WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 653 - Lorne Michaels

Episode Date: November 9, 2015

In the history of WTF, Lorne Michaels is talked about more than any other person. Now he is finally a guest. The man behind SNL goes through it all, from the reason he started the show back in 1975 to the reason he keeps doing it. Meanwhile, Marc tries to get some closure on the meeting he had with Lorne 20 years ago that has haunted him ever since. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Alright, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers? What the fuck buddies? What the fucking ears? What the fuck, Tuckians? How is it going? I am Mark Maron. This is my show, WTF. Welcome. Welcome to you newcomers, to you first timers, to you regular visitors. Thank you for joining me today. This is a big day. It's a big day, people. we've been leading up to this day for a while now yes yes today is lauren michaels day lauren michaels is my guest on wtf today and then those of you who listen to this show know that's a pretty big deal. Some of us, myself included, I didn't know if it was ever going to happen. But it happened.

Oh, it fucking happened, people. And also, I want to tell you this. There is a companion piece to this episode. If you have a Howl Premium account, you can get a special WTF episode called Lauren's Stories. It's available now, and it's two hours of stories from throughout the history of WTF with more than 20 past and current cast members of SNL telling their best stuff about Lorne to me. Because I asked. Why did I ask? Because I have, or had, I'm going to put it in the past tense now,

a slight obsession with a meeting that I had with Lorne Michaels in 1995. All right, so if you have a Howell subscription, you can get this special episode. If you don't have a Howell subscription, go to howell.fm and use the promo code WTF to sign up for like $3.99 a month. Okay, 20 people from SNL over the years. I talked to about Lauren, like looking back on it. It's amazing. Like how obsessed I was.

It ebbed and flowed over the years. And this whole process of interviewing Lauren, it sort of came up. I was in New York. I was invited to see the first episode of this season. I'd never been to a It sort of came up. I was in New York. I was invited to see the first episode of this season. I'd never been to a taping of SNL. I would not go. Not that I was ever invited, but I had a couple of opportunities over the last two decades to maybe tag along with somebody to go, maybe my old manager, Dave Becky or somebody. but because I was resentful and I felt like I'd missed an opportunity to be on that show somehow, I blame myself sometimes.

Sometimes I blame Lorne. Sometimes I blame show business. But anyway, I went to the show and it was sort of an amazing experience. I waited. They sat us and it was Hillary you know hillary clinton was on and miley cyrus and uh but i'd never seen the the sort of mechanics of it it's it's a fairly intimate space there's you know there's chairs set up on the floor for the people that sit close to the stage it looked like an alternative comedy venue in that way and then there's all these sets and

then you're up in the balcony and there's just it seemed like 50 people moving things around there's an electricity to live television but when it came right down to it it was just funny people on the stage you know doing their shit trying to get laughs in that room which was a much smaller room there was a there was a humanness to the experience that i that i never really realized or noticed on tv just because of the amount of people involved in the production and the pace of the production. And Lauren is walking around from set to set doing things. I saw Steven Spielberg was there that night just hanging out with his family. Name dropping aside, the mechanics of it just on a human level is profound. So many people involved.

There's nothing else like that. It is its own thing that keeps operating in almost a theatrical fashion like a community like a town a village you know for for years for decades it was it was touching to me it made me have a respect for that for the process it held a place in my mind once and and the meeting with lauren obviously held a profound place in my mind once and and the meeting with lauren obviously held a profound place in my mind wow this this is a cathartic thing for me as you know if you listen to this show i've been hung up on this meeting i had with lauren michaels for the 95 season for for decades for fucking decades it's it's evolved and morphed and changed its position in my mind and how, you know, how I feel

about it or, or how I see it. I've talked to every, anyone who's been on SNL who comes into this, into this garage, I've talked about it because initially in my mind, you know, not only had I failed at getting a gig on SNL, but I had assumed all kinds of things about the situation. I've had that memory in my mind for so long. And when it was hot and new, I was like, I got fucked or Lauren doesn't like me or Lauren is evil or Lauren is some sort of demonic puppet master or I was used to pressure somebody else into doing something like, it was just a rabbit hole,

an ever flowing rabbit hole of possibilities of ways for me to either think i was fucked or that show business was fucked and but as time went on and i talked to more people from snl my my my feelings about lauren michael started to shift because i had talked to all these people that you know that saw him as this human person as this uh this creative guy this supportive guy, this guy who helps careers and shepherds people through things and also has a keen sense of comedy and television production. As time went on and I talked to more people, my sense of what happened in that meeting became less about me.

And I didn't like that shift in my mind. I liked keeping Lorne Michaels, this evil wizard who somehow shunned me and exiled me from a possibly much different career and show business, that he had that kind of power. And as time went on and I talked to people about it, I didn't know if it was even necessary to do it anymore. I know a lot of you are like, it was the white whale. Well, Ahab doesn't catch the white whale. And there were periods where I'm like, I didn't even pursue really interviewing him.

I made one phone call once a couple years ago to his assistant, Lauren, and said, does he know who I am? Would he be interested in doing this? And she said, he's out of the country. We'll get back to you. That was like a year or two ago. And I didn't really follow up on it because I didn't know if I wanted to do it anymore.

I didn't know what I needed. I didn't know what i needed when i did the audition i didn't know what i needed now it was emotional it wasn't professional which i think played into it into the reason why it didn't go well for me in the meeting and also now you know what did i really expect from this guy what what kind of closure was i going to get from lauren michaels about this thing that had been sitting like a benign tumor at the heart of my memory, you know, for what, two decades now. But now I have my opportunity. We talked about everything. Let me just set the scene a little bit.

So on Monday, my interview was for Monday, and we were to show up at six o'clock. Lorne that day was getting pitches from the writers with the host, who was Amy Schumer, in a room, and then he had to go meet Seth Meyers for dinner. I was sitting in the same place I was in 1995 waiting to see him for my meeting with him to be on the show. But it was completely different right out of the gate. Like there was the couch, there was a table, that was all in place,

but there was several desks and several people in the area outside of Lorne's office. In my mind, it was just a door, there was a desk and that was it. I think I may be confusing my real memory with that scene in King of Comedy where Rupert Pupkin is just sitting there with a woman waiting to see Jerry Lewis.

And then there's Lorne, I see Lorne. And I'm struck immediately with this moment of like, oh, fuck. He's just a guy. He's just a guy. He's a man. And this is his job. He works here. He runs this place. I walk up. I say hi. I say hi to higgins he gives me a hug i've got my recorder on we walk into the office and brendan's gonna set up the boom with the cord and i'm standing there holding my recorder and lauren is there and this was the first thing he said and and i think this will this will set the tone of the interview you're about to hear. Sorry to the lick on it. It was a reasonable delay.

This is the scene of the crime. You were here before. You remember. Of course I remember. Okay, good. What is established with that little soundbite is right off the bat, he was definitely aware of what was going on. he was definitely aware of what was going on so now here is

here's some time that I spent talking to Lorne Mike death is in our air this year's most anticipated series FX's Shogun only on Disney Plus we live and we die

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exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. Calgary is an opportunity-rich city, home to innovators, dreamers, disruptors, and problem solvers. The city's visionaries are turning heads around the globe across all sectors, each and every day. They embody Calgary's DNA.

A city that's innovative, inclusive, and creative. And they're helping put Calgary and our innovation ecosystem on the map as a place where people come to solve some of the world's greatest challenges. Calgary is on the right path forward. Take a closer look at CalgaryEconomicDevelopment.com. Yeah, I remember because I saw you on stage you saw me like yeah marcy had seen me somewhere yeah and i came in here it's a very loaded experience for me of course i mean people believe i'm obsessed with it and i guess we can start with it okay i came in here i waited an hour or so tracy morgan was

out there waiting with me do you know what day of the week it was where we were in production uh maybe i i wish i remembered that i you know i decided before i got here i was smoking a lot of pot at the time but i thought maybe i shouldn't smoke too much uh-huh and i got here and tracy morgan was there and his hair looked very shiny the hair was in very good shape yes i waited a while and i was reading a bruce wagner book i remember and i came in here and you were had he been on stage the night that you performed who tracy yeah i don't know if he was i mean i know that we went to um stand up new york right i remember anyways i come in here in my recollection there were books over here.

Was there? It's probably pretty much the same as it's always been. Right. Steve Higgins was there. I walk in and you said, how was Conan last night? Did they laugh? Did they laugh at you? It's better when they laugh. And that was nice. It was nice.

I was scared. And you'd done Conan the night before. Right. and then i sat down and then uh you you did you used a zoo analogy for comedians have you used that before monkeys and all that yeah yes yeah yeah so that's a regular thing no it wasn't a regular thing it was just my sort of beginning to piece together where comedians stood in hollywood right the the lions are scary when you go to the zoo yeah first first uh thing you want to see is the lion because the lion is the king of the jungle and uh and uh it has it's regal yeah and uh the second thing you want to see are the bears because they're the strongest and the fastest and the third you want to see the monkeys because they're funny and occasionally one of them jerks off.

Right. And what I said, I don't think you had added the jerk off line yet. Because I said, as long as they're not throwing their shit at you. Yeah. Got nothing. Yeah. Got no laugh from you. Well, I would have gone softer as you saw.

Yeah, yeah. Exactly. And Steve Higgins was like, this is not going well already. And did you know Steve before? Kind of. I met him once or twice. Like on the scene. Right, and then you just looked at me for a little while,

and Steve actually went, and you said, it's important to look in someone's eyes. You can see a lot in someone's eyes. And then I was trying to exude some star quality of some kind, which was not successful. God, you really remember this. Yeah, I remember it. And then in my recollection, there was a smaller bowl of candy.

And yeah, that's the Tootsie Roll one, but it's a Jolly Rancher in my mind. No, it would have been Tootsie Rolls. Well, I remember I i took one and at that moment you shot a look at steve and i thought i'd failed the candy test oh yeah no no there was no candy there was no no alternative candy there was just the one there was popcorn probably there right there no i didn't get popcorn yeah and that was sort of like um the my experience with it and then i waited and it and and nothing happened and i'd heard a couple of things over the years i'm not hung up on this no no no but where would where were we in 95 was this when when norm was about was renegotiating his contract i believe and uh and i i'm not sure

exactly who was on the cast i think i was being considered for a an update commentator role. Right. No, I remember that. But had we already made the transition to like Will Ferrell and Sherry? Was it 95? I think it was perhaps for the 96 season. So that cast was already in place. I think so. And then Tracy was added in.

Right. Yeah. Well, what happened? I think that what happened was it was a period in the show's history where the critical community and the network were on the same side, which seldom happened. I think that Don Omar, who was running the network then,

we were getting killed in the press. We were in a transition away from the baby boom. And you had people like Sandler and Farley and Spade. And Mike Myers was just leaving. Dana had just left. And so there was a sort of consensus. york magazine ran a cover on farley and why these people weren't funny right uh i think don omar felt it as well i kept saying they're not playing to you you know they're playing uh pretty much to your kids right uh

that we were in the middle of a change but uh at the time because the show was everything then was compared to the original cast right it was like they did they fit were they did they measure up and of course the idea that they were listening to different music that they were different from a different time uh didn't get through and as i said the critics were really fierce and ratings were starting to suffer and by and large it had begun and also the movies had begun to work sure uh tommy boy was right for i think or we shot it in 94 yeah so and i don't think uh he was a fan of norm mcdonald uh but i was sort of i'm always sort of lookingald. But I was sort of,

I'm always sort of looking for what I think are sort of original voices. And I thought I wouldn't have met with you if I didn't think you had one. Well, that's good. Yeah. So there was no, it was just not my year. No, I think we were being pounded

on a whole other level about, which was really existential at that point. The critics were saturday night dead uh the network was uh you have to change you're too set in your ways right uh and the the simple fact which was that different generations come in and make the show their own right that uh they find their own way of doing it within the same tradition as opposed to blowing it up and starting over and all that. So, and, you know, the thing about broadcast is that you're on in all 50 states. Right. And, you know, in the way that the railroads united the country in the 19th century. I think the networks did in this century.

Okay. And so you know that the show plays differently in Arkansas than it does in Hawaii or differently. Maybe I wasn't right. No, no, no, no. You were fine. Oh. You had a strong point of view and you were clear. Right.

Yeah, no, no. You were just part of a mix. There was no idea of so much replacement because you can only do that gradually. It was, it was whether or not, whether or not to bring you, I think we still had a Whitney Brown.

No, maybe he was gone. I think that like, I think Spade might've just left. Right. Yeah. But it was interesting because at that time, remember, we were doing alternative comedy.

Very much so. Downtown. Yeah, yeah. And I mean no offense, but you said, one of the first things you said was like, I don't know what you think you're doing down there below 14th Street. Yeah, right. But it doesn't matter.

Right. I was trying to be helpful and save you a a few years yeah okay yeah yeah well i appreciate no i was just being playful i know yeah well i mean in retrospect i don't know that i was necessarily ready for the show and and i came in here i don't think you're ever you need to have spent a certain amount of time on stage sure to be ready for the show i think you were ready i think it was i I didn't have, I learned early on that if you bring people in and there's no real spot for them, Spade used to, I think when we did the debate

with Bush, Clinton, and Perot, Dana did Bush and Perot, and David was on the wide shot filling in as Dana dressed as Perot. So if you see the wide shot filling in as dana dressed as perot so if you see the three shot of them it's actually spade because dana can't be literally in both places but once we cut in yeah it's dana again right so uh it was just tough for david to catch a break because dana was the writers will always go to whatever whoever came through for them on the last show and so they'll go with the performer that they know can deliver and it's just harder to unless you have

some unless you play some other kind of part or unless you bring some other kind of voice that's clear and can withstand uh those first five or six shows when the audience is less than friendly. Well, that's interesting because one of the things that I did say was how big of a fan I was of the first season. And I obviously mythologized them in my mind and they meant a lot to me as a kid. First season or first five years? Well, the first five years. Okay. And you said, well, we've had a lot of

good casts yeah like very quickly yeah sort of dismiss the whole notion that that that was it well when i came back in in 85 uh i continually got beat up by the golden years uh and i've been there for all the golden years and i can tell you that they were not golden at the time because from the time chevy left in which is the beginning of january of 77 bill murray and and the young jim downey come in together um those are the first changes we made and and saturday night dead started around then right so we survived it and the idea that the show will continually reinvent itself and that you have to give it time. The living through it is not fun, if you're me.

Probably even less fun if you're the audience. Right. People have to be bad before they can be good. Dress rehearsal has to be bad before it can be good. Sure. Well, let's go back because I think it's important. I mean, you grew up in Canada. Yeah. And what was your family like?

What was your father do? What did he do? My father died when I was 14. Yeah. And my mother's parents owned a movie house. So I just started seeing movies at a very early age. I just started seeing movies at a very early age. And around the kitchen table, if they were talking about movies or felt strongly about Jimmy Cagney or something, I wasn't aware at that point that they didn't actually know Jimmy Cagney. But it was sort of in the air.

And when— Were you brought up very Jewish? Yeah. Pretty Jewish? Yeah, by and large, Jewish neighborhood, yeah. Yeah, because I have no sense of what the Canadian Jewish community was like. Well, it's different in every city, I suppose, yeah. But there was a lot.

Yeah, and a strong theater community and a strong tradition of stuff. This was in Toronto? This was in Toronto, Canada, yeahada and your name was lippowitz then yeah yeah well when i was for yeah not not once i began to perform right was it what was your full name lauren lauren lippowitz yeah and when did you start is it true i heard this weird bit of information is lou jacoby your godfather um I think my mother told me something about it once yeah that I mean

he and my uncle had I think written songs together oh really yeah when he was in Toronto yeah he's a great character actor that guy he's a funny guy yeah when I uh what my first trip to New York when I came down uh by the bus from Toronto I went uh one of the plays I saw was uh Come Blow Your Horn which was Neil Simon's first play and he was in it and I went my mother told me to go backstage and say hello and I did and he was nice to me and that's that that's that but were you taken with being backstage or with the idea of theater? Yeah, I think I just, in the most broadest sense of it, wanted to be in show business, I think. But I also sort of wanted lots of other things, too. So I didn't have any kind of single-mindedness right about that i think by 1967 uh i was in that part of that generation

that would have said what i want to do is direct oh really because you saw sort of the graduate and sure yeah and you went well i'd like to do that and but you did some comedy yeah yeah no one i performed and i did shows at uh in high school and shows at university. Wrote and direct. Yeah. Performed. You know, and performed with another guy. Howard Pomerantz. Yeah.

Were you guys childhood buddies? No. No. I did a show at the university called UC Follies. And he was, he came to see me about his brother, Earl, who went on to be a sort of very successful comedy writer, who did stand-up. And would I consider him for the show, which I did. For your college show. College show, yeah.

Oh, yeah? Yeah. And that's how you and Harpy became friends? Yeah. Well, that's when we met. And then after college, after I graduated, I went to England for a while, and then I came back. What did you do in England? Avoid going to law school, primarily.

But it was just a more... London in 1966 was just a way more happening place than Toronto was at the time. And it was the first time I'd been exposed to life outside, you know, life outside of where I grew up. Drugs, rock and roll. No, not, I suppose that was part of it,

but it wasn't so much that it was just that, um, I knew what I, I knew I didn't want to go to law school. I didn't, I wouldn't have had the confidence to say that I could succeed, uh, in show business.

And they weren't really recruiting from Toronto at that point. In general. Yeah, there was not a big trade ad. We're the Canadians. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. So I didn't know how you'd kind of get into it or do it. And when I came back from Toronto, I came back to Toronto from London,

Howard Shore, who'd been with me in Toronto Back from Toronto, I came back to Toronto from London. Howard Shore, who'd been with me in Toronto and who's one of my oldest friends. Musical director? Yeah, he was a musical director. Here's my friend with three Oscars. He and I would write songs a little bit. I thought we tried a little bit of that. Funny songs or real songs?

No, not real songs. Oh, did you sing? No, I mean, a little bit of that funny songs or no real songs not real songs oh and uh did you sing no i mean a little bit in junior high but not no no i never thought of myself as a singer um uh heart and i started sort of improvising and doing a little bit of stand-up together and i worked a little bit in an advertising agency just sort of copywriting and i was um just sort of looking around and and gradually we sort of began to earn we started doing a radio show on the cbc 15 minutes on wednesday nights at 10 you and heart yeah which was sort of political in nature and satire as it was then called we didn't know no

one was listening we thought it was really important and we were really proud of it we began performing sort of in clubs uh we had a sort of sort of classic straight man comedy kind of you were the straight man i was yeah i was a straight man or the serious one or the tall good- looking one whatever whichever way you want uh but definitely the straight man and um hart came to new york i think he either saw woody allen or he met with jack rollins in some way we ended up sort of uh going down and and uh to new york and and uh to New York and writing for him. For his clients?

No, no, for Woody. No, for Woody. Specifically, yeah. And he was incredibly encouraging and generous. And we would fly down. We'd meet with him for a few hours. He was stand-up then. Yeah.

And then we'd go back to Toronto. Were you part of any of his classic fits? No, no, no. I contributed zero to his career, but he was really, really helpful in mine. Oh, yeah? What did he say? I remember, let me think it clearly. I remember suggesting a joke. This is from another time.

suggesting a joke this is from a another time uh it had to do with being obsessed by the idea that there was someone who was thinking the same thoughts at the same time and that you know tracking down the doppelganger thing and tracking down that person and finding him but every time he called the line was busy right uh which no longer applies right uh but he said uh that's a brilliant joke and i think that probably kept me warm for a year and a half yeah just the compliment it didn't do anything and then we wrote some stuff for joan rivers and then we did a little bit for dick cavett which i don't remember where these are all clients yeah yeah yeah because i met with him when he was a very old man and i somehow insulted him he was a joy yeah i heard he was amazing guy yeah and had worked going back to nichols and

may yeah yeah harry belafonte and yeah those guys had worked with woody sort of nurturing him when he was a stand-up at the bitter end and all that. Well, that was back when management did that. Yeah, exactly. No, he had no interest in going to a meeting at a network. He was happy at 3 o'clock in the morning talking over the act. And was kind of an inspiring figure. And he'd guide you into, how did the TV opportunity with Hart come around for the terrific what happened was we did uh we signed with uh william morris with a very young david geffen was our agent william morris and then really then material

that we had written for uh joan rivers got sent out and i think our agent on the west coast was howard west and uh a guy from tor guy from Toronto named Bernie Orenstein who maybe knew us a little bit or maybe knew Hart and his partner Saul Turtletaub were producing a show with Phyllis Diller called The Beautiful Phyllis Diller Show and we got offered to be writers on that show and we were there in LA, in LA, uh, which I could talk about that for an hour, but I'm not sure we want to spend that much time on it, but your first trip to LA. Yeah.

I know. First job. Yeah. And we were in Burbank and there was all, there was the tonight show down the hall and, and, uh, D Martin.

And, uh, I believe Jerry Lewis had a show and it, it, Burbank was like a sort of hub of activity. Who were your primary influences? Who did you like to watch? I mean, what impressed you about performers?

Which ones? Oh, when I was a kid. Or just at this time, when you started working in show business. Oh, I think that you knew that it was just the beginning of the change. By 68, I think Bobby Kennedy had been shot. knew that it was just the beginning of the of the change by 68 you know i think uh bobby kennedy had been shot we were yeah you know we were there and it was i think i was either 23 or 24 and i think the next oldest writer to me was 52 so we were working primarily with people who come up through radio and were now had been in television for as long as television been going. Bob Schiller, who is one of the I Love Lucy writers, was very all of the writers were incredibly encouraging.

George Balzer, who'd written for Jack Benny, who was a huge hero of mine, gave me a bunch of Benny scripts to read, which were very thin because there was a lot of pauses. They were radio shows. So that generation was still very much in power. And I had long hair and a headband. Sure. And television couldn't have been farther removed from what was happening.

You know, music and film and all those things were starting to turn. And television was a little. I think because it's the mass medium. And whenever when movies are the mass medium, they were very tightly controlled. And when movies got freed by television, then I think they began to loosen up. And I think television, up until really us in Late Night and then Cable after that, were pretty much the way they'd always been. Well, didn't it take the idea that the executives that were in charge at the time,

not unlike the film executives, were like, we don't know what to do anymore. So they had to open the door a little bit. It was like, we don't know what to do anymore. So they had to open the door a little bit. Yeah, except that we went from the Phyllis Diller show, which we were so young. I remember asking how it was going. They'd say it was going really well. And then around show seven or eight,

on our very first show, which was just, we were against Barbra Streisand and Central Park. And I thought we were going to get killed being from Toronto. They didn't, if I remember right, I think they did an 18 or 19 chair and Phil Stiller did a 41 chair. And that's when I began to understand how big a place America was. And people weren't following it as avidly as I was. And I think that around show seven or eight, there were people in our offices measuring them.

You know, like for, we weren't in actual offices. We were in trailers in the parking lot. Which network was it? NBC. I've been in nbc most of my life and then did you like phyllis oh she was wonderful yeah just wonderful yeah and really generous with the writers and and funny but we would go you know uh literally to a a deli in in burbank uh called Kosherama,

which was, I think, on Riverside. We'd go with all the older writers and they'd just tell stories. Yeah. You know, and there was a guy named Keith Fowler who'd written for the Honeymooners. Shilram Woskoff had written for I Love Lucy. George Balzer, as I said, had written for... So you had this sort of,

these people who'd made a life out of writing comedy and wrote jokes and wrote sketches and episodes and understood character. So on one hand, I'm learning that, and on another hand, everything's changing. And you worked for Schwatter as well? Yeah, no, then when Phil Stiller got canceled, we got a job on Laugh-In, which was in its first season. And that worked for Schwatter as well? Yeah, no. Then when Phil Stiller got canceled, we got a job on Laugh-In,

which was in its first season. And that was the turning point, right? And that was the number one show. Right. But that was the counterculture starting to be integrated a bit. Yeah, but think of this. Yeah.

Laugh-In was on Monday at 8, as was Here's Lucy. And they were both often tied for number one, which meant half the country. This was when 40 million people are watching. Right. So 40 million people are watching Lucy and 40 million people are watching laughing, laughing.

So it's a, there's always two Americas in that regard, you know, and, but you could feel that, you know, that the creativity was shifting. Yes.

And, and I think that it wasn't a particularly fun show to work on for us. We never went to the studio. The writers worked at a motel. In a sweat bar. No, no, no. We were treated well and paid well. And George Schlatter was encouraging.

It's just that Paul Keyes, who was the head writer, the way it worked was not the way I was expecting it to. I sort of thought it would be more, not quite Kaufman and Hart out of town, but some sense of, it was much more factory. So we would write things and then uh they would be rewritten and then uh they they'd do them and then i think carolyn raskin was her name would who was in the editing room she'd sort of put the shows together george kept the energy up in the studio and got performances out of everybody and it was very much i'm sure his vision but we were actually brought in by

rowan and martin because we did two-man comedy so we wrote a lot of monologues you know the team dynamic yeah and they were funny they were funny but it was also the sort of thing which was a little demoralizing because quite often they read them off the cards for the first time and there was no audience oh really yeah so you kind of went oh right so it was entirely you couldn't get the satisfaction no i mean it wasn't writers were part of it we had um you know and and i think when i came here i wanted uh to sort of do it differently. So I wanted the writers to follow their pieces right to the end. Right. And that sort of became the template. So after

Laughing, you went back to Canada and did the Harden. Went back to Canada, yeah. Went back, did a couple years, yeah. And learned that, do the TV yourself. Yeah, yeah. And the structure of that show was a variety show. That was a variety show that was a variety show but more probably influenced by laughing right there was a different title every time one was called

today makes me nervous there were like a lot of uh do you ever look at that now do you have yet when was the last time you look at shows i did a month ago so it isn't uh are you friends with heart yeah yeah i i did i talked to him oddly enough last week, I think. Oh, yeah? When I was first beginning here, he didn't like LA. Right. It didn't work for his family. And he was older than me and he had kids.

Yeah. And we did those shows. And Hart was way more of a performer than I was. Sure. So I noticed we were in the editing room. I was learning how to do that and i'd see myself before the slate and i'd be preoccupied checking lighting checking things making sure things are right and then the slate would happen i'd be smiling and i realized oh the other guy is more me than that than that guy um but i knew you i don't think you can produce comedy

unless you've been on a stage you know and i think for a lot of writers who come out of print or you know even even a lot of lampoon writers they're much happier with animation oh really they have more freedom well the performers do exactly what they're told you know like you don't have to go through the medium of somebody who's popular for a whole other set of reasons right yeah and cater to his personality yeah or he doesn't like that or right that was funny or he embellished that joke or right he got the timing wrong or he did it you know uh there's a human part of it yeah that that doesn't go along so well with right yeah so what was the relationship in in terms of putting that first cast together with uh with the national lampoon radio hour and

the canadian talent that you had how'd that i mean i know you've probably covered that before but really you think well we don't even have to it's a no no i'm i'm good i can talk about anything but i it because it it seems to me like your intentions were were fundamentally creative at that time that oh 100 100 no i i had done i was uh i had done three years in la before that i was living at the chateau marmont was it nice then no it was kind of run down but yeah but um in your 20s yeah 27 eight nine i had my 30th birthday at the marmont in the lobby of the marmont which was one of the first parties they allowed uh after really yeah it was kind of a deal but so that was changing too yeah and also maybe it was kind of played month. You had a fight for the party?

No, no, no, no. It was just a, it's a whole other set of stories. But I think that they were, it was just, it ended up being a lot of people there because all of the people who were doing what I was doing or attempting to do what I was doing were, vaguely knew each other they ate at the same restaurant guys like from the committee maybe or like yeah i knew i knew lots

of people from the committee carol androsky right but it was also you sort of knew where you it was a small comedy you were watching it was a small community. But I was writing for television, but the person who changed my life was Lily Tomlin, who I was going to go back to Canada. I'd come out. Bernie Brillstein started to be my manager. I met with Lily Tomlin about doing a special. I showed her some stuff I'd done in Canada that she liked, and I think it was a period where I was

probably more lost about what whether I'd be able to do the kind of thing I wanted to do and she was very much a kindred spirit braver than I was we had coffee or something and then I got offered a job to work on a special which oddly enough herb sergeant was the producer of which was at cbs it was like like 12 weeks and so i called the people from canada said i'm gonna this was i think in the summer i won't be back till middle of november and it became you have to make a choice right bernie one bernie was on i think he was happy that i was gonna work that long on something but with lily yeah and he had uh there was a mama cast special and a gleason carney reunion special and uh i remember thinking you know because i loved the honeymoons uh

but i did i i went with lily because she was again just pushing it and also uh brave and i met well i met so i met richard prior through her and and we did that special and i wrote a couple things and it was nominated for an emmy the show did they used to do pilot specials then and the idea was if the pilot did well enough as a special then they would order it to series and cbs didn't order it and then abc approached us and she called me and jane wagner who uh was also writing on that first show she wanted the two of us to produce it and so she went to abc and said and put my name forward as you know a producer i'd done the job in canada but write a producer but now i was going to be in america for

lily and approved right and um and that was huge and that show did win an emmy uh and probably was the reason i had the credibility at such a young age to be hired to do SNL. Oh, well, that's amazing. Yeah. And have you thanked Lily for that? Yeah.

Many times. Every time recently. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So let's, because we have somewhat limited time, but when you bring,

when you brought together that first cast, I guess my question is, is that, you know, having, I saw the show the other night I came as guest, and I'd never been to the show. Not because I was bitter or for any other reason. It's tough to get tickets.

Yeah, it is. Even if I have friends occasionally. Yeah, no, no, I know. They can't help me. Yeah, exactly. But I was surprised. You're still very involved. You're out there.

And I was amazed at how many people were involved in moving things around it was very exciting and you know I talked to Louie before I came he says oh it's going to be great it's always a great time to go to Saturday Night Live and I felt like you know I missed something because at some point I was like no I'm not

going to Saturday Night Live but the intimacy of it and the immediacy of it and it's still fundamentally exactly the intimacy of it and the immediacy of it. And it's still fundamentally exactly the same as it was the first show. Yeah, and that's an interesting question. Why did you keep it here? I think that what happened for me was, basically when I got here,

it was 1975 and there were deer running through the hall at Rockefeller Center. They were showing me potential offices and there were deer running through the hall at Rockefeller Center. They were showing me potential offices, and they were on most floors. And I settled here on 17. But for the first few months, I was on the fourth floor in the office of a former programming guy named Larry White. And when I got the office, it was a plant that was just bone dry with one leaf a big tall plant with one leaf left and inside the desk was like gel use hill and malox tablets and and a couple of racing forms filled out and i thought this is not you know uh i'm not in

california anymore but i knew and and fought for a lot of pre-production time so i spent three months rounding up everybody who i thought uh would be good and i knew some i knew i brought my friend howard down to do the band michael o'donoghue said why would you bring someone from canada to new york city and i went well it was tough to explain and uh he was a guy Miller who had worked on um on the Lily show yeah said uh when you get to New York you should uh meet Michael O'Donoghue and uh he hadn't done television but I I used to listen to I would drive in my car on Sunday nights uh when I was living at the Marmont and listen to the National Lampoon Radio Show,

which I used to love. And he'd been very involved in that. And so he and I and Anne Beetz, who he was living with, we met at the, they wanted to go to the Oyster Bar at Grand Central. I talked down what I thought I was going to be doing. I saw Candide on Broadway

guy named Gary Nardino who's an agent at uh ICM said you should see this show because those designers are and I went and saw it and that was Eugene and Franny Lee and I met with them and I sort of described what I was going to do and they they joined up. And it was gradually sort of rounding people up. Gilda I'd known from Toronto. From Godspell or before? Oh, I'd known them from that scene from Godspell, but I kind of knew her more like even summer camp. Oh, as a kid?

Yeah, well, not as a kid, but we didn't go to the same camp, but I had a friend who'd gone out with her and whatever. It's interesting to me how everyone kind of knows each other sometimes oh yeah no and also i think chevy had spent summers in canada and within and and i think john danny danny of course danny i knew from toronto uh he'd been on my show in canada lorraine had been on uh lily Show and I sort of began and when I got here Herb Sargent called me and

took me to dinner to Elaine's which I'd never been and he was really nice and had lots of advice but he was probably 25 years older than I was had been the head writer on the Tonight Show with steve allen you know and and was the sort of the most elegant name in new york television and uh the next day he called he

said i want to come talk to you and he came into this office and i said uh we talked and he said i want to do your show and i said her you can't do my show. One, because the top money is $700 a week. And two, you know, I just don't think. And he said, well, I don't care. I'm in. He wanted to be part of something new. He wanted to be part of something new, yeah. And I didn't know then what couldn't be done.

And also because I was the same as I'd always been, which was I wanted to do this. I wanted to do that. I wanted to do music. I wanted to do, i wanted to do that i wanted to do music i wanted to do you know films i wanted to do the news i wanted as my father once said my eyes were bigger than my stomach so he took me to a restaurant to learn that once he let me order everything that i said i wanted and then it all arrived but um but i found that i was slowly beginning to, and I knew that doing it live, there wouldn't be a pilot. Right.

And Herb Schlosser, whose idea it really was to do a live show. He was an NBC guy. He was the NBC, he was head of the network. Yeah. And Dick Ebersole, who I'd met while I was doing Lily's show, who was out a little younger than I was and had worked for Rune Arledge at ABC and had just landed this job as head of late night at NBC.

I, by this point, had agreed to do a movie at Paramount. I was going to write a screenplay. So you were a writer guy. I was a writer. I earned my living as a writer by that point for like seven, eight years. I had the meeting. He described that he

was gonna do a bunch of pilots in late night you know asked me if i'd do one i didn't really think it would get in the way and then uh one night i came home uh late to the marmont there was a message from dick to be at the polo lounge this was at two o'clock in the morning to call him and then to be at the polo lounge at 7 in the morning for a breakfast meeting, which was not something I was in the habit of doing. I did have breakfast, but not normally until about 9 o'clock. Okay. Yeah.

I showed up and Dick had briefed me a little bit before. It was the head of programming and the head of talent, a guy named Dave Tavit, who was a wonderful guy. The head of research was a guy named dave tevin who was a wonderful guy the head of research was a guy named uh marvin antonowski and they i described the show i wanted to do which was pretty much this show and uh research proved that the audience that i wanted wouldn't be there at that time because it's saturday night and everybody'd be out i think they just really wanted to look at me to realize that i wasn't crazy right you know it was a sort of approval thing more than that and then i came in uh and

with dick guided me through all of it it was a labyrinth but i sort of spoke to what i think was the board at mbc and explained what i was going to do again and it took me three months to find everybody and then we lived together for three months before we went on and i knew from being a writer that you always write your last hit until you're actively discouraged from writing it by the audience or the or the industry so i began to let gradually people would just keep writing and then out of boredom they'd start writing with somebody else and then a kind of cross-pollinization began to happen and the material began to look like nothing else relationships were solidified and the the lamp you know michael when i when he

met akroyd well anyway what they were like why would you you know because it was they were all different cultures they were all the only thing they had in common was that i thought they were all talented and funny and funny yeah so this was the system that was put in place from day one you stay you stay here because this is the place where snl is yes this is where it lives and that's that's the end of it yeah it's It's always been the place it lives. And we're up here for three days, and then we go down. We do read through here on Wednesday,

and then I move down to the studio. And you just had the pitch meeting just today. Yeah. This is Monday. Yeah. Same Monday meeting at five o'clock, which has been there since the beginning. Yeah.

With the host and with the cast and the writers. I guess what I try to get out of people when I talk to them who's been here because of my own mythologizing of you and of the show is that I somehow – It's got to be awesome to be meeting me like this and talking. Oh, no. I'm teasing. No, I'm happy that it's a very human conversation because whatever I experienced in 1995, for whatever reason, whatever happened, it loomed large in my head, not in a negative –

Oh, no, no. And also, you can't really explain bad timing to someone. No, that's true. for whatever reason whatever happened it loomed large in my head not in oh no no and and also you can't really explain bad timing no no no what i mean by it is we were under assault no i got it and uh so we weren't you know everything we were doing was being scrutinized everything was and so it was like uh as i would with as i have with lots of people you sort of bring them in because when I saw Bottle Rocket I wanted to meet the guys who did it

and you sort of meet people you think are have something but they're moving around in your head and sometimes there's a spot and sometimes there's not and that's sort of yeah I'm okay with it.

I'm happy to talk to you. We're both here. Yeah. And so the, but the creative system, like, cause I know a lot of people and I've talked to a lot of people. I've talked to people that have been on the show a year. I've talked to people who've not been on the show and people who've been on the show for 10 years.

Right. So I think you got the, I think the best thing that you could say about the show was the 40th anniversary. Not so much, you know, when you do live television, the one thing you can't expect is for it to be perfect. But that night, for me, watching all of the people who created and built the show working together and also being the audience for each other was as close to perfect

as i was ever going to get because the feeling in the room was so warm and supportive and you realize that it's in the cliche sense it's a family and they're all they've all you can't explain that experience of doing it except to other people who have done it it's very intimate as well and and spielberg was hanging around for some reason, I noticed. He just dropped by? Yeah, he's been a fan of the show since probably when we did Jaws, which was the third or fourth show, but probably before that. So he was just in town.

Hillary Clinton? His premiere, yeah. Well, she just didn't wander in. No, I know what it takes to deliver a politician to a location. Oh, that's right. Yeah, premier, yeah. Well, she just didn't wander in. No, I know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know what it takes to deliver a politician to a location. Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I guess the transition from being a guy who made SNL to being one of the most powerful men in television. Right.

At some point, there's a bit in the book about Conan. There's a bit where you talk to that guy, Erwin Siegelstein. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It seemed to me that that was when you were giving your resignation. I was resigning, yeah. And he said something to you that seemed to define how you feel and how you see show business. Yeah, I mean, I think that there's a thing about broadcasters that you realize i we

were i was shooting a movie once in the western part of virginia yeah not west virginia but the western part of the state of virginia and there were we were at a holiday inn and there wasn't the only thing there was was a pizza hut for about 100 miles and in this holiday and they had a big screen television and uh in the pizza hut they had like a jar for black lung stuff i realized that people came in and drove in to watch monday night football on the big screen and then they told me they also come in on saturdays to watch snl and so I think not to get grand about it but I think that you sort of realize that you know when I was growing up in Toronto and there was shows coming out of New York live shows I didn't know anything about that there was nothing

like that in Toronto but you sort of connect to a bigger world and you go oh I'd like to be part of that and I think for snl our our strength has always been in the middle of the country uh and people watch it and and identify with it and connect to it and so shutting them out because they're not qualified to watch or because uh we're going to just do things that uh are so specific that they won't understand. Inside jokes. And also, for me, there's something about a variety show, which is a variety of comedy styles. Never has there been a consensus, as long as I've been here from the writing staff, about other people's writing.

You know, the people who write dry stuff don't like the big broad stuff we do physical comedy we do low comedy we do political satire always i hope with some level of intelligence behind it but people get snobbish they go well i don't like slapstick whatever that means and you go and you go well yeah no were you laughing because you i saw you laughing uh it's that variety of styles of big dumb comedy uh it's how i almost would at my peak seriousness which was probably having won a couple of emmys uh i think the at the end of the first season of snl which i thought of as kind of my championship season because i'd written everything i ever wanted to write at least twice by that point. I got three Emmys,

one for writing and producing, two for SNL, and one for a Lily Tomlin show that I'd done the year before. And we started being taken very seriously, but also none of us knew that the show was happening till that summer. Sure.

You know, because we were always here. And I think that there was some sense that began of like, oh, well, I'd always thought what we were doing was important. But then you begin to be told it's important and your thing changes. And because I've been working with prior and you saw the first season you know what that was and when steve martin first showed up and i'd known him a little bit as a writer or was certainly aware of him but he was a writer on smothers

brothers when i was on laughing yeah and i think there'd been a touch football game where the two shows I caught a catch. That's how I remember it. From Dan Rowan. But I think that what happened was what he was doing, which was so different than what we were doing, because

we started to get dark. Yeah. Not even dark, but just serious or beginning to take ourselves a little seriously. And then you saw, and Bernie said, I think you should really think of Steve Martin. And I went, ah, yeah, balloon animals and all that stuff. But then he came and he changed the show.

And that, in a certain sense that was the thing that that the first real big reinvention of the show after the 75 76 season to make it a broader show no just that it was another kind of sensibility that different sensibilities would come in with different people and you just let them fight it out no it never gets to that because the thing about comedy people is yeah if you actually laugh yeah and give it up for somebody kind of we we know it you know what i mean it's not it doesn't whatever you've been arguing once you start to laugh and you have to really love laughing you have to really be on the side of people who can make you laugh and you want to be around as many funny people as you can it it gets a little isolating and sometimes you can

drift off but it is a certain way of expressing yourself that that is just as powerful as any of the other forms and now you have the tonight show you brought the tonight show back to new york yeah that was the first that that trip that i alluded to uh earlier when i came down by bus yeah uh i had a friend who anyway i got tickets to the uh he knew a writer on the he was working with an actress whose boyfriend was dick cabot and who uh they later got married but he was a writer on the jack parr show and it was the christmas show and he met us downstairs online and gave us our two tickets and i i went into what is now jimmy's studio uh betty white was on the show and it was so small you know it was i'd watched the jack par show at that point yeah it was uh through high school and it was like oh but it was also coming by the skating rink coming by

the christmas tree coming into that building coming all that was just uh it was the same it's pretty much the same for me now as it was then. It's amazing to me that you've grown up and you've defined and created the medium that you've redefined. Well, you know, when I was at University of Toronto, McLuhan was there. Yeah. But he did say that we were leaving the industrial age and coming into the information age.

Yeah. That's mid-60s. So all those ideas of what can be done and how you can change the way people see things was sort of in the air. And live being the oldest form, because I'd grown up on all those, Jimmy Durante, Colgate Comedy Hour, Martin and Lewis, all that live television. We didn't much know it was live, oldest form you know because i'd grown up on all those jimmy duranty you know colgate comedy hour

martin and lewis all that live television we didn't much know was live but it had a different quality and uh the idea that that would then be the way in an in a new wine and old bottles way that that's that would be the way that you could carry on that it wasn't going to be that it looked all shiny like what was happening in video and film it was going to look in a certain way primitive and and more relatable and raw and exciting yeah i like we ended on mccluhan thanks for talking okay and that that was the end of that conversation because what happened was he ran out of time because he had to meet Seth Meyers for dinner and I and I didn't feel quite satisfied personally or otherwise because he there was still a lot to talk about because you know with Lorne there was still a lot to talk about because you know with lorn there was my personal problems

that needed to be addressed but he's also a great wtf guest in terms of the history of comedy his influence on comedy his life and show business so so i didn't think we got to all that we had to get to so we told uh the assistant in the front office there you know like look he said we could he would talk some more so is there time for that and you know if there is you know, like, look, he said he would talk some more. So is there time for that? And, you know, if there is, you know, let us know. I'm only in town for another day. And apparently Lauren came out and said, make sure you set that up with Mark. And I went back the next night at 11 o'clock. You know, he had been out to dinner with Amy.

And this is something he does every week. You know, on Monday, he does the pitches with the host. And then he goes out to dinner with the host. And then that night on Tuesday, they write till like 2 or 3 in the morning. So he came. He met me at like 11 o'clock after he had dinner, and we talked for a second hour. And it was amazing. And so this is that second hour.

Enjoy the rest of my conversation with Lorne Michaels. This is our second conversation. It's now Tuesday. I talked to you Monday. Monday was the pitch, the host day down the hall. What happens today? This is Tuesday. Tuesday is writing.

There's a host dinner, which I just came from, yeah. Is that just you and her? No, no, no. It's her. It was Amy, Amy's sister, and cast. Okay. And some writers, yeah. And now they're writing?

Yeah. Sketches. And some have been writing. While you're at dinner? Yeah. And before, and last night and whatever and this is every week every week so you do the show saturday night you go to the party you get home at five yeah you sleep till all day sunday no noon okay and then monday you come to work. Yeah. And Monday I have that meeting, which you came after,

which is the host meeting the writing staff and people from the various departments, music, design, et cetera, and the cast. And I go around the room and ask people what they're working on or their idea or whatever. And it's sometimes very productive and sometimes not at all. But it's a signal that the week has started again and that we're not talking about last week's show anymore. Right. Every week.

Every week. For about 35 years. Yeah. I mean, there's, you know. A few years off. Yeah. No, we have a show next week, but then we have a week or two off. And so, yeah.

Okay. So I guess instead of, you know, going over stories that you've told a million times, let's start like this. When you explained to me why, you know, my situation was difficult at the time, or I wasn't chosen, you said it was, I didn't fit a slot in your head. So my assumption. No, no, no. I didn't say that. You said it was, I didn't fit a slot in your head. So my assumption. No, no, no. I didn't say that.

Kind of. No, no. What I was saying was I saw something. Right. When I saw you. Right. And I talked to you.

Yeah. And so you kind of put it in your head as when something opens or when something is, you know, it's just part of. Yeah. You know, Louis said earlier today we were talking about he was

talking about with michael jordan yeah the guy said i don't want to tell his story that he'd be thrilled the trailblazers yeah didn't pick him up you know like in the draft and they said we weren't looking for a power forward right i think you're just always looking for what you need to fill right well that's my question it wasn't a personal question is that i assume and you can I think you're just always looking for what you need to fill. Right. Well, that's my question. It wasn't a personal question. Is that I assume, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, that after. I will. Sure.

After the first five years of the show. You know, that whatever you learned or whatever, you know, heartbreak happened there or whatever worked or didn't work. That some sort of template was set in your mind about how the show works the how it worked who would be performing on it right who would be writing varied but right so in my mind you have sort of a lorn based commedia della arte in your mind certainly one way of putting it yeah and and these slots will be filled somehow or another and yeah except that you never it isn't that you're looking for something it's that you recognize it when you see it right so and now that the and i i assume that the lessons that

were learned that season and we talked a bit about you know the the production designer and the stage and and the commitment to the space and and and there's a magic here for you and and you seem to be somewhat of a creature of habit that you know this is your life right yeah so sad but i keep coming back to that conversation you had with that executive who said that went upon your resignation said uh look you know the contract is for a show you know good or bad or moral judgments and that's not our problem yeah he said um the uh if you read you know i i was uh outraged at somebody doing something and uh having been lied to and whatever and i thought i was doing working really hard and doing a good job and uh he said you you can resign uh and we will keep the show on and it will go on for as long as it goes on

and inevitably the quality will go down and you'll see that uh the audience will at some point sense that and they will drift away and inevitably when there's nothing more and no no time can be sold anymore then we'll cancel it right and he said and and the thing you really care about will be gone and he said if you read your contract carefully you'll see that we asked for the show to be 90 minutes in length, uh, for it to have this many commercial breaks, uh, for it to be done for this budget, but nowhere in the contract do we ask for it to be good. Uh,

if you are so, I believe you said neurotic and driven that you feel you have to make it good. Well, that's, that's about, that's a good thing for us, but it isn't what we asked for what we asked for was for it to be 90 minutes in length and to cost that x amount and it is

a way of looking at things where you you put into perspective what it is you do and how much of it is what's being asked for and what you feel you have to do and i think that was uh eye-opening because the show i there was a um a time when i wanted to do the ruttles right uh because i the pythons were big heroes of mine and eric idol and i were friends and he'd done a part of his Rutland weekend television, which was like a three, four minute thing about the Rutles. And I thought, oh, this could be like a longer thing. And mock documentaries was a thing in Canada since 50% of programming was documentaries. The comedy version of it was just part of the culture.

And he wrote it. I of it was just part of the culture and uh he wrote it i i thought it was really good and uh i wanted to do it in one of our empty time periods and uh it was going to cost like 275 000 it's the 70s i went down uh to talk to Irwin and said, I really want to do this. It's got the SNL people. It's got some of the Python people. It's got, you know, I think Mick Jagger will do it. George Harrison is involved in helping Eric with the script. And I think it'll be really, you know, I think it'll be good.

And I'd like to do it. And he said, no. And I was so taken aback because SNL was like, it was like 78, and we were like at this ratings peak, and people, I mean, we'd won Emmys every, it was just, and I was sort of stunned. I left my office, I came back up to 17 and uh and then I started to get angry like you know so I called and asked to come back down and he said uh okay I went well how how could you I said how could you say no to me on this

and he said well then you can do it and i go why would you put me through it he said because when you're in my end of it no is always the right answer you can only get hurt saying yes so if you're if you say no 100 of the time you're right 75 of the time if it's really really important to you then you'll come back which you did and i went really you made me jump but it was they understood how they ran their world right you know and what program is but and they would give you chapter and verse about how music was the lowest rated thing on television a thing about music and i don't think it rated terribly highly i watched it yeah no one but the people who were already i was trying to do what i thought was a sort of like sensibility things that

could be in our time period that were uh that the same audience would like a sort of unity of taste and this was a night that snl was off yeah and so that was a lesson you learned about programmers and about that also that that they were remember in those days you needed 40 million people at this hour no no not in general yeah steve martin called his company 40 share because that was what you needed to stay on the air is that amazing yeah well i mean there were two big ones and one little net right yeah do you miss those days absolutely not no it was what that meant was that 11 30 at night replacing tonight show reruns was just what you did yeah which is what we did was just low stakes right so it didn't

it didn't count in prime time therefore there, it didn't impact anyone in the programming department. The ratings didn't matter. When we came on, they projected a four rating. We came on higher, like a five rating. And then we sort of grew. So it was just an unexplored time period whether people would watch at 11.30. And just as AM radio had turned into FM as the alternative, we were now the alternative to primetime,

so much so that it's Herb Sargent's phrase, not ready for primetime players. But it was the way we were defined. And it was at that time, as we spoke of before, a little later maybe, that movies had already shifted into appropriating counterculture and youth values of the time. The studios had collapsed in the late 60s.

Right. And so... It took another decade. Yeah, and the movies, yeah. Yeah, we were the first, but it didn't really infect prime time. I'm trying to think if you classify something with Mork and Mindy. Yeah, I don't think so.

It was pretty mainstream. You know, new shows kept coming along, and they used the talent that we would have... Showed them. Yeah, or that would have been part of what we were, the same sensibility. But you guys were taking risks. Yeah.

And that was the difference, and that was the freedom you had. Yes. So I guess, and over time, as we talked about yesterday, you started to realize that the middle of the country and that affiliates and whatnot were really the crux of the business. Yeah. It was holding an audience is really the crux of the business and that was a big audience yeah so at some point you you knew to get away from more esoteric comedy

maybe no i think we always we always led with whatever we thought was funniest as we began you know like uh i think it's like the third or fourth show Chevy wants to do Gerald Ford because Gerald Ford had fallen on a runway and it was sort of widely reported. And Chevy, who one of the first things I knew about him way before we went on the air was he could fall and he could make you laugh falling. It was just a part of what he did. He'd do it in restaurants and on the street

and it was always, always funny and it would always make me laugh and so the idea of fusing those two things his ability to fall and his he made no effort at all to look like gerald ford uh he just said he was which i thought was both brave and new you know we now, again, have gone back to demanding that people look like the person they're playing. But this was so confident and so, it was just, he was golden. You sort of knew when he was out there that he could do anything. I looked forward to it. Yeah. You waited for it. Yeah. When you were watching when I was 13 or 14, I was like, looked forward to it. Yeah. You waited for it.

When you were watching when I was 13 or 14, I was like, I waited for it. Yeah. So that conference. And he had brilliant timing. Oh, amazing. Yeah. And that electricity that came out of that group. I mean, I think that in my mind, you must have realized something then that there was

a chemistry, there was a dynamic, there was an interplay between these performers there was a rawness there was an intensity it was magic and also you had a writing staff and performers who all lived under the same roof there was no distinction and there was a closeness to it all yeah at that point yeah you're very close to all of them all of them but also everyone was pretty much it was the thing about live is everyone needs everyone to the last minute. Yeah. In the movie business, you meet the writer before you start shooting and then you meet him again at the premiere. And this was, you need the writer because if those changes don't get to the cards and you're going out and performing it, you're dead. So that person is essential to you till even after you're on the air to tell you what the changes are and performing it, you're dead. So that person is essential to you

till even after you're on the air to tell you what the changes are and how it's going and to work with you on it. The same thing with the prop guy. If he's not putting it in your hand just before you walk out because you've been doing a quick change, then you don't have it when you come out.

It's like theater. And the band has to come in on cue so everyone's necessary until good night. And how is that not the biggest rush in the world? It is the biggest rush in the world, yeah. Every week. And I imagine that on some level, whatever was planted in you, that feeling, must be something that's worth chasing for a lifetime. Yeah, I mean, this, you know, last week was the first show.

Yeah, I mean, this, you know, last week was the first show, and Phil Himes, who's our 92-year-old lighting director, who's been, wasn't there the first year, but I think pretty soon thereafter, was having an argument about the shooting on the second Miley Cyrus number. And he came to me to talk about it, and the orchestra orchestra you know the band was playing the warm-up songs Al Green was somewhere in the background and you kind of

uh the audience was coming in Michael Che was on stage doing a warm-up before Keenan and and uh the girls came out yeah and you kind of everyone still cares as much about getting it right. And I think you're, and there's a level of excitement to it because you know how many times I've said it, but we don't go on because we're ready. We go on because it's 1130. And that's the truth.

And it took me forever to realize it because there's just a point which you have to stop you can't fix it anymore right and then that becomes what that show was and there's nothing else i'm not this isn't a bragging statement there's nothing else like it because there's nothing else it just it just it grew into that and that's what it is it's amazing too and there is an intimacy to it and it feels like theater and it feels like it's like it's you know there's a lot of risk still oh completely yeah and when it doesn't work it's like an earthquake it just is everybody looks around at each other everybody knows it kind of didn't

happen it didn't ignite and it was a thing you cared about and then uh i'm sure every stand-up has the same thing like the thing that had worked three nights in a row and then it didn't kind of connect or uh but that's never a whole show no right but but it feels like it's a whole show if you're in that sketch as it's going down and you know in the 70s when i was much more raw certainly on sundays because the amount of adrenaline that goes through you is uh is a lot people would call me on sunday and and they'd say uh and i really dreaded picking up the phone and i'd they'd say well i saw the show and that would just like hang there and uh yeah i thought it

was good i thought that was pretty good listen you know the thing that you did uh you know did did you think that was funny and you go well it was at dress rehearsal if you'd been there two hours earlier you would have seen it be funny but somebody came in on the wrong foot the camera cut was late the now the timing of the thing is off it's beginning to unravel and we didn't have the recovery skills then it was just it would just start to unravel and then it would collapse and you go oh because it was all about energy and timing and when you didn't have either uh you were you were real trouble yeah right and so sometimes we'd get cut off in the middle we'd have uh four minutes to do a seven minute sketch and uh you could dan akroyd and later

phil hartman loved those because they could move that quickly and talk that fast and you know i think it was am beats who after one of them said uh it was a blow for surrealism yeah it just is it didn't make much sense it was fun to watch you just didn't uh know what it was kind of getting at and and so i think the audience learned that that was part of it. And you'd see people at the beginnings of their career. And if they stumbled or it didn't work, you were in some way still rooting for them. It was forgivable. And obviously in the first cast as well as any other cast, there were performers that didn't show up as much that were you know marginalized for one reason or another yeah or didn't perform to a certain level but were still involved you sort of felt that and

that that happens every cast yeah and there's a thing that you learn where if they if the audience loves someone the writers are really really lucky right you know uh you can't you can't stop them from liking that person they will go with that person they will follow them into dangerous territory the writers can use that because you have at the center of it when movies call it a star we we call it whatever we call it here but it is that thing where the audience some level of trust has been has happened between that artist and that audience and they will they'll show up and they will follow them and when it takes a long time for the artist to betray that trust if they make six movies in a row where they're not in any way that kind of

they don't do the thing they don't bring the thing that the audience loved them for then after a while but you have to really actively discourage them from coming after you've right won them and some people who start here evolved out of that and took a lot of chances like bill murray and oh yeah no and i think everybody here knows about taking chances i think it's about staying true to who you are and if you're growing and evolving i think the audience stays with you i think it's when uh you it's when you send a signal that what they loved you for here doesn't much matter right to you anymore than i think they they feel like they were or they don't like it they made a mistake right yeah yeah there's

something about eddie murphy at this juncture that's a little like that yeah i mean he was probably it may well be the biggest star that ever came out of the show yeah you know and i wasn't here for that so uh it's easier for me to say but right but dick was and it was a phenomenon it's happened many times in the show. And that guy or that woman has the power to energize the entire cast. And also to, if that person is as connected as normally

to the writing staff, they will find the person or persons who write for that voice and they will be able to soar they'll be able to take go into places that uh you know superstardom yeah and also but superstardom in our world it's a different thing you can be a giant star on snl and everyone you know watches it so you that but you're leaving out like 98 of the country you know so um it's a it's a certain kind of community and and i think our rating i think i may mention this yesterday our rating last you know for last saturday show is like you know uh six seven million households

uh which is about where we were in the 70s that's great it's always what i mean by it is it's never was 40 million households right you know it's it's state level, give or take. The people who are interested in it are generally educated, urban. Yeah. They want to see who the new people. Yeah. So, okay. So you talk about the writers a lot and you, you know, you respectfully and you include them in all this conversation. Now, I've talked to a lot of people that have done well on this show, and I've talked to

a few that feel alienated or hurt by the show, and none of them will say bad things about you. Yeah. No, no, I wasn't worried about that part. I think one of the reasons that the writers are so important, aside from the fact that they write things, is that they're never they're just as involved but they will never get credit they'll get careers and uh success but there's something in the illusion of comedy that the people doing it are making it up that's true even smart people

think that you watch bob hope yeah the smarter people i mean this is show business history but guys like jack benny bob hope george burns always mentioned their writers right and but most people didn't they did they couldn't bear the the idea that they weren't their words right so it wasn't happening right then yeah right and so if you watched red skeleton you didn't think he didn't it was all that yeah it was just red you didn't think he didn't it was all that yeah it was just red being red right but the idea that it was scripted they didn't want to know no and they in smart people don't want to know like i noticed that during the writer's strike you know when you saw all these monologists who would go out and clearly were doing 10 year old

jokes yeah and and then you really saw i always like the writer's guild strikes because when they're picketing they they want the metaphor to be that they're like teachers. Right. You know, like hardworking people who are doing something really valuable as opposed to very well-paid people in terms of the normal. And more power to it, you know, like fight for everything you believe you deserve. But there's something in the metaphor where you sort of see the line of them and you go yeah you're still doing okay yeah yeah oh yeah you're not doing as well as right but uh health care and that other yeah yes yeah but i guess the question

i was leaning towards is that you know there is a competitive nature to to the writing staff and and who aligns themselves with stars to every part of the show right and and some people believe that it's it's fostered and you know and and in talking to you uh you know i i have different um you know i i see you as a person yeah and and i see that some people i imagine would be hurt if they were excluded. Every week. Yeah. Every week. And you have to deal with that. But I imagine the reason why you let it go on or maybe encourage it to any degree is that's where you're the, you know, in charge, then the moment that everybody believes that you don't want it to be the best show possible, that you're playing favorites or that you're doing,

you're not in control or trying to please another, you know, constituency or not just about making it great, then you don't have the right to walk by them after you've cut their piece you know it has i'm i'm when i'm scrambling between dress and air i'm uh there are people i like more than other people but i'm not that's not part of it right it's just what's working if we move that later will it did it get run over address because of where it was? Are the rewrites good? Can so-and-so tighten that performance

and pick it up so that it plays? And where should it play? So all those are moving parts. And I think the nature of it is people, even the most powerful people at any given point in terms of cast, will all play by the same rules and uh there's a moment in my ninth floor office when people come through the door they always uh and there's like 40 50 people in there and it's smaller than this office and their eyes always go to the board which is at the other sure on the other wall to see what's been

and there's some people who just have that shrug of like do you believe this i mean how can that not be in uh it killed the dress and very few writers don't hear laughs at dress right oh uh there can be silence but there's i thought it pretty well. Yeah, yeah. It killed it. And so there's just, and then there's the variable of the host, because the show only works if the host looks good. So you're balancing a lot of things that you're never going to get entirely right. You are. Yeah, I am, yeah.

So you see your specific talent as being sort of the conductor? No, no. I see my specific talent as moving it forward, getting the best out of everyone that I can, and encouraging a climate in which brighter ideas prevail and in which chance is part of it, and encouraging people and discouraging people you know if if you tell me an idea and i think that's not going to play i'll tell it to you now

if you're thinking he just doesn't get it right and i'm thinking i wrote it three times i've read it read through 12 times it has never worked uh and i know i say it won't work they'll say he doesn't get it and so we'll and i have to fall back to well maybe this time is different maybe it will so we read it and then it flattens, and you go, yeah, no. Why were we thinking? So you can't discourage people from writing something, but you can sort of let them experience it themselves and see why it doesn't work.

Do you feel that the people that had issues at the show or struggled at the show and eventually hit the wall, that they would maybe have those issues no matter where they were no i possibly but i i can't hide behind that i think that there was a projection because i've been in charge from the beginning i think there's a projection that all power stops with me, you know? So in times like the period when you showed up, when there's a whole other thing,

you know, when Burbank has suddenly noticed us and well, what are they doing there? You know? And, and they almost, it's a little bit like Imperial Rome. When there's trouble in Rome, which most of the time there is,

they leave you alone. They don't come to the provinces and we're like in the in the 70s we were like you want to cover SNL you work six days a week and you give up every Saturday night no one wanted that and you go to New York yeah but if you were even if you're in New York that was so I think that people think any decision that comes down is mine. And so the idea that there's people I report to or... Still? Oh, yeah, yeah, of course, yeah.

Really? Yeah. Yeah. That's how it works. But I mean, you've made yourself and many others fortunes. You've redefined television. You now have The Tonight Show. Right.

You're telling me that there's a guy that can say, Lorne, what are you doing? When a lot of stuff was going down in the 90s, Warren Littlefield, who was then running the network, running programming, gave an interview, and he said, we're going to make a lot of changes at SNL. And Bill Carter, who was interviewing him in The Times, said, yeah, but not Lorne Michaels.

And he said, I said everything. Which was a signal to me, obviously, because I read The New York Times, that everything was up for grabs, and they were not happy, and they wanted to make a change. They also had reams of research that proved that music didn't play on television and and that we should be just doing comedy just doing sketches like oh but it's pace you need something in between particularly live you know a comedy sketch to a comedy sketch the people have to follow that they're not gonna the piece isn't gonna work we're gonna exhaust people yeah and the live audience in particular and there was a reason why it worked

and and uh there's a quote from uh attributed to mr bulliva uh which was if it's ticking don't open the back yeah you know and and you sort of go no that isn't the part you want to fix. If you have people they don't like on the show, that you can fix. But when you have people they like and writing that they like and the host is good and... Everybody's happy. Yeah. I think Amy Schumer this week with The Weeknd, who I think has two songs that are number you know i mean

it will be a hot show because it's also amy at this moment right you know yeah and that's uh and the audience will be there i think there's a difference between numbers and influence and uh snl always had that yeah so the people follow us, which is primarily from the beginning, the industry, Hollywood, Washington, because we were always playing to them. And hipsters. Or whatever. Sometimes hipsters, sometimes people who were no longer hipsters. Sophisticated people. Yeah, I mean, Tom Davis said once, I think in the 90s, he said that the original audience

wanted to stay up and watch the show. They had kids now, and they'd smoke a joint, and when the show started, fall asleep. Yeah. That seems like Tom Davis' personal experience. Yeah, well, I think for sure. Yeah, he devoted many hours to that but i think that there's everybody feels when people say to me what the best cast was yeah almost invariably i can tell when they went to high school yeah you know if they say phil harman data cover you go well you yeah and because in high school

you're you have no power whatsoever you have no money you can't drive you you know just staying up late is exciting and having your friends over that's when i watch it yeah yeah and so you attach to a cast and and you you go those four or five years with them well you've been you've been through about 150 cast members probably i'm not yeah yeah i don't keep saying now on through you know and you've had amazing talent throughout all of it right you uh you there was even a couple as you said in the years that you weren't here oh and also there are a lot of people i saw um robert downey jr this summer and he was in the 85 cast yeah as was joan cusack yeah they were brilliant it just wasn't right right for here at that time but

you got guys like you know like like farrell who is you know one of the funniest persons that ever lived for whatever reason for sure innately yeah molly shannon was a genius and no question and it seems to me that throughout it you know which is why we can't get into specific stories phil hartman you know farley all of them yeah that there have been it seems to me that from the beginning there there's been this sort of current that you you seem to have a feeling for that you you want to happen that there's there's an electricity that can occur between people and with performers right that you want to happen that there's there's an electricity that can occur between people and with performers right that you're kind of chasing get out of the way of it right yeah now you know

from the very beginning i imagine that first cast was was as a young man you were all very probably very close yeah and i i imagine you you know when you talked about living at the chateau and knowing that belushi passed away there that it must have been like a devastating heartbreak to happen to somebody that you loved and was part of that. Now, as time goes on, what are some of those liabilities of the talented can be excess and self-destruction.

Right. How do you handle that? What are you willing to tolerate? Well, I mean, it's a small point of pride that nobody's ever died doing the show. It generally happens a couple years after they leave the show. Yeah.

And that's, I think, because the intensity of it leads to that, leads to some kind of exhilaration and high, and maybe people want that to continue. Is it your drug, the show? No, well, you know, my drug is... Red wine? I don't think it's the show. It's not that.

There's something about the show that you know you're only going to get close. You're never going to leave going that one was perfect never no not once you if you're from my side of things you only see the mistakes you you see somebody take off and do a magical which you enjoy it isn't that but you sort of see that the camera cut was late or that that the guy was cued in too early or that that joke didn't make it to cards and there's a stumble all of that and but it's a snapshot of what happened at 11 30 to 1 sure and so it's a different it isn't like you go well now i'm i'm done my work is done there's just it's like a sport you play aside from that yeah over the years you've become very adept

at the politics of show business uh-huh you've you know you've become you've powerful i might have been adept at the beginning but really i mean but i imagine that you know learning you know when to pull back when to aggressive, when to let things happen. And when I read the book about Conan, you seem like the Buddha of that book somehow. Is there something you need to do? You're a lifer. You're a TV lifer. Yeah.

I think I've probably done 20-odd movies. I've probably done 20 odd movies I was on the phone earlier with Tina Fey and Robert Carlock because we're shooting a retake you know a reshoot of a scene in the movie that we all just did and movies are something

whether it's as simple as Wayne's World or Mean Girls or whatever the only when I was off in the period I was off, I wrote with Steve Martin and Randy Newman, we wrote Three Amigos together, which was the better part of a year

and which was one of the happiest periods of my life. So I liked that. And I like music. I like being around that. Your buddies with Paulul simon yeah yeah you guys just hang out i saw him today yeah um uh but lots of there are lots of uh it's just being around creative people yeah i guess being around funny people is important being around the best people yeah and so i think you, this is a way that I got to spend my life.

And the thing about talent is it has to, for lack of a better word, ripen. It just needs whatever Malcolm Gladwell's 10,000 hours are or whatever. So you sort of see people here turn the corner. There's that moment when something connects. Right. I've seen it. And then the audience goes, oh, I always loved him. Right.

And you can point out with data that they didn't. But it doesn't matter because at that moment, they're no longer who they were. And that excites you? Well, there's something about it if you believe that what the writing is about and if what you you can for me it's having a voice having uh a seat at the table whether it's politics or music or comedy to to be part of what's going on what's happening that week yeah that time if you don't have that do you find you're a sad person no i mean am i like the melancholy clown no i know i mean i mean but like

if you weren't being stimulated in the five years i didn't do the show yeah i never saw the show not because of any sort of uh defiant, I really just, I thought, well, I was there all those Saturdays. Why would I want to stay home on a Saturday? Now, it just is, there's a thing that's exciting and thrilling about doing it. And then when I'm not doing it,

there's lots of other things that interest me. Do you know, I remember I worked for you at that internet show, This Is Not A Test, that Biederman ran. I hosted lots of other things that interest me. Do you know, I remember I worked for you at that internet show, This Is Not a Test, that Biederman ran. I hosted that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. When we were doing an internet show and no one had the internet. Yeah.

That was pretty exciting. Yeah, there's the thing about being there too early. That's never good. I'm so close to it. I do it all the time. Yeah, no, no, no. I do it all the time. You go like, oh, right, there's no one here.

Well, you know, coming back to that conversation again where the guy, he said basically that whether you're here or not, the network will be here. Yeah. And now it seems that you're going to be here. Yeah, no. And the network might not. But I think he said we will always be here because we are eternal and i think on some level that level of uh that level of power is always there no matter who owns the network or who runs things and i think uh whether if you're michelangelo you had a pope and i'm certainly not michelangelo but do you know what i mean you there's always

on some level a patron and uh under, you know, whatever blessing you work. And so we still see yourself as an employee. Not as I never saw myself as an employee, but I do believe that I work for someone. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Were you excited that you brought The Tonight Show back to New York? I mean, very.

I mean, that's a pretty amazing thing. Steve Burke and Brian Roberts and Bob Greenblatt, who are the Comcast people who came in. When I said about Jimmy that I thought he was, you know, we were doing Late Night, and I said to Steve Burke, I really want to do it in New York. He said, do you believe he's the guy and i said

yeah i do thanks for the question and uh he he went okay well then let's let's we'll do it and he flew out and he met with jay on a sunday no one knew about it and he talked to him and he he said i don't know that our shows will be any better in the fall next year, but I know that we have the Olympics and I think we could launch it. And I'd like to do this the right way. And of course, we'll take care of everybody on your staff and all that. And it was done with such elegance. Granted, you probably read the books from before.

But when we said well we we need to get 6b into shape there was a complete redo of the studio and eugene lee who did that brilliant design of it looks like it was there from 1955 on but it's that the acoustics were done by you know people from lincoln center came in it was like a magical transformation into what the perfect television studio could be and there was a hundred you know like a hundred percent support they're really proud of it and it sent this signal that they believe in the future they're going to be in the business right staying uh at a time when all the articles for the network business is over and uh and you go well what's going to replace it just more fragmented stuff you know smaller smaller audiences so we know that the

the pipes work you know people find monday night football they find us every week they find the things they find right and and every now and then there's a new show like empire or or this year with uh blind spot the people everybody's talking about and that is that's what are called hits yeah and they don't happen that often yeah and when they don't happen for a while people go well i guess this is over right it just means there haven't been hits for a while so you're you're you're a believer in 100 in the old model yeah i'm a believer i don't know whether commercials is the answer i'd rather that they didn't try and do 26 shows a year i mean jack benny did 39 yeah you know uh but there was a lower

less less people in that yeah exactly and i think you know that sort of uh hbo model of 13 episodes of something you can get anybody good to do it because you're not taking small commitment and they're yeah yeah so you're just going to keep going until you what you can't uh see or you know one day they find you wandering the halls when uh looking for chubby i just i decided to do the i decided to do the 40th two summers ago because it was august and uh my cell phone rang and it was uh kenny mung who works here for years yeah and he called me to say don Pardo had died and he was 95 maybe 96 and uh I had not Don had retired a couple times and I said that's just unacceptable so he moved to Tucson we would tape him there we you know that voice was so important that was that sound voice yeah and and the way that

Derek Jeter to the end had Bob Shepard announce him as he was coming out to bat. You go, those are just traditions that are part of things. And I went, he was the first person from that time who, he began here in June 1944. I'm not born. And so I go, he'd been an mbc his his whole life not that i that was my goal but there was something about if i don't do this 40th show there this would be the last time that that founding generation will all be there and so i did it i doubt that i'll do another one but it was it was an amazing night because you sort of looked around

and you knew every face. You know what was amazing? I knew every face, obviously. Is how quickly Dan and Lorraine dropped into those characters. Yeah. That was amazing to me. That they were just beneath the surface.

Yeah. Dana Carvey used to say, tell me anyone who's been funnier than they were on snl after i don't think it's true because there's lots of great work after but i think for everyone there's that period when they struggle there's a period when they're finding their way and then there's that great period where they're just let me at them and whatever they got to do they're going to destroy you know chris that once again that cast of uh kristin fred andy jason bill uh amazing yeah and and then six people leave

because it's their time and then you have to introduce a whole new group of people and people go well they're not the ones we love and you go trust me yeah wait you'll get away but it is painful because it's always and that's where you're at now yeah well no i think i'm we're we moved past that last year i think we're solid now but i used to say that all babies are ugly unless they're your baby and uh then after a while three four months into it people go what a cute baby but it is uh when they first come out they're not necessarily great looking and that's there's something to the audience's patience with us yeah that they go yeah somebody who used to review said i'm not reviewing the new cast anymore because she says i always don't think they're good and then three years later i'm

they are yeah and you go sometimes it happens immediately chevy was stunning how fast it happened and he knew it he didn't believe me he but you know he and i were very, very close. He, I, and O'Donoghue, that first Christmas, because none of us knew where to go, we stayed here. We stayed in this office and we wrote. We wrote the first show back, which was an Elliot Gould show, which won the Emmy that year. And that level of, we were all about the same age.

Michael was a little older than us. But John and Danny, Lorraine, Gilda, they were all much, much younger. To us, it was like six or seven years when you're 30 and someone's 23. A lot. You know, Bill Murray's 22. You kind of go, right, well, you know, it's not your turn yet. You know, it's like you're only in sixth grade. When you get to eighth grade, you'll be able to.

And I think that there was something about that time and the how deeply everyone cared about each other that is you're always trying to get back to. Yeah. And we do. And, you know, I have a family, which is really, you know, as cliche as it sounds, the most important thing in my life. And you sort of realize that you don't have this in lieu of a family.

You just have this and a family. And it's a different feeling you know if you don't have one feeds the other if you can't care about the people you work with you probably are going to have a hard time caring about the people you live with and i think the reason i was watching that yankee game was because there's something about when you watch team sports, you understand if you follow baseball, why you need a third baseman. Because if somebody hits it in that area and you don't have anyone,

you're going to be very embarrassed. Yeah. So there's something about knowing you need the others that in order for you to be remarkable, that's a big deal. That is a big deal. And it's something you learned later in life? I think I always sort of knew it.

Even when I was performing, I was part of a two-man thing where I was in plays or whatever. I think because the show was in New York and because theater is here, there's some connection in live television to the theater and also to cameras yeah and uh i don't know i don't think this show could exist anywhere else it's beautiful it's a beautiful idea

and you keep in touch with some guys you and mike are friends and do you do you have relationships with a lot of the past cast oh yeah of yeah, of course. Yeah? You still talk to, like, Dan and those guys? Yeah, I talk to Dan. Yeah. I may see Dan week after next. And I did it with Christian the other night. You love them. Yeah, I do, yeah.

Yeah, and I think the feeling is probably mutual. It is. I believe it is. If you did it right, it turns out really well. Okay. Well, that's beautiful. It was great talking to you. And I just want to say in closing, because I would be remiss if I didn't, I'm ready to re-audition.

Yeah. You know, I think that I'm at that place now. I'm fully formed. Well, again, you know, we're always on the lookout. Well, you know, it's an interesting thing. When Chris Rock told me about leslie uh she did my show before yeah and and amazing i go well how you know she says she's the funniest person i know funniest woman i know and i think you know and she's not gonna work for you or she's

gonna work for at&t but she's the real thing and i went well how old is she and i think she's the real thing. And I went, well, how old is she? And I think she was 46. And I went, well, that's, uh, well, you don't have her come in, but it is that thing of where that's not what you're looking for. Right.

You know, our ideal is something else. And then you see it and you fall in love and you go, she's great. Yeah. And that's what I mean by whatever it is you say you're looking for is the brochure. You know, like what the real thing is, is when you see it and you're blown away by it, can you respond in the right way?

Right. Yeah. Right. I get it. I get it. Well, that's encouraging. I'm going to take that as a maybe. Yeah.

No, no, no. And, you know, there's always, there's parts floating around, you know. Okay. Good. Good. Because I have a lot of- And you'll leave your headshot, of course. Yeah, no, no, no. And, you know, there's always, there's parts floating around, you know. Okay, good, good. Because I have a lot of... And you'll leave your headshot, of course. Yeah, no, I haven't. I brought a bunch of them. What do they do now?

They don't do headshots anymore. Everyone knows everybody. You just got to go online. No, that's a guy. There's no mystery to it anymore. Yeah. Well, how do you feel that now there's like generations of people that see this as a goal? Well, that happened really in the 80s.

You realize that we were auditioning people who wanted to get here. Yeah. As opposed to rounding everybody up in the 70s where... We got to find them. Yeah, exactly. But now your casts are huge. Yeah. Is it just sort of like you have a farm team and uh and no i think it was

because when everyone left in the 70s and you had to start all new it was better to bring one or two people in every year uh and that cohort were sort of connected to each other and then they would learn from the others and then gradually you know john who started last week yeah who's you know bright and talented uh you know he's about the same age as peach right at pizza 21 yeah yeah all right well this is a this has been a pleasure for me also i'm available to host yeah there's a lot of well if this thing explodes you know okay well now i gotta get promotion behind it yeah thanks lauren thank you so that's it that was it that was the experience and it was a great one folks it was a it was a great experience. And what are you going to do?

Not only did I get closure, not only by this point did I didn't even know if I needed it, but it was great to have it. And also what I came away with was Lorne Michaels is a good guy. He's a great guy. I loved hanging out with him. He's got a job. He loves his job. He's been doing the job for 35 years. You heard the history of it. He's a creature of habit, but he loves what he's doing and he's totally engaged with it every week. He's in show business.

He's a producer of a show that's been on a long time and is very unique and done in a very specific way and it's his life it's his love and that's who Lorne Michaels is he's in show business and he's a guy and I had a great time talking to him

I want to thank Lauren Roseman from NBC and Abigail Parsons from my booking team for making this happen. Also, the photo used in the iTunes artwork on this episode is by Frank Oakenfels at NBC. That's all. You know the deal. No guitar today. No guitar today. Big day. Boomer lives! Well, almost almost anything. So no, you can't get snowballs on Uber Eats. But meatballs and mozzarella balls. Yes, we can deliver that. Uber Eats. Get almost almost anything.

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will get a Dan Dawson bobblehead courtesy of Backley Construction. Punch your ticket to Kids Night on Saturday, March 9th at 5pm in Rock City at torontorock.com.