're like, there's an Elm Street. every city, so I'm sure something happened bad there, you know, and they can make a TV series

at it. I was looking at the way they were pitching shows, and I just thought, what if we just did bad Elizabeth and featured them every week, you know, from history, present ones? And he was like, that kind of has legs. And I throw everything at Gideon. And like, and he could be like, he's very good and like, he's like, yeah, well, I don't know, but that one he got excited about. And then that's when we started developing it together. But we throw ideas back at each other all the time, back and forth at each other. So we go wait with hypersticks. Who are some of the Elizabeths and Lizes and Lizes that you've featured so far? Oh, we've done eight episodes and we're about to premiere four more. And there are, you'd be surprised how many there are. There's Elizabeth Holmes. There's Lizzie

Borden. There's this, we did Queen Elizabeth I, the first. There's this Hungarian countess. We had Julie Delpy as a guest because she did a movie about her called Herzabet Bathory, and she bathed in blood. There was Elizabeth Finch. There's ones you know about, and then there's ones you don't. So it's kind of a nice mix. Yeah. And we did like Bet Wefelslaufer. We always had trouble pronouncing the name, but who was a Canadian nurse, who was like apparently the biggest serial killer in Canada because she killed her patients.

So that was interesting. So we sort of juxtapose it with history and modern ones. And we also did, like, Elizabeth Finch was the writer for Grayson and Adamie that sort of made up a cancer past history. So, yeah, it's kind of all over the place. And it's been a lot of fun. It's really fun. And it should be said, we aren't shock jocks on the show. We do espouse our opinions on these women.

And we try to be fair in, like, deciding whether they're bad or not. And we got a really nice write-up in The Guardian and the Irish Independent. And we work with someone, you know, Will Beckton. Oh, he's great. Yeah, we love well. So that has been fun. They have such a lovely studio in Studio City, Los Angeles. And I'm in Brooklyn, and Kathy and Will are in L.A., but I've been able to go out there for taping.

So that's been so fun, and we've gone out, and we've had, we've gone to these great lunch places near where we record the show. It's been so much fun. And the audience for the show is great. We actually have a really nice, nice bunch of listeners. How long does it take to research an episode? Do you have help or do you both do the research yourself? We do it ourselves. Yeah.

I mean, all the stuff we've been talking about, the Daily Show, all these shows we've brought up today has brought us to this point. It's part of what we do well. We like writing things that are funny, but we also like the nuts and bolts of producing, including like booking people, including the research, and your shoot is as good as what you come into it with. So if that makes sense, I know the grammar was weird. But we know, like, we have to have the good facts or it's just not going to be as fun as it could be.

So we do a lot of research and we try to find the best stuff. We're pretty like-minded about what we find interesting. Like even the most peculiar fact, I'll find in getting to be like, oh, that's amazing. And even like weird TV movies of the week, like we did a thing about Lizzie Borden. And then there was this weird movie of the week with Elizabeth Montgomery that Kathy found, who was in Bewitched. And she also played Lizzie Borden. And it was actually a big deal when it came out. And it made people turn against Lizzie Borden because it actually decided she was definitely guilty.

Like they show her hacking. Not to, no spoilers, but they made the choice to just show what happened. And actually, it's pretty controversial. I think she was probably innocent. But that movie of the week has made it that now people dress up like her for Halloween. It kind of term people against her. So there's a lot of it. And then what was the movie of the week we talked about?

What was Sharon Glass? She did one on Betty Ann Wilson. It's a fascinating story. She's a woman from Huntsville who has a fraternal twin sister. who the two of them sort of basically hired a hitman to kill Betty's husband. Betty went to jail. Her sister did it. It's still very much up in the air, this verdict.

And Sharon Lest played both roles. She was in Cagney and Lacey, of course. Of course. But she played Betty Wilson as both twins in a TV movie that was amazing. And she's great. She's so awesome. Her memoir is amazing, by the way. When you do an episode like Elizabeth Holmes, you know,

there have been documentaries and so much written about her. How hard is that to find new things to talk about that haven't been documented with someone like her? Is that a challenge or where do you go for that research? I think part of it is just finding new stuff like that one in particular is tough, but I also think we have to trust our own take on things. We'll feel unique. And also we do go on tangents about certain things. It was interesting because we also did one on Isabella of Spain and Gideon read this and all that stuff and Isabella, Queen Isabella. And I was just trying to catch up.

So I was looking on podcasts about her. And I found one that was a Catholic podcast about her that paints her as a hero. You know, like a hero. And, you know, like she's very special. So he was coming in this, I was like, I've been listening to some Catholic podcasts that really love her, you know. So we kind of like try to round things out and see how they, you know. know, what the other. Most people don't like the Inquisition, but this particular podcast, Kathy

listened to her, is like, she's awesome. She did a lot of work for Christianity. Yeah. When does the second season come out or is it out right now? Well, I don't know when this episode is coming up, but we have four new episodes. It's basically wrapping up season one. We took a pretty long hiatus. So these four episodes are coming up very soon. So when this episode comes out, out, I imagine episode nine will have just come out. And there'll be episode nine, episode 10, 11, 12. Then we'll be done with season one. And then we have to see about season two. Yeah, Bad Elizabeth produced by Jet Road Studios, Will and Amber Beckton. They're great. Will had me on Life and Comedy. I think you were a guest as well. So I got to go to his studio. That's awesome. Yeah, I love that episode.

Yeah, it was wonderful. Wow. It's amazing just to hear all your late night tales and just all your stories. And the fact, I love the fact that, you know, you can't force chemistry and you've been friends since, you know, for decades. So I really love this undertaking. And everyone definitely check out Bad Elizabeth. Gideon Evans and Kathy Egan Taylor, thank you so much for talking with us. Thank you so much as well. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Mark. This has been a pleasure. And I am looking forward to reading Love, John. Connie Carson. I'm sorry I haven't read it yet. Oh, that's all right. My mom did that's enough. I've heard I've heard great things. Oh, good. Okay. Yeah. Thank you, sir. Thanks for listening. Please subscribe so you never miss an episode on Apple Podcasts. Please rate it and leave a review. Be sure to go to late-nighter.com for all your late-night TV news. And you can find my podcast at at late-nighter.com forward slash podcasts. Have a wonderful week and I'll see you.

See you next Tuesday.