WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 791 - Eugene Levy

Episode Date: March 5, 2017

Eugene Levy brings more than five decades of comedy history from north of the border into the garage. He tells Marc about his early days as a college student in Canada hanging out with Martin Short, Ivan Reitman, and Catherine O'Hara, performing in a fabled production of Godspell in Toronto with an all-star lineup of comedy stars, and joining the Second City theater, which paved the way for SCTV. Eugene also explains what goes into co-writing Christopher Guest's largely improvised films. 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.

Death is in our air. This year's most anticipated series, FX's Shogun, only on Disney+. We live and we die. We control nothing beyond that. An epic saga based on the global best-selling novel by James Clavel. To show your true heart is to risk your life.

When I die here, you'll never leave Japan alive. FX's Shogun, a new original series streaming February 27th, exclusively on Disney Plus. 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's on the right path forward. Take a closer look out at calgaryeconomicdevelopment.com. all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fucking ears what the fuck nicks what the fuck epitomises someone sent me that one how's it going i'm mark maron this is my show if it different, it's because I'm not in the garage. Does it sound okay? I think it sounds better.

I just adjusted a knob. Sounds better in my head. Did you notice the knob adjustment? Well, where am I? Am I hidden away? Am I in a bunker somewhere? Did I split? Am I fucking out?

Am I off the grid?? Did I split? Am I fucking out? Am I off the grid? Kinda. I kinda am. I'm in Canada. I'm in Canada for two nights. And I got to be honest with you, you know, and I say this with a heavy heart, but I feel fucking relieved, man. I'm just here two days and I feel relieved.

I'll talk about, I just was in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Ridgefield, Connecticut. Great shows. I'll tell you about them in a second, but there's something going on this month that you're probably going to hear about whenever you listen to podcasts this month in March. And I feel like I should, I should let you know, I should bring you into the loop. And it's not just this one. It's an industry-wide initiative going on right now called Tripod. And the goal is to enlist you, the loyal podcast listeners, to get other people you know listening to podcasts. That's right. We're on a mission. Be pod missionaries. I know this might shock you,

but some people still don't get podcasts. It's still a mystery to them. My father, for instance, who I doubt has even listened to the interview I did with Barack Obama. I don't know how what he says to his friends or people he knows who bring it up to him, but I'm pretty sure he hasn't. I'm not sure he's listened to one fucking podcast, my dad. But obviously, we're getting into a different issue all right right now pretty much every top podcast producer is taking the time this month to encourage listeners to get the word out tell a friend or a family member about your favorite podcast tell them any way you want and if you do it on social media use the hashtag tripod t-r-y pod all right and thanks for spreading the word you know we're just doing a

little little push for the medium for the medium of podcasting so yeah i'm in this very pleasant hotel in montreal oh by the way eugene levy speaking of canada is on the show today from sctv and from many movies from many things you've seen, from all the Christopher Guest films, the very funny and quirky guy who's been out a long time, Eugene Levy, getting into a little of that SCTV history. And it's odd that I'm doing the intro in Canada. That was not planned. It just happened that way. I flew in me and Singer, Ryan Singer on the road. He's with me. So we flew into New York on Wednesday, rented a car, drove up to Ridgefield. It was the Ridgefield Playhouse.

And it seemed like an old school. Brendan, my producer, Brendan McDonald, met us up there. He drove up from New York. It was a pretty great show. It was a pretty sweet show. It was a packed little room. But the interesting thing about it was after the show, I'm backstage and the woman who runs the place, she comes up to me and she says, hey, Mark, there's a couple of guys that said they went on a

teen tour with you. Does that ring a bell? And I'm like, fuck yeah, it rings a bell. If it's the guy that took all my money on that bus playing poker with me, I'd like to see him. I went on a barren teen tour when I was like, I don't know how old I was, maybe 14. And these were these tours. Most of them came out of Long Island. It was like an alternative to camp. You just get on a bus with like 30 or 40 other

kids and you start to really look forward to the places that you actually sleep in a hotel. But I was on a bus for like a month or so with these guys, these kids. There was a lot of us. I was surprised at the memories that I had because I've been around a long time. I've been a lot of places, but why was it so stuck in my head, you know, this particular trip, like this teen tour? Well, I'll tell you why. Because for some reason on that teen tour, I got sucked into a compulsive gambling habit.

I was like 14, 15 years old, and there were these kids from Long Island. I know who they were craig and mike and we would just play fucking cards all the time on the bus and i lost a lot of money i lost all the money that i had you know for the trip and i had to wire my aunt so my parents wouldn't know for for more money which i lost to these fucking card sharks, these hustlers, these young, I don't know what, professional gamblers from Long Island. And it was embedded in my memory.

And I remember a lot of guys, I remember a few people from that team tour. So she said, they're here. And I'm like, all right, them back because uh I need to I need to settle a score and sure enough in walks and we're all in our 50s now Craig and Andy and their wives and I'm like I know you man I know you Craig I know you Andy now Andy didn't play cards but Craig did and I said you got to be straight with me. Yeah, I know. I know it's surprising.

I remember, but I fucking remember because I think you cheated me out of a lot of money. Now, just tell me right now. Was that a rigged game? I got right in his face. And he told me, no, you're just a shitty card player, which is true and actually remains true. But it was sort of fascinating to see these guys. It's always fascinating to see people. I mean, what has it been?

35, 36 years, 35 years ago, they had some pictures of the teen tour. It excites me whenever I see people that I knew for any amount of time that I remember, and they're still alive and they're okay and they're doing well. That's who I am. No resentment. Even if he said he'd, that's, that's who I am. That's what, you know, no resentment. I will.

Even if he said he'd stolen the money, I wouldn't have cared, but he didn't shitty card player. I'm going to have to accept that. Right. I'm going to have to accept that. That's just the way it is. So we had a great show,

great show in Ridgefield at the Ridgefield playhouse. Very enjoyable. It's nice seeing him. Brendan, he went back to New York and then, uh, Ryan and and i the next day drove up about three hours or so got jacked on duncan donuts coffee i ate a few donuts fuck it fuck it all right i'm taking the pills i can eat what i want now isn't that the right thing isn't that how a grown aging man with slightly high cholesterol uh puts things into perspective i could eat healthy and just really manage things or part of me could be like well every once in a while why not just go

to fucking town i'm taking the pills right right i gotta live a little i don't know when this shit's gonna end right there's a dialogue i engage with so then we drove up to portsmouth new hampshire this landscape is very familiar to me running that that drive from New York to Boston to Connecticut. I did one-nighters all throughout this area all my life, not all my life, when I was starting out doing comedy. So it was all very familiar, and it's very wintry. It's very crisp. It's very clear. All the trees have shed their leaves, and there's an intensity to it. There's a certain quality to the light into the air in the winter in New England. It was all coming back.

All the feelings, all the confusion, all the anger, all the not knowing of being in college, of starting comedy, of setting out to do what I want to do in the panic of cigarette smoke and coffee in my shitty VW Golf, running around to unknown little townships to play one-nighters in pubs and bars and grills. And it all just came back. But it's a beautiful nostalgia, you know?

As the world around us gets chaotic and dark, sometimes nostalgia is the only thing that can float your heart above the fucking surface so it buoys there so it's not just sinking like it's stuck to a fucking anvil we go up to Portsmouth and it's this little coastal town I think I've probably been there I feel like I've done a gig there I don't know I don't remember but it all looked very familiar and we my buddy jimmy my buddy jimmy medicine portsmouth now jimmy just uh quit his government job uh the last job he had was working in the state department for uh flying around the world on the plane with uh senator john kerry secretary of state john kerry it was exciting to get you know the deep uh the deep understanding of how actually the government works in all its nuanced ways.

But nonetheless, Jimmy and I go way back. We go back to college. And it was great seeing him. We did that show last night at the Music Hall. What a great venue. Been there since the 1800s. Great crowd. But we had a great show.

And Jim said, why don't we, I was going to fly. Me and Ryan were going to fly to Montreal. We we're gonna drive back to boston fly up but jimmy said let's drive it so we drove up here through that fucking beautiful winter crisp air a few a few snow squalls is that what they're called squalls it was great and i again bringing it full circle here, I got to be honest with you. We got in, we got through customs and just physically and mentally, I felt a relief to not be afraid of the country I'm in. And that is so fucked up and sad. And I'm only here for two days. Not like I'm living here, but I did feel a tangible sort of like, all right, the, you know, whatever's,

you know, whatever the psychic vibe culturally that's going on in my country is not here. And I'm going to enjoy it. I'm going to meditate for a couple of days in this. I'm going to take it in. I'm going to fucking relax I'm going to meditate for a couple of days in this I'm going to take it in I'm going to fucking relax for a couple of days is that okay? is that alright with you guys? next week I'll be at

College Street Music Hall in New Haven on March 10th Troy Savings Bank Music Hall March 11th in Troy, New York Flynn Center March 12th in Burlington, Vermont. That's next weekend. You want to hear me talking

to Eugene Levy? It's really kind of an honor to meet these cats. Especially these old SCTV people. I still got to get them. I've got a few kids in the hall.

I've got a couple SCTV people. I don't have any Monty Pythons. I got to do that too. Let's enter the world of Back in the Garage. And this is my conversation with Eugene Levy. He's currently in the show

Schitt's Creek, which is now in its third season. You can watch it Wednesdays on Pop TV, although our Canadian listeners are scoffing because they've already been watching it on the CBC up here in Canada, where I am. All right, this is me and Mr. Calgary is a city built by innovators. Innovation is in the city's DNA. And it's with this pedigree that bright minds and future thinking problem solvers are tackling some of the world's greatest challenges from right here in Calgary. From cleaner energy, safe and secure food, efficient movement of goods and people, and better health solutions, Calgary's visionaries are turning heads around the globe. Across all sectors, each and every day.

Calgary's on the right path forward. Take a closer look how at calgaryeconomicdevelopment.com. Death is in our air. This year's most anticipated series, FX's Shogun, only on Disney+. We live and we die. We control nothing beyond that. An epic saga based on the global best-selling novel

by James Clavel. To show your true heart is to risk your life. When I die here, you'll never leave Japan alive. FX's Shogun. A new original series streaming February 27th exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. Favi. Levy. You look nice.

You look very well put together, Mr. Levy. Do you know how tough it is to find sleeveless sweater vests in this town? I assumed you got it online. I didn't even know they made them anymore. I don't shop online. You like to go? My son keeps telling me, why don't I shop online? I said, I don't know.

It's just kind of a drag to send stuff back. But I think I'm going to start doing that now. Yeah. Do you like going to the store? No, I'm not really. I don't like shopping. Right. I mean, I like looking. I don't like shopping. Right. I mean, I, I like looking, I don't, I don't like trying on stuff, you know, cause it only makes me feel bad about myself.

Oh, really? I just find it exhausting. It's exhausting. And, uh, and pants is just, is like a, just a pain in the ass. Yeah. Yeah. Because, uh, you think you're a certain size and then you're not and then you're not you got to deal with that shit yeah and then and then it doesn't do up and then you're thinking why do i need jeans why why do i need to leave the house why do i

need to dress how are you feeling about uh things you feeling funny in general i i never i never feel uh funny except i'm gonna take a sip of water and let it run down your face purposely run down my face just to get me yeah funny oh there it is yeah no funny funny yeah uh i'm i'm not i'm not really a funny guy that's the biggest enigma about me. I'm not a stand-up. I've never done stand-up. I just went into improv theater because if I'm going to go down,

I want to take some people with me. At least have the protection. I'm not just going up there and blowing it all myself. Right, right. Pick up where you left off. You can't look like a total asshole. I want some collateral damage. You come from, you grew up in Canada?

Well, you don't have to say it like that. Yes, I did. I mean, I knew that. So I generally would have just said, where did you grow up? But I chose to insert the information. But there was something about Canada, the way you said it on your face. It looked like it was, you grew up in Canada? No, I... In other words other words bracket you're kidding me no no absolutely not I've had a lot of uh important Canadians in this garage and important show business Canadians I've had I talked to Monty Hall at his house wow and he's from Winnipeg Lorne Green was he I didn't I Lorne Green. I didn't get the opportunity. I did talk to Lorne Michaels.

Yeah, he's also big. Yeah, Ivan Reitman I talked to. Went to school with Ivan. So what part of Canada did you grow up in? Explain it to me. I grew up in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, which is about 40 miles southwest of Toronto. Oh, so it was like a suburb of the city in a way. Well, it's not a suburb of Toronto.

I don't think Hamiltonians would actually love to hear you say that. I don't want to alienate any Canadians. I might have to live there. No, Hamilton was kind of the Pittsburgh of the North. It was kind of a steel town. Oh, really? Yes. Is it still?

Nicknamed the ambitious city. Okay. So it's sort of like, all right, Pittsburgh. That's a good analogy. Yeah, there were a lot of steel companies going on in the 50s and 60s, and then they're gone. Yeah. Now, virtually. Not unlike America.

The industry is gone. What is the, have you been back to Hamilton? I used to go back to visit family. In fact, I still do. I have some aunts and uncles. Well, now it's one uncle. I had two uncles that lived to be 99. That's encouraging.

I just visited my aunt in San Francisco over the weekend, who is 97. Wow. Powerful genes. The baby brother is 94. Her baby brother? Yeah, Sid. He's still golfing. Yeah.

That's great. That's good. Yeah is that is good and i had a few other aunts and uncles well into their 90s but anyway the trips to hamilton are getting kind of fewer and fewer and i still have family back there but when something like that happens in hamilton is it like here i mean does the economy collapse is there despair when uh like the steel leaves uh there's despair generally i think no hamilton's a lovely city but it did go through a tough time right in the 70s 80s you know it's just uh the plants closed steel closed uh malls opened up outside of hamilton which took all the business out of the city drained it and drained it kind of and then went through a major depression and when did it bounce back did it is it okay is it hip uh hamilton is uh is bouncing back in a major

way oh good yeah yeah no no a lot of uh gentrification happening and cafes and a lot a lot of uh great things happening and still home of the hamilton tiger cats oh yeah yeah is that hockey i no mark is it no no i took a shot it's not but actually as a guess it's a good guess because you know because i'm from canada exactly so hockey would be the major i thought i was gonna nail it no hamilton tiger cats what are they you know my friend joe flared's a football team okay all right they used to be part of a nine-member Canadian football league. Yeah. Two of the nine teams called the Rough Riders. Yeah.

So the Tiger Cats were, as my friend Joe Flaherty used to say, the most ridiculous name for a team he's ever heard. It's like calling a team the Monkey Apes. But that's Hamilton. Proud to be a Hamiltonian. Was your family in the, in the steel manufacturing business? No, no, no, no. What'd your old man do?

Not remotely. My, my dad worked in a, uh, in a car plant. Yeah. Um, and, uh, was a kind of a foreman in the, uh, in the plant and, uh, grew up, uh, basically doing a lot of physical foreman in the plant. Yeah. And grew up basically doing a lot of physical labor. Yeah, running the line. He was a working guy. And your mom? Working guy.

My mom was a housewife. You know, just managed three kids. I have an older brother. I have a younger sister. How are they doing? They're doing well. I just saw my sister on the weekend in San Francisco, and my brother's back in Toronto. Anyone in show business?

Well, no. Well, my brother is a producer on our television show. Schitt's Creek? Schitt's Creek. Did you create that? I created that with my son. Oh, really? Schitt's Creek is a father-son operation yeah

yeah and do you both write on it still uh we we i i was writing with him um to be honest i was in the writing room the first year when we started the show yeah until i realized he can he can just run with it now yeah it's all you it saves me me 12 hours in a writing room trying to crack story. But so he's running the show now, and he's doing a great job. And you're working with Catherine O'Hara. Catherine O'Hara. Genius. Yeah, she's pretty damn good.

We've been working together just for eons. Great. Like how many years? Like 40 years? Well, 40. Is it 40? Yeah. That's amazing, isn't it?

Yeah. She started out, she was, we met, I think, even before Second City opened in 1973 in Toronto. I was in a production of Godspell in Toronto in 1972. You were in that that mythic production it was a pretty good production was it like yeah was it martin short it was martin yes was gilda radner martin also from hamilton martin short marty and i went to yes went to school together uh uh as well yeah and so we were the only two kind of hamiltonians you went to high

school together no no we met at mcmaster university kind of Hamiltonians. You went to high school together? No, no. We met at McMaster University, but I knew of Marty in high school because Marty, for a period of time, was dating my sister. So I knew, I've heard, I heard tell of the name Marty Short through my sister back in high school. Really? Yeah, when she was in high school. But I didn't meet Marty, really, until McMaster University. So what is McMaster?. So what is McMaster? What is that college? You know, it's funny because, well, not that funny, but McMaster is just basically was a college

started by some Baptists back in the, whatever it was, 20s, 30s, something, and majored really in engineering when I was there that was kind of a big thing there was no drama course there was no film course there was no nothing pertaining to the arts really it was all kind of extracurricular i don't even know what an engineering degree uh in enable someone to do well you can build you can like build a bridge oh okay well that's that's important yeah yeah you can build a bridge. Yeah. Yeah. In fact, you would have a rosy future now with all the infrastructure work that's going to be going on. Yeah, it's all going to happen.

In this country. But it was all extracurricular. All the drama, the film, you know, that's where I met Ivan. Ivan Reitman. Running the film club at McMaster. But he was there, like, so there literally was no arts, yet you met these people that went on to become, you know, tremendous contributors to comedy and art. Yeah, because we could do, we could just make movies,

and nobody's telling you what to do. You just take a camera and make it the way you want it. It's not like a class where you're passing or failing. Who was in charge of that? How did that? Well, Ivan took it over, you know, in 1966 when I got there. Yeah. And when he got there, it was kind of an underground-ish kind of film club, right?

It wasn't, but it was about making films, not about watching films. No, it was about making films. Oh, okay. When Ivan took over, he actually formed the club into a money-making venture. Oh, really? I think he told me about that. Yes, because he did have film nights. Right.

And he had horror film nights he'd screen people would charge pay money and you'd have an all-night film festival where films would be bicycled around two or three theaters and right they'd be going on all night but not these are these are mainstream movies that he would show for money mainstream movies right show for money okay and then he also started a he organized the making of the movies by, you know, having a, you would have to submit an idea for a film and the top five ideas got chosen. That's how mine got chosen. And that's when I first met Ivan. We all made our own movies.

What was your movie? My first movie, I made two movies. My first one was called garbage uh-huh um and i worked uh garbage uh for two three summers yeah uh up in hamilton what does that mean you worked garbage it means you kind of stood on the back of a metal truck in 110 degree heat in the humidity of an august hamilton summer and dumped garbage at your feet and then packed it down so that you got seven tons of garbage into a truck into a truck and then you'd go to the dump and unload it and then go back and do it all over again so you're what

you're what we used to call a garbage man uh yes a garbage man yes or sanitary engineer is that right you went to engineering school. That's right. Yeah. So what was the film garbage about? Well, it was a very complicated story. Basically, it involved seeing students writing an exam, thinking of what they want to write down as an answer, and then cutting to a bunch of garbage coming out the back of a garbage truck being dumped onto the dump. That was the tag. So the theme of it was,

because a lot of people still may not quite know what it's about, school was kind of garbage. Right. Yeah. So that was a four-and-a-half-minute movie, no sound, and then I made the first talkie. Oh, good for you. Finally, you broke the audio boundary.

The first synchronized sound movie. That was you. That's amazing. I had no idea that I was talking to somebody that had that big a place in film history. Well, you and a nation. Yes. It's weird because a lot of people I think think that was the jazz singer or something, right? That was one of the first talkies.

Well, that talkie scored a bit more publicity than my talkie. Yeah. What was yours called? Jack and Jill. Interesting. Yeah. Was it based on the poem? It was based, although I used the poem at the end as a surprise.

Oh, good. Yeah, but it was about, oh, a bunch of emotionally disturbed people. Was it a comedy? No, although it did turn out to be. It did. So you shot a serious talkie called Jack and Jill that was not meant to be funny. That's right. How old were you, 20?

Yeah, I was about 20. But this was a serious film. Yeah, it was a serious film that turned out to be kind of funny. That's pretty much the story of my career. I'd go into audition for movies, for serious movies, and end up getting laughs at the audition. So you became that guy. The guy who had to learn that he was funny long after everyone else knew. Yeah, it's never got the part, but good comic relief for the casting people.

But Jack and Jill, now I'm obsessed with it. So what is it? It's early 70s and it's a serious film. And what was it about? It was about a guy in a home for emotionally disturbed adults who had a had a crush on one of the girls uh in the home and made up a story about the romance between him and the girl which we actually saw his story and at the end of the movie you find out that this story that you think is a real story is he's writing this story oh right he's actually in this home. And then the other people come in while he's writing it. And they take the paper that he's writing. And they look at it. And it says Jack and Jill.

And they all make fun of him. And then they recite Jack and Jill. To him? To him. Like together? Until he dramatically turns and screams into camera, stop. Yeah. And that's it.

That's it. Wow. Yeah. Now, that was a feature? That was an 18-minute feature. Yeah. Yeah. Do you have this digitized?

Is this available on YouTube? Well, there is a story, which I will not go into here. But I did. I looked for years to try and find these movies. Your movies. Yeah, they were left at McMaster, and then I moved and went on with my life. And years later, I said, gee, I'd love to try and get a hold of the movies that I made there. Of Garbage and Jack and Jill?

Yeah, and nobody knew. Yeah. Anybody going to McMaster, they didn't know. Anything about the film board had ceased to be uh everything had stopped we don't know where the things are people looked for them they they had no idea a couple of years ago not even that um i had uh my uh cousin uh who now works at mcmaster um uh said she heard she heard that there was somebody running a film night in Hamilton where they're showing McMaster movies.

And I went, whoa. Well, then give me the name of this guy, because I want to get a hold of him to find out how he got a hold of the movies. And I did. He got a hold of your movies? He got a hold of all the movies. Ivan's movies, my movies. When was this?

This was this year. Oh, wow. Yeah. And I got a hold of the guy, and I said, how do I get a hold? He said, well, I'll send you the link. And not only that, he personally went through and cleaned up. Restored them. Digitally restored.

The first talkie. The movies. Yeah. Yeah. So that's it. So now I have them have them what was it like watching them again it was pretty amazing because you're just seeing a whole chunk of your life really because the people in the movies are your friends yeah people you went to school with and so

it's it's just it's you know it's like you know time travel 40 50 years never quite happened. Oh, my God. Yeah. And are you in that movie? Did you play the role? No. No. Just directed and wrote them?

Just directed and wrote them and provided a voice, I think, in one of the movies. One of the voices is. In fact, Ivan and I voiced a section of Garbage. Yeah. Because we didn't have sync sound, so we had to kind of see two people talking, and then we created dialogue so it looked like a dubbed movie in a way. Kind of fit. Yeah. So how do you go from there?

So that began your relationship with Ivan. Yeah, that was a good. with Ivan yeah that was a good and Ivan to be honest is the one person responsible for I would say me being in the business because when when when he left to do his first feature in Toronto when he left McMaster he left a year before I did so I um and I wasn't doing that well because I was doing a lot of drama I was doing a lot of film you know involved with the film board and working on the paper and I loved loved it. Never went to class. Where'd you do drama? At McMaster.

Oh, so they had a, like a. They had a club. Oh, okay. With a good director of drama who was brought in from Toronto. Oh, okay. And so we actually did a lot of plays. Yeah? You know, but there was still, there was no course.

Right. Mostly serious plays? Mostly serious. You wanted to be a serious actor. Well, you know, it was the 60s, so there was a lot of those plays where you're crawling, crawling on the floor and creating human pyramids and things like that. Screaming. Yes. Anything but acting, I guess.

Yeah, group theater stuff. Group theater. Or like, what was it? Or group pyramids. Theater of cruelty. Experimental theater. Or like, what was it? Or group theater of cruelty. Experimental theater. Yes, yes. The Polish lab theater from the late 60s was a huge influence.

So that's what I was doing. And so I really was bombing out of academically. Yeah. And realized I had to get a job. So I knew Ivan was in Toronto starting his first movie. I called him to say, Ivan, I'm failing my year. I'm really going under here, but I think I need a job. I think school is over for me.

So you didn't finish? And he said, no, I never finished. I left school. I wouldn't have been able to pass anyway. I was so far behind. And he said, well, boy, if you'd have called me a week ago, I could have got you a job in props. I could have got you a job in painting or something.

But every job is gone. I mean, coffee boy is the only job. But I said, great, I'll take it. He said, no, I can't give it to you. I said, I'll take it. He said, no, I can't give it to you. It's really not a real job. It only pays $60 a week. And I'm too embarrassed to give it to you. I said, I'll take it. He said, no, I can't give it to you. It's really not a real job. It only pays $60 a week, and I'm too embarrassed to give you the job.

Right. So I said, please give me the job. So that was my first job. And then Ivan's second movie that he did. What was that first movie? It was called Foxy Lady. It's a movie nobody's ever seen since the day it was released. I think he told me about that.

Were you in it, too? I was coffee boy on the movie. And then at the end, he gave me I think he told me about that. Were you in it, too? I was Coffee Boy on the movie, and then at the end, he gave me a cameo. Oh, good. At the end, because he knew I did a lot of work at McMaster, a lot of acting work and comedy, and he thought that was funny. So on his second movie, Cannibal Girls,

a movie he was thinking of doing, he said, do you want to be in the movie? Do you want to be in the movie? Star of the movie, and you can star with Andrea Martin. And I said, great. Did you know her? I met her on Foxy Lady. I served her coffee.

Yeah. Yes. And so I met Andrea on Foxy Lady, and then we did Cannibal Girls. Popular movie? Together. It won some award in Spain. oh okay the best horror comedy or something well that's good but is it was it a good movie no not remotely it was um it was mostly improvised and not well yeah well it's interesting because out of mcmaster's extracurricular clubs uh you know comes the sort of like tour de force of Canadian comedy in a way, that first wave there.

Well, yeah. I mean, Ivan came out of there, Marty Short, myself, Dave Thomas, Doug Henning, the magician. Sure, I remember him. What was that show he did on Broadway? The Magic Show. The Magic Show. I think I saw it. He smiles a lot, kind of hippie yeah

mustache yeah marty marty short used to do oh that's right impersonation of uh magic is illusion and illusion is magical and yeah he's a good character so before sctv was uh was the production of uh what was it godspell, the first thing that brought everyone together? How did that kind of happen? They just came to town and auditioned. And I auditioned for it. Marty was still writing his finals at McMaster. Marty was in social work at McMaster University.

And I called him to say, Marty, you should come in and audition for the show. Yeah. Because it's a musical show. It's like big, big New York production. Was he already doing stuff like that? Marty? At McMaster. He was?

Yes, he was acting. In fact, I directed Marty in a musical at McMaster called Benji, which was an original musical that was written by my roommate, Bob Sandler. Yeah. original musical that was written by my roommate, Bob Sandler. Yeah. And a great musician in Toronto, Tony Koznik, did the music for it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so we put it on there.

So Marty was performing. But again, like everybody, like me and everybody else that was doing it, you never thought about doing it professionally. It never occurred to me once while i was doing all these plays at mcmaster that wouldn't this be nice to do this professionally yeah you didn't become an actor nobody became actors what really it was just something you were just kind of having fun with just having fun with and was marty in like could you see the marty we see now in the marty then was he Was he? Yeah. Yeah.

Same. Yeah. Same. Same impressions. I mean, amazingly good impressions. He was doing that then. Yeah. Same voice.

Same great singing voice. So you tell him to audition for Godspell and what happens? So he came in and auditioned. And, of course, we both end up making the final show. And who else? Like, you had this amazing cast where i wasn't gilded it was me and marty gilder yeah gilder radner andrea martin victor garber uh victor garber paul schaefer was our musical director so that was a big show but like it seems to me like when i talked to ivan about it as well that that seemed to be the first like it felt like something

professional and something was happening and that these talents that all went on to other things and that you went on to work with, that seemed to be the first place it kind of happened. That actually was our first taste of show business, our first professional show, and meeting some really amazingly talented people. And then, you know, right out of Godspell, Second City opened up. I mean, we were really lucky being in Toronto at that time because, you know, Godspell was a major

production coming in from New York, right? Great. Second City was the great improvisational company that decided that Bernie Solins, who owned the company, owned the theater, decided to open up a theater in Toronto because they had played Toronto in the mid-60s and got amazing reviews. Right. So we just happened to be there in Toronto when Second City came to open up a Toronto theater. The first franchise.

First franchise. And that's where I met John Candy and Dan Aykroyd. But they were all Canadians, right? Yeah. So where did they come in from? You had never met them before. So Second City opens, and everybody wants to be part of it. Like people who are performing comedy want to be part of it.

Yeah. And what was the structure of it? How did it work? How did you get in? Was it a workshop situation? you you had to audition yeah okay you had to audition um you know five exercise called five through the door five characters you you'd have to create a character and they'd give you a situation like um it's a complaint department at a department store so somebody's the person working for the department store right you've got in for a complaint department at a department store. So somebody is the person working for the department store.

You've got in for a complaint, and then you do your complaint. You go through the door. You come back again as a different character complaining. Right. And then another character. And then you would go through some improvisations, and they made a choice. And they cast it.

And they cast it, yes. Like who was in charge of Second City there? Like I don't know. I they cast it, yes. Who was in charge of Second City there? I don't know. I know some of the history. I think I talked to Shelly Berman about the Compass players, and then that became Second City. But who did they send up as the guys who knew what they were doing? Well, Bernie and Del.

Del Close. Oh, Del Close, of course, yeah. He came up. Del Close would come up, and Bernie would also come up and work and be involved in directing shows but he wasn't you know he wasn't so much a director yeah bernie as he was just he owned it yeah right uh but del was that's a young del close del was yeah del was pretty amazing he was an amazing character yeah um like how Like, what did you learn from that guy? Well, he, well, you learned kind of how, basically through Second City, this is the great thing about Second City for us, who were lucky enough to get in it, is it's a great comedy school.

You know, it just, the shows were intelligent, they were bright. They were really funny, but really smart. And they were all improvised. Well, the shows were improvised and then you hone the improvisations down. Um, uh, a second city show is, I mean, you go and see the actual show, but every scene in the show was created through improvisation and honed to the point where we now have a solid piece. So then you put all these pieces together, you do your show. And then at the end of the show, you go out and take suggestions from the audience. And you take 15 minutes, you go back, talk about them, how are we going to do it.

Yeah. And then you come out and improvise the pieces. With how many people, like seven? Well, five, six, seven people sure in a cast and over time the pieces that you improvise when it comes time to starting your next show seven six seven eight months down the line you take the improvisations that you were doing that seemed like they were successful and you go back and try and recreate those improvisations and you start honing those down and they become the scenes for the next show and how did dell like what was dell's like uh process he just knew what he was doing it's hard

to do you know dell was oh that's you know yeah that's that you're doing it right. All that said, fuck it. It's, you know, but all right, cat's out of the bag. You're fired. Well, were there structures that were like, cause I know that Dell had some, some, some exercises and,

and, and things, right? Yeah, it was great. He was great at what he did. He was a great improvisational teacher. Yeah.

Very guru ish. Yeah. And he was there for years and he was a guy that also had a lot of personal problems and addictions and things and you know at that time yeah was there a system that you would you that you learned from him what did you learn about improvising from him you know you learn here the thing about we learned from from dell and certainly second city because it really was a hallmark of of the company since it was created was just, you know, always perform at the top of your intelligence level, which is something you

don't think you need to hear. But you do. I mean, it's amazing when you hear it, you go, oh, I get it. Because even if you're doing something cheap, play it smart. Right. If you're playing a cheap character, play it smart. Right. So don't go for the easy laugh.

Don't go for an easy laugh. Right. Just make it smart. Make the laugh smart. Or if you're creating a character, whatever, make the laugh come out of the character. But make it, you know, don't just throw it away and step over the line. Right. So never think you're smarter than your audience.

Right. And so those are guidelines that we, anybody in Second City goes on to use for the rest of your career, basically. So in that first crew, it was it was you and acroyd and candy the first company in toronto was it was at a different theater right and that was yes dan acroyd valerie bromfield a great uh very funny uh writer performer um a couple of local people joe flarity brian doyle murray his brother yeah and that was the company and then it closed because it didn't have a liquor license and people just got tired of having crepes and cokes so they closed yeah it only stayed open about six months yeah and then it was reopened at

the old fire hall in toronto and that's where people went john yes john and and uh and uh me and joe were in that company. When John got hired, John Candy got hired for Second City, they sent him down to Chicago. That's how good they thought he was. Dell wanted John Candy in Chicago in the company with Bill Murray. So that was already going? Bill was already down there?

Bill was in the company, yes. And they wanted John? Yeah, they wanted him in Chicago. What was in the company. Yeah. And they wanted John. Yeah, they wanted him in Chicago. What was amazing about John when you first met him? Like, he was just... He was just funny. Yeah. I mean, he was funny. Kind of, you know, had a very cute, adorable face.

Yeah. John wasn't that heavy. Initially? Back then. Yeah. You know, he was kind of plumpish. Right. Nevertheless, it was okay to do fat jokes sort of back then he was the guy leading the charge right that's he it was almost seems like

a uh that the model of um it's weird when you you look at at these sketch troops that are these improv troops that later created all you guys that that there almost seems to be a type, that there's a commedia della arte element to it, that people fall into a role, like the sort of bombastic, slightly heavy guy is sort of thematic throughout all of these groups. It seems like Belushi and Candy were kind of the beginning of it, and then you get this legacy of that.

Maybe I'm just romanticizing it or mythologizing it. Because I see all you guys as like these archetypes of what is now like sketch comedy. And everybody comes out of improv now more than stand-up. There was a while there where it was stand-up heavy. And now it's all about those models that were created at second city uh that now sort of guide show business yeah that's yeah although that's true although i think snl really still kind of there's still a lot of stand-up that gets people going into snl still come out of stand-up although they they have been coming out of the committee or UCB. The Lampoon.

Right. Back in the day. The committee is not. That was a long time ago. Right. Yeah. Well, that's how our show got started in Toronto. Because SNL, when they started in 1975.

Yeah. Really, the two groups were Second City and National Lampoon. Right. Second City and National Lampoon. Right. And Bernie Solins, who ran Second City, saying, boy, we're going to have our people just draining right out of Second City, going right into SNL. Yeah. Whoa, let's stop this here.

Yeah. Maybe we should have our own show. In Canada. Well, it so happened it was in, we started in Canada. Right. Because I guess the, most of us, John and Joe and myself were in Canada doing Second City Theater. And Marty? Marty came in later. So the idea was to counter SNL and create a show there.

Yeah. To hold on to talent. Yeah. Why should Saturday Night Live be taking all of our Second City talent? Why don't we have our own show where Second City can funnel talent? I think National Lampoon felt that way too. I've heard stories that the whole format was just pilfered by Lorne from Lampoon and just drained everybody out.

It's a conspiracy theory. It's funny. Well, you know, it's funny because, you know, Ivan, I was with Ivan when we first saw the National Lampoon Touring Show with Belushi and Harold Ramis and Bill and Gilda. Yeah. And it was a really funny show and, you know, out there. You saw it in Canada? Edgy. Yeah, they came up to Toronto and played a club in Toronto.

And then Ivan went back and talked to, you know, the cast. We all did. Yeah, great show, great show, great show. Next thing you know, Ivan is working out a deal with Maddie Simmons to create a permanent club in New York so this group can perform permanently. Maddie Simmons from National Lampoon. That's right. Yeah. That's right.

Right. Which is amazing when you think what Maddie Simmons owned and why would he need an Ivan. Right. And yet. He did it? Ivan was a, yeah, went into partnership with Maddie. And then out of that, of course, came Animal House. Right house right and you know ivan's career yeah yeah so all right so you guys so who it's bernie's idea to do second city first second city tv sctv yeah and how does that how does that

start down well we got together we just said we got together with Dell was involved Harold Ramos myself Joe Dave Thomas, yeah, and we kind of brainstormed the idea of a television network, uh-huh where we could do tell TV parody right and Make it like a programming day right Right. And that was the idea. With the behind the scenes and the bits. Yeah, behind the scenes, we wanted a storyline running through the show. And I can't honestly remember whose idea that was.

It could have been Bernie's. Or it could have been Harold's. Yeah. But anyway, that was it so that that storyline through the show created um a was really um the context a key thing for our show because instead of it just being a series of sketches we had a storyline where we needed some characters who worked at the station to carry some of these storylines right like johnny larue yeah john candy's character yeah um and who is what was fired his character's name the owner of the

station guy caballero yeah yeah was i and that came out of an improv an improvisation on the floor and in front of the camera uh harold ramus one of the smartest, funniest guys that I have ever met. May he rest in peace. Was doing a character called Mo Green in the first season of our show. He was the station business manager or the manager. And kind of a weaselly guy. And he did a show called Bowling for Dollars. Yeah.

And he would take calls on his Bowling for Dollars, and we would, in the first season, improvise a lot of these things. So Joe got on the phone with Harold on camera saying, Who am I talking to? And he says, Green, this is your boss, Guy Caballero. Yeah. And you could see Haroldold laugh on camera right because it's a play on gay caballero yeah uh anyway and so that kid that's where that character started yeah in an improv and then he

he became the the boss of the station so the whole idea which made it different from snl and in a way that was probably more easy to refill was you you had this whole umbrella, which was the network. So you could just, that was in place. So it was just a matter of creating characters, satirizing existing people, and just moving them through this network day. Yeah. And it was a great format for a show, for kind of poking fun at tv news programs and dramas and comedies and sitcoms and whatever i remember having to watch it like it wasn't on here until later like it was it was on one o'clock or something right and that was in but that was as it was happening because

when i was in a teenager i would watch it but that was current it wasn't like we weren't watching it after the like it wasn't, it hadn't run. I can't remember what years those were. What years were they? It's 1976. Okay. 76, 77, we were doing half hours. 78 was still half hour. And in our second year, a syndication company picked us up and syndicated our show in, I think, 40 U.S. cities.

Right. That must have been when I was watching it. Late at night. And it came on after SNL. Yeah, yeah, right. Or maybe it was Friday night. I can't remember. But I think it was after SNL.

I think so. One o'clock in the morning. Yeah, right. And then there were those of us who were kids who were sort of like this is its own thing you know like it had its own following and it was clearly different it was different it was like when python came on the scene if we would watch python and it was like wow where's that come from foreign is this weird i've never seen anything like it yeah exactly i remember seeing like martin do robin and you know and then the whole backdrop of all these other characters the weird what was that i haven't costello bit i was

trying to remember well we we did a we did a piece called the um this will mean probably nothing to the uh listeners because these are shows that are going back. But we did a show called The Midnight Express Special. Yeah. There was a show on NBC, a late-night music show, called The Midnight Special. What was that guy's name? The Midnight Special with Catman, not Catman, Wolfman Jack. Yeah. And then the movie, Midnight Express.

Right. So we combined the Midnight Express special as the Wolfman Jack show. Right. Hosted by Abbott and Costello, but the idea of the storyline through Midnight Express of somebody trying to smuggle. Heroin or hashish. Dope or heroin, hashish. Right. Into the country or get it out of the country we we incorporate it into the abbott and costello routine um so we did that we sometimes took a couple of things mixed them

together and and and um uh but by the same token our show was a post-production show we we did have the opportunity to write the show first or at least get the writing started and then shoot the show, and then we were involved in the editing. There wasn't an audience? No. I think that was the primary difference that you noticed.

Yeah, just playing to camera, and that is the primary and always is the primary difference. If you're performing for a studio audience, you want to get a response from the audience. Right. And to get the response from the audience, your performance has to come up, and that's where you get sitcom. Yeah. The performances are elevated to a –

Right. It's right out of vaudeville. A bit kind of a heightened, comedically heightened. The same with SNL. Right. And you guys were and yeah we play right to camera so we could keep the we could keep the subtlety of what we're doing just right into camera right and hold the characters a little harder hold the character and they did they did add a laugh track to the show which which you know couldn't do anything

about it really oh really well we tried in a very our very first show in the first season we thought we don't want a laugh track we just want this to play without a laugh track and we we cut the show together and and and looked at it and it just seemed like it was laying there right where there should be left oh we need to laugh so then we brought in an audience and we played the show for the audience and recorded the audience yeah but that wasn't good because the audience would laugh but they would laugh over another line like they'd laugh over a a joke or laugh line sure the laughs were coming in weird places right so we said i'd get the guy with a machine and so he you know he would do he would do as good a job as he could. So the original crew of the first season, how was that?

It was you, Candy. The first season was we started the show with Joe Flaherty, John Candy, myself, Dave Thomas, Catherine O'Hara, Andrea Martin, and Harold Ramis. In our third season, 78-79, I think somebody didn't come back. Catherine was gone that season. John Candy was gone. So they brought in, that was the season Rick Moranis joined the show. And then they brought in Robin Duke and Tony Rosato, also passed away this year.

So they were in the show for one season. Okay. In the half hour format and then when we came back in the 90 minute format on nbc um it was it was uh joe john me rick dave andre and katherine and is that when the like the Great White North thing started and all that stuff? Yeah. The thing started to stick. Who was producing that one? The hour and a half one?

Well, we had, as a creative producer, you mean? It was on NBC. It was on NBC and we had executives from NBC who hated coming up to Toronto. Not only Toronto. We were also shooting the show in Edmonton.

When we started the 90-minute show, we were in Edmonton, Alberta, shooting the show. I know that place. So nobody wanted to fly up to Edmonton. So the executives from NBC would fly up occasionally and just say, lie up occasionally yeah and and you know just say um hey why don't you uh put your a material up front like we do on snl yeah put your a material up front and then and then the middle portion you know do your material which is okay the experimental stuff yeah put that at the put that at the end you know because because the demographics are you know the audience is uh we're getting good numbers in the first half hour and then it drops a little bit

last half hour you don't want to worry about it so we say oh interesting interesting and they'd go back and you know we just kept on doing what we're doing always ignored them yeah how long did it last in that form three seasons and 90 minutes and then our last season was uh we were on cinemax and there was just four of us on that last season oh really so we're getting into some indulgent stuff yeah in our last season so it was a fun stuff it was a good run and it was a good run and you know what the thing was like the inmates were running the asylum sure that we really had nobody telling us what to do. And we got spoiled a little bit.

Yeah. Because that's not the way shows are run. Yeah, yeah. Chances are you'll never get to do that again. Although we're having a pretty good shot at it with our current show, Schitt's Creek. But, you know, it's great when you can do what you want and you're, you don't have to do something you don't want. Yeah. And you have a bunch of friends with you.

And you have a bunch of friends with you because we did, we worked together, we partied together and it was like a dream really. Were you ever considered for SNL? Was that something you thought about doing or? Uh, I may have thought about it. Right. But I, I never, um, I, you were never, I never, no, You were never summoned? No, I was never summoned.

I remember one year Lorne Michaels came up to when we were doing Second City stage or filling in or whatever, whatever. And I know Joe and John did some stuff like audition pieces on a thing. But they didn't get they didn't get hired but it's interesting all you guys like a lot of you uh certainly had good careers in television and you know obviously you're still going john did some big movies joe had a recurring roles for years everybody did good yeah joe's on freaks and geeks marty's you know just still going strong john candy had a great uh film career yeah john was like the biggest star he was a major

became a major film star yeah did some great work he did great work funny guy and you know, we're still going. I went through, I think, got into some directing stuff in the late 80s. Yeah. Because, you know, I got. In Canada? Yeah, some in Canada. One feature film that I did here, it was actually shot in Europe, but for Dino De Laurentiis. Oh, yeah? What was that?

It was called Once Upon a Crime. Uh-huh. And it was a feature that we shot in Rome and Monte Carlo. It was a comedy? It was a comedy, yeah. It was kind of a farce. John Candy, Jim Belushi, Sybil Shepard, Sean Young, George Hamilton. And that was your first big movie directing?

Well, that was my first and only feature directing. No story there. I think that says it all, doesn't it? But it actually was really funny. It was a funny movie. It had some very funny moments. It just got a little weird.

We couldn't quite get the third act going. They hired writers and writers, some big name writers and stuff, but still couldn't get it going. There were a few issues with Dino. Did you deal with Dino?

Yeah. I actually liked Dino de lorenos it was it was uh uh he had a reputation like you know i'd heard before i started working uh on that movie that you know some directors would just in their contract they say no he's not allowed on the set yeah and when we started the movie he was was, you know, he was so great. Yeah. He was like a second dad. Yeah. He was like, he was just great.

He was funny. He liked to laugh. Uh-huh. The scouting trip in Europe was an experience in itself. Uh-huh. It was just first class all the way down the line. Yeah. It was like first class hotels.

He would take you out to the best restaurants. It was, he got along great with them. we started the movie everything was going great and then things just you know uh uh oh we got into some issues about the script and what he thought was funny and what i didn't think was funny and and while i was over there in pre-production yeah dino was still in los angeles and we'd have some screaming matches on the phone really yeah like i mean screaming matches where he he would be faxing pages that he got some guys to work on for free and you know this is a good joke that's a good joke and the woman here comes by with the big boob and you know walking christino i don't think it's funny what you know

screaming to the point where when he finally did come over when we started shooting i met him in his hotel and i had a stick with a white flag on it oh really waving my white flag and did that work uh it worked for about 10 minutes yeah i think Belushi did him on SNL, I think. Didn't he? Belushi's like, my Kong, talking about the King Kong movie. Oh, yeah. I think, yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah. I hadn't even thought about that until you just mentioned it.

So when did you move sort of down here and start, you know, doing that? I would come down sporadically for a lot of different projects when we uh first time i came down uh honestly was uh for anything serious we did a second city in pasadena yeah in 1975 right but a live show uh yeah the live show that was my first trip to California. Right. In 1980, we came down to do a movie called Going Berserk with John, Joe, Joe Flaherty, John Candy, and myself. Yeah. A movie that David Steinberg directed. Sure. And it was not much of a script, I remember, at the time. And I was in Toronto, and joe joe and john were down

with the writers working on this thing and i say hey send up some pages uh yeah well we will when we get it down you know which is not ready yet but we're working on it but boy there's a great part for you and there's some funny scenes great a month later because send up some pages yeah so i can read well we're, we're almost there. We got something. Next thing you know, I'm flying down to Los Angeles. They're shooting in a week. Yeah.

No pages. I've already signed. Still waiting. And they said, well, come down here. We'll give you the thing when you get down here. Yeah. And so I got the script. I went back to my hotel.

I got into bed. I turned on the lamp. Started reading. got to page 15, called my lawyer. I said, oh, my God, Ted, this is horrible. What are we going to do? The script is horrible. It's garbage. I can't do it. I can't do it.

I love the guys. I can't do it. What was the problem? Were they partying or they lost it? It just just it just wasn't good let's put it that way it was it just wasn't good so i went in to uh so my lawyer says well you know we'll go in we'll take a meeting with david steinberg in the morning we went in and had the meeting and i said he said so gene i understand you have some problems with this script i said well like dave honestly i don't think it's ready to you're shooting in a week yeah personally and i know this means nothing to you i don't think it's ready i

don't think it's ready it's not it needs a lot of work and and uh he's, of course it needs work, Gene. You know, this is not the movie we're shooting in a week. We're constantly making amends to the script. And tell you what, why don't you stick around for the week and work with the boys and redo the scenes you feel like you want to redo. We're not doing this. It's going to be much better by the time we start shooting next week. So stick around for the week and and see what you can do to help think things so we leave the meeting and my lawyer says okay you know what just do the movie because you're not going to come out of this

smelling too good if you if i have to go and tell the studio that you've decided to back out at the last second right you know yeah um even though the director said yes you can leave now but if you yeah stick around and work on it and if you don't if you don't like what at the end of the week then you can just go back and leave. He said, that's not going to happen. Right. So just do the movie. And I did. And it was great fun. Not a great movie. But it was actually a very cultish kind of movie.

So many people have come up and said, going berserk is insane. And I said, it is. What year was that? That was 1980. Yeah. And then Splash was 83. And then I'd come down and do that and then you know we we um traveled to jamaica for club paradise in 84 and then i was back in la in 85

to do armed and dangerous right with john candy and so my trips were frequent. Yeah, I would come down and do work down here for years. You and John were real tight? Yeah. Yeah. And you and Joe? Yeah. Yeah. It's good.

Still see Joe, still see the people. We still see each other on a semi-regular basis. That's nice. Marty. Marty, of course, all the time because he's you know, he's my oldest and dearest friend. I mean, we... Do you live by each other? Yeah, we're one minute apart.

Oh, so, yeah, so you're around. Yeah. That's nice. Yeah, one minute apart. He seems to be... Marty's probably the funniest guy in show business. I don't think there's anybody faster. I don't think there's anybody who's got a faster mind than Marty.

And case in point, Jiminy Glick, if you love that character. Yeah. And a lot of that is just off the cuff. And it is absolutely brilliant. Yeah, he's amazing. You know, he transcends show business almost. Yeah. Yeah.

He embodies it and transcends it. He definitely embodies it. And he is the anchor to, I mean, he knows everybody in the business. And everybody loves him. So how did you get involved with, because I think like most people now, maybe that's not right for me to say, outside of American Pie, which is a franchise you've been connected with for years. Yeah. There's like 12 of them now, right? Well, no, no, not 12. No well no no not 12 no no not 12 8 okay

but that's a good that's a good gig the gift that keeps on giving it was um yeah it was a good gig four feet four theatrical features and four straight to dvds and that was great but the uh the chris guest movies who you you know you work with uh catherine a lot catherine fred yeah uh fred willard um um oh great great uh cast and chris of course who's how did you meet another comic genius um how did i meet chris uh he called me i knew i knew chris i knew of chris from going back to Lampoon and the radio shows and the albums. And I knew Gilda was doing work there and Schaefer was doing work there and Bill Murray. I knew those voices, but there was one voice that I'd never heard. Chevy.

Chevy. One voice that I'd never heard, and that was Chris. Yeah. And it was brilliant. His character work was astonishingly great. um one voice that i'd never heard and that was chris yeah and it was brilliant his character work was and astonishingly great and i kept saying who is that guy who is this guy who is this guy i got a chance to not to work with him on a billy crystal special in the mid 80s yeah uh not working directly with him but i would when he was shooting his stuff i would go make sure i'd go and watch you're a fan huge fan and um and then

years later i get a call i'm in toronto and i get a call and it's chris and he says i'm thinking of doing a movie um and i'm wondering if you would like to come down and uh write it with me. And I'm, you know, I'm thinking, I don't even know the guy. I met him twice. How many people turned it down before you called me? So he said, yeah, I've got a cabin up in the northwest region of the country, and we could go up there for a week. I'm thinking, yeah uh okay yeah uh

and in in my mind in in in in milliseconds i'm thinking i'm trying to work it out thinking okay how about how this could be great or it could be horrible or it could be i don't know the guy and this is great now we're in a cabin and what if it's not working well i guess i'll just go back to the airport sure well you got to lose that's it so but so i flew down to meet him there and from the first second he picked me up at the airport it was just laughs and and just just great and that's that's that was the beginning isn't that interesting though like out of nowhere a guy that you respected so much and that you had no real sense that he knew what about you right like you know why you well you know you know it was years later almost at the end of our run yeah when i put when i put the question to him chris why did you call me that day? How, who did you approach?

How many people did you approach before you went? He said, no, you were my first choice. I said, based on, based on, I was a fan of your show, SCTV, and in particular, loved your work on the show. So I called you i said what boy i wish i'd asked you that in the very beginning because i always thought i was number nine on the list why would he stay with you for four movies i don't i don't i you know i mean well the first one worked out but you know i i uh it was kind of an odd thing. Yeah, Chris is very, very funny and insanely funny.

No, yeah, it's transcendent. There's something about his commitment to things that's really amazing. Yeah. And his sensibility is completely unique. Had some great laughs putting those movies together. But you co-wrote four of them, right? Yeah. Guffman, Best in like four of them, right? Yeah. Guffman, Best in Show, Mighty Wind, for your consideration.

Yeah. You were with him. Now, what do those scripts look like? Are they? Well, they're outlines. They're pretty detailed outlines that got more detailed as we went along. I mean, I think the script for Guffman was maybe 15 pages. And, you know, we lay out the story from scene to scene.

Yeah. Scene to scene. We lay out the story and we kind of we describe what exposition has to come out in every scene to keep the story going. The movies are improvised. Right. So we don't really write dialogue. If we thought of something funny as a joke, we would put it in the outline

and hope the character uses it. Right. But it was just really keeping the story moving from scene to scene because you've got to have an anchor that if you're improvising a movie and it's just a free-for-all, then good luck. It's hard to put together. It's hard to put together. So you've got to have an anchor that if you're improvising a movie and it's just a free-for-all, then good luck. It's hard to put together.

It's hard to put together. So you've got to have something that keeps the story moving. And that's what we did. And with every movie, we got more involved in character backgrounds. Actually writing those out. Writing who the characters were, where they went to school, what books they wrote. For the actor? For the actor.

And did they appreciate that? Yeah. Oh, well, yeah. Sure. Yeah. And sometimes they added to school, what books they wrote. For the actor? For the actor. Uh-huh. And did they appreciate that? Yeah. Oh, well, yeah, sure. Yeah, and sometimes they added to it, and sometimes in a major way added to it. And then there's a sort of ensemble sort of started to reveal itself through those movies. Like there were core players that seemed to be in a lot of the movies.

Yeah, we started out, I mean, guffman was just katherine myself chris fred and uh very talented improvisational actress in toronto linda cash uh who played my wife and waiting for in in that movie waiting for guffman and it was a andaban, of course. Balaban. And that was kind of the core for Guffman. And then it just expanded with Best in Show. We brought in Jennifer Coolidge. Jane. Who I had seen. I didn't work with her, but I saw her when American Pie came out,

and I recommended her to Chris. She's great. I just talked to her. She's astounding in a way. Really, really great and quirky and funny and jane lynch and um and then michael mckeon yeah um and that was for best in show and michael higgins oh yeah he's interesting john michael higgins yeah yeah so that was that and those movies were honestly just a lot of fun. On Guffman, we had more,

we didn't learn soon enough, but on Guffman, there were a lot of scenes that we would laugh in the middle of a take. Couldn't help it. There were scenes where I would, there were group scenes

where I would drop slowly behind the person in front of me on my hands and knees and crawl off the set right while they're still shooting so that the scene would go on and i couldn't stop laughing and the experimental theater experience paid off it yes it did yes it did crawling crawling don't don't be afraid to get the tummy dirty and then we learned that you if you're, because it is improvised, you know, if you're laughing through something that's really funny, chances are you're never going to quite get that moment again. Right.

So it was. So you figured out a way to crawl. Well, we learned, yes, crawling became a big thing. Always make sure you're near somebody that you can move behind. Right. So you didn't lose that that's a perfect take well like in in mighty in mighty win that relationship that you and katherine o'hara had was like outside of it being funny and and and tragic it was really deep

well and i think that comes through with a lot of his movies that where you have these amazing characters in this this vibe but the the maybe it's the backstory maybe it's the performers but jesus man i mean they're moving chris and i share that the one thing that that made us work well together is we share that sensibility of not being afraid to kind of bridge that line between comedy and drama right uh case in point um a mighty wind yeah you know we we were coming up with um evolving the characters for the show and we're we're talking about mitch and mickey are two characters yeah and the the fact that they were the sweethearts of the folk music right generation and and uh their big hit song was kiss at the end of the rainbow and they would sing the

song and then kiss at the end of the song well now we have years later a reunion and in the history of these two characters they had a horrible split up and a horrible divorce and a horrible fight and they never saw each other and and mitch went went into sanatoriums and just drugs and lost it and became weird. Yeah, yeah. She remarried. Well, what's going to happen when they come back to the reunion and they're going to sing their hit song? How are these two people going to kiss? Are they actually going to kiss at the end of the end of

the song okay okay they hate it because they hate each other yeah and we kind of had a moment where we realized wait a minute this this could be the storyline the a storyline yeah for the movie. But how scary is that? We're writing, this is a comedy, and yet we're gearing this movie toward a third act where are these two people going to kiss at the end of the movie? What are we getting ourselves into here? This could be horrible because if it doesn't work, I mean, if it doesn't, if the audience isn't there with you,

then it's going to be a, oh, it's going to be an ugger. And yet we both felt compelled to move in that direction because it seemed like the most exciting way to go in terms of a story. So it's that line between comedy and drama that has always been my comedic raison d'etre, kind of. It's the most exciting way to do comedy for me because i'm not a joke person right as as is evidenced you know for the past hour and 10 minutes well no

but i don't know if that's true like you know even like your sensitivity to characters like even like with bobby bitman you know back in the day which was a spoof on you know that generation of stand-up you knew what wasn't funny and how to make it funny i mean i i think you you do you know i'm not not that you need me to tell you that i i do think you have an understanding of yeah no no no no no no it's an understanding yeah no no no it's true but but but but the uh the the kind of comedy for me that from the very beginning is is character driven sure so even on sctv it's always character driven right and as and again as broad as some of the characters were on sctv

we committed to the characters we never we never we never had a joke at the expense of the character or stepped outside the character right no tongue-in-cheek stuff right uh that's right so that's always it's always been important edith prickly big big broad character and yet edith prickly is a that's edith yeah prickly that's who she is well maybe that's some of that stuff that came from that that instruction in a way of of dell saying you know keep it intelligent well that's it that drives that that is the driving force behind everything make it intelligent but to, making it intelligent also means just making it three-dimensional.

Yeah. Make a character funny but real. Make him, you know, you should be able to take an audience on a much more kind of rewarding trip than necessarily just, you know, kind of laughing. And the way you guys played that out in Mighty Wind with, you know, it becoming, now that you say that it became the A story in a way, that whole third act where all the other performers are like,

I don't know what's going to happen, right? It was like. Yeah, very emotional moment. They were all moving towards it. Yeah. And they brought the audience with it. That's right. Yeah.

Yeah, they come in and they move into the wings to see, are they going to do it are they going to do it and then they can it really was a an amazing uh moment that you could actually feel i'm getting choked up now when we were doing when we were actually shooting it oh yeah uh you could feel it because i remember looking into the wings and seeing parker posey with tears in her eyes while while i'm while the camera's there and I'm doing the scene with Catherine. So it was great. And that's the kind of comedy that I love.

And that's what we were doing on our movies with Chris. Make the characters real. I mean, the characters, the audience has to be able to grab hold of something. Yeah. And if you do it successfully, then you can take them on a nice ride. Sure. And you're doing that now with the- Exactly what we're doing in Schitt's Creek.

Schitt's Creek. And you have this dynamic, I imagine, with Catherine that is, like, it's weird when you do have genuine you know decades of history with somebody and you know their emotional nuances as performers that there must be a comfort level to that uh yeah amazing amazing comfort level and we we we kind of know um we we have the same approach to yeah our work catherine and i we we take it kind of very seriously uh approach our work as actors approach a character and and uh and we kind of have a sense where somebody is going or could go or you know we're so we work very well together emotionally on that level. Is that, you know, you're not really playing, you know, the confidence you have to have in the character to not play for laughs.

But to assume that they are comedic characters innately is some sort of gift. I mean, you guys kind of invented some of that. It's just a commitment to character work. Really? That's really all it is. It's not, it's, I mean, for me personally

on Schitt's Creek now, and I should, for your listeners, mention that it is S-C-H-I-T-T-S. And it's on Pop. It is a person's name. Pop TV?

It's a real name. And it's on Pop and Netflix. Yeah. So, you know, this is um commitment this is a commitment to character and this is a uh and you know my son dan uh who i worked on the show with created the show with he came to me with an idea for for this wealthy family that loses its money but he also came to me because the the sensibility of the movies that

would that chris and i were doing that's kind of that's kind of the sensibility that he was he wanted for in the show and that's what we started uh you know kind of working with it's good he had connections with you uh it didn't didn't hurt yeah it didn't hurt let's put that way but to his credit he'd, he would never, ever. He spent eight years on MTV in Canada as a host and doing live stuff and doing it very well and writing funny sketches and doing some great work. And I just, I never thought that the big question was, would he be able to do something like this, a half hour comedy, a character that has got to be a genuine character, you know, and writing. And honestly, anyway, long story short, he's great. He's quite brilliant at it. And I just love watching him work.

And he's got a character on our show that is insanely funny. You must be proud. Yeah. Yeah. Dad's proud. Very proud. Good. Yeah, extremely.

Well, look, man, it was great talking to you, and I'm happy that you're going and you're doing great work, and congratulations on the new season. Well, thank you. And I can't believe I'm finally here in this illustrious garage here. And I've seen the pictures and kind of said, hmm, I wonder what it's like to be across the desk from Mr. Marin. It's delightful. It's a great conversation. I never heard action

yeah no i don't do that uh-huh so i take it i take it where are we ready to go or yeah was that was this just preamble that was all we're about to start oh great great okay thanks man thanks i enjoyed that. It was a pleasure meeting him. I like hearing the history. You know I do. I can breathe. I'm just going to take it in.

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