Episode 419 - Catherine O'Hara
Marc:All right, let's do this.
Marc:How are you?
Marc:What the fuckers?
Marc:What the fuck buddies?
Marc:What the fuck mix?
Marc:What the fucking ears?
Marc:What the fuck's the bulls?
Marc:Welcome.
Marc:I am Mark Maron.
Marc:This is WTF.
Marc:Thank you for joining me today.
Marc:Wow, that sounded proper.
Marc:Thank you for joining me today.
Marc:What am I, Mr. Rogers?
Marc:It's a big show today.
Marc:Catherine O'Hara is on the show today.
Marc:And man, I am thrilled to have her here.
Marc:But I want to give you a heads up.
Marc:Something went wrong.
Marc:I'll give you the story behind it because it caused me a lot of panic, anxiety, and anger.
Marc:Here's what happened.
Marc:Somehow or another, this has only happened twice in the entire 400 and whatever show run of WTF.
Marc:I did the entire interview with Catherine O'Hara, the genius comedy actress.
Marc:out here in my garage.
Marc:We talked for an hour, however long we talked, hour plus.
Marc:Sounded good in my headphones.
Marc:We had a great conversation.
Marc:I played it back and there was something wrong.
Marc:There was some sort of weird staticky clicking that started slowly at the beginning of the interview and then progressed and got worse throughout the interview.
Marc:This happened one other time during Lucinda Williams singing her songs.
Marc:Have no idea what it was.
Marc:No idea, but it rendered it really annoying and almost unlistenable.
Marc:It was just this thing, this sound quality, this static.
Marc:Had no idea what it was.
Marc:And when I got done with the interview, I was livid.
Marc:And who do you get mad at?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:Electricity?
Marc:Do I know what happened?
Marc:I do not know what happened.
Marc:I still don't know what happened.
Marc:That's the weird thing about dealing with computers is what the fuck happened?
Marc:We fixed it.
Marc:And I'll tell you who fixed it in a second.
Marc:But that that feeling of helplessness, this is the one thing you get when you I think when you deal with the analog world, if you're putting it on tape and you're mastering something, it's on tape.
Marc:Yeah, things can go wrong.
Marc:But I don't know what series or sequence or electrons or currents.
Marc:I don't know what series of events led for to GarageBand, you know, having a brain fart for an entire episode.
Marc:And just like every once in a while, everyone has this experience.
Marc:The brain in your computer goes, hey, fuck you.
Marc:I'm just going to fuck things up because, I don't know, just impulsive.
Marc:Randomly impulsive, I'm going to fuck you.
Marc:So the brain in the computer did that and I panicked.
Marc:And I reached out on Twitter basically saying, somebody who can clean up a sound file, help me out.
Marc:I need this to be salvaged.
Marc:I had a conversation with Catherine O'Hara.
Marc:I need help.
Marc:Help me.
Marc:Help me, sound nerds.
Marc:And a lot of people got back to me.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:A couple of people we sent files to to fix, to see what we could do.
Marc:Brock McFarlane is an engineer with his own business called CPS Mastering.
Marc:That's cpsmastering.com.
Marc:He cleaned it up.
Marc:Beautiful.
Marc:Beautiful.
Marc:Then another guy, Declan Quinn, is a sound engineer for the Smodcast Network.
Marc:He's got his own business, too.
Marc:Creakystudios.com.
Marc:He cleaned one up, too.
Marc:Both of them sounded great.
Marc:And I appreciate your help.
Marc:Between the two of them, we were able to get something that's listenable.
Marc:And it sounds a little different.
Marc:The quality is a little different than what you're used to on this show.
Marc:And I apologize for that.
Marc:But it is not in any way going to distract you from the amazing conversation I had with Catherine O'Hara.
Marc:I, again, don't know what happened.
Marc:Just sometimes the hard drive says, nah, I'm not feeling it today.
Marc:I'm a little irritable.
Marc:I'm going to fuck your life up.
Marc:What happened, man?
Marc:What happened with your computer?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:Nobody knows.
Marc:I have my computer guy over here.
Marc:Can't figure it.
Marc:Can't track it.
Marc:It's only happened twice in 400 and some odd episodes.
Marc:All right, so I just got to live with that?
Marc:Yeah, you got to back your shit up while it's happening.
Marc:So that won't happen again.
Marc:All right?
Marc:I'm not mad about it.
Marc:I just wanted to give you a heads up as to why it sounds a little different.
Marc:What else is going on with me?
Marc:I'll tell you what.
Marc:I'm going in tomorrow for my first psyche vow.
Marc:Pow!
Marc:Wow.
Marc:Just shit my pants a little.
Marc:JustCoffee.coop.
Marc:Haven't done that one in a while.
Marc:A classic.
Marc:Anyways, I'm going in tomorrow to get a psychological evaluation at a psychiatrist.
Marc:Why?
Marc:Why, you're asking?
Marc:Maren, you're such a well-adjusted guy.
Marc:I don't get it, man.
Marc:I listen to you every day.
Marc:What I can get through the first 10 minutes, I'll listen to, but you seem like a guy that doesn't have a lot of problems.
Marc:Look, man, I'm constantly sucking on nicotine.
Marc:I'm constantly filling myself up with caffeine.
Marc:I'm constantly at the edge of anger.
Marc:And I know some of you think like, well, maybe it's a caffeine.
Marc:Maybe it's a nicotine.
Marc:Maybe it's whatever it is.
Marc:Maybe those things are exacerbating it.
Marc:Why am I telling you this?
Marc:Well, I want to go see what's wrong with me.
Marc:I'm going to go get a psychological evaluation and I want to see what's wrong with me.
Marc:I don't know how they work.
Marc:Do I just sit in there and he check marks a bunch of boxes and puts it in a machine?
Marc:Bipolar.
Marc:Narcissism.
Marc:Oh, old machine.
Marc:They took that off the list.
Marc:Who the hell knows?
Marc:Well, what I'm going to do for you right now is maybe we'll play a little game.
Marc:Let's do a little pool.
Marc:Let's take a little.
Marc:Let's let's play a game.
Marc:I want you guys, whoever feels like it, whoever's listening, maybe why don't you diagnose me?
Marc:diagnose me and send it to WTF pod at gmail.com.
Marc:And let's see who wins.
Marc:Those of you who hit the diagnosis on the head, I will certainly I'll mention your name on the air.
Marc:I don't know if I've got anything for you.
Marc:I'll look around.
Marc:Maybe I have something for you.
Marc:Maybe I'll send you something.
Marc:Maybe this is not a good contest, but how about just the pride of winning?
Marc:So let's play that.
Marc:This is the what's wrong with Mark pool.
Marc:I'm going in for a psychological evaluation tomorrow.
Marc:I don't know how long I got to wait for the diagnosis, but feel free to diagnose me and send them to WTF pod at Gmail.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:How about you clinicians?
Marc:How about you psychiatrists who are familiar with me?
Marc:How about you people that read my book?
Marc:How about you people?
Marc:This seems like a fun game.
Marc:What's wrong with Mark?
Marc:Come on, play along.
Marc:Now let's go to my conversation.
Marc:And again, please forgive whatever sound quality difference there is.
Marc:But if it weren't for for Brock McFarlane and Declan Quinn, we would have nothing because my computer freaked out.
Marc:That's better.
Marc:Let's go to the I love Catherine O'Hara.
Marc:I've been trying to talk to her for a few years.
Marc:She's always been somebody I really wanted to talk to.
Marc:And I'm thrilled that I have this.
Marc:Enjoy.
Marc:You know who I had in here yesterday?
Marc:Michael McKean.
Guest:Did you?
Marc:Excellent.
Marc:And we talked for a while and he brought you up.
Guest:Wow.
Marc:And he said, she's amazing.
Marc:And he had a story as to why.
Marc:He said there was a take in Best of Show
Marc:where uh you were having a moment with an ex-boyfriend and and you did it three times and he was he said every time you blushed uh and he thought that is amazing acting yeah i'd like to say i could control that well no but you can't it's not that you can't do more than three times today i'm sure no i'm not gonna be uh be like that but like where now where did you where did you come from you come from canada
Guest:Yes, Toronto.
Marc:And how come, I know it's a broad and a vague question.
Marc:A lot of people come from Canada who are hilarious, like that whole SCTV crew and others.
Marc:And what is it, do you have any sort of thoughts on why people in Canada are funny in a certain way?
Marc:Like Mike Meyer, there are people that are very funny, but it doesn't seem to be exactly in an American way, obviously.
Guest:No.
Marc:What is it?
Marc:Is there a freedom in Canada?
Guest:My stock answer is because the country's a good straight man.
Guest:Oh, is that it?
Guest:I don't know about now, but in the past it was a little more provincial than America.
Guest:Oh, right.
Guest:greatly and wonderfully influenced by England.
Marc:Right.
Guest:And all the material we saw from there.
Marc:Right.
Guest:And the music and the fashion and everything.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:They start all the ideas.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Then they come through Canada and then they get to you.
Guest:But you guys also, you made it up.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Guest:You invented it.
Guest:They came from there.
Marc:So you were mostly influenced by British comedy and British culture.
Marc:I mean, we didn't really get that much here.
Marc:I imagine maybe it came over directly over there.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, it didn't all happen that way here.
Guest:No, I feel like we were probably seeing it earlier than you were, yeah.
Marc:Yeah, like what were some of the stuff you were watching?
Guest:Like Monty Python.
Guest:I know that's obvious.
Guest:Everyone knows them now, but I was, you know, we all thought we discovered them in high school.
Marc:Well, no, we got that later.
Marc:We definitely got that later.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And that sort of blew your mind?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Do you remember, like, where were you in college or high school?
Guest:No, high school.
Guest:And, yeah, just in love with all of them, and I thought they were so smart.
Marc:Yeah?
Guest:Just, yeah, it was great.
Marc:And you were like, that's what I'm going to do?
Marc:Who knew?
Guest:Yeah, I know.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Did you do any of that stuff in high school?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Like funny stuff?
Guest:Theater arts, yeah.
Marc:Yeah?
Marc:Like musicals?
Guest:No, I was in Harvey.
Marc:Yeah?
Guest:I played V. Louise Simmons, the old lady.
Marc:Harvey?
Marc:Is that the one about the rabbit?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So that was the first stage experience?
Guest:I guess so.
Guest:Yes, my first big show.
Guest:With a paying audience, yeah.
Marc:A paying audience of sympathetic parents?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, look at them trying.
Marc:Take these off.
Marc:Really?
Guest:You know why?
Marc:No good?
Guest:I don't want to be aware of them being recorded.
Marc:Oh, you don't?
Guest:I don't know why.
Guest:I'm not afraid of it, but there's something about, it makes me, I feel like I can talk to you if I do this.
Marc:Yeah, no.
Guest:Is that okay?
Marc:Yeah, I'm fine with it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I usually only have people wear them just so they can calibrate their voice, but you seem like a pro.
Marc:You've done some cartoon voices.
Guest:There you go.
Guest:Haven't you?
Guest:Yes, I am, sir.
Marc:Have you?
Marc:Yeah, one or two.
Marc:Not huge ones.
Guest:It's fun, though.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:No, it's great.
Marc:I can never see myself as a cartoon, so you just read it like a person.
Marc:And then when you see it come out of a cartoon's mouth, you're like, oh, my God.
Guest:As opposed to reading it like a cartoon.
Marc:Right, yeah.
Marc:I mean, I would think that you could.
Marc:I was a squirrel once, and I didn't sit there and go, like, how does one be a squirrel?
Guest:Which one was that?
Marc:It was for Adventure Time.
Marc:I think that children like it, and their stoned parents enjoy it.
Guest:i love all the animated shows that are like that yeah they're funny on all these different levels right right age but your kids will get older and older and start getting the jokes they didn't get last year which they got that they didn't get the year before oh really so you can actually show a kid every year the same cartoon i guess you kind of can because they get different levels of humor on it yeah
Marc:And they think like, oh, I'm not going to watch it again, Mom.
Marc:And then they're like, oh, my God, I never even saw that.
Guest:You don't have kids, do you?
Guest:None.
Guest:Kids can watch anything over and over a hundred times.
Guest:It's kind of scary.
Marc:But isn't that the joy of having the ability to show them something and just throw it over?
Guest:They have amazing memories, but they let them, they willingly forget everything they've seen.
Guest:And just watch it again for the 50th time.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And have that fresh experience again.
Guest:How old are your kids?
Guest:They're 18 and 16.
Marc:So they're through that, you would think.
Guest:No, they'll watch movies that they love.
Guest:And I go, didn't you watch that last week?
Guest:No, I have to see this part.
Guest:I have to see this part again.
Marc:I don't know why I'm laughing.
Marc:I just watched Silver Linings Playbook for the fifth time.
Marc:Did you?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Wow.
Marc:I love movies about crazy people.
Marc:It's very touching.
Guest:It was really touching.
Guest:It makes me feel less alone.
Guest:It was beautiful.
Marc:Flawed, beautiful people.
Guest:Less alone.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Crazy people are the beautiful people.
Guest:They are.
Marc:And you play a lot of slightly emotionally crazed people.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Sure.
Marc:So what did you tap?
Guest:Got to tap what you've been.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Did you grow up with that?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I grew up in a big family.
Guest:Seven kids.
Guest:Seven.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:My mom and dad were both funny.
Guest:Yes, of course.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:And what would you be if you weren't Catholic with a bunch of kids?
Marc:A Hasidic Jewish, but I don't think, yeah, I don't think you, you didn't strike me as an Orthodox Jew.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, Herod is not really a Christian Bible Belt.
Marc:No, they don't even have that many Mormon.
Guest:No, that's not.
Marc:Mormons do that, but not.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But Catholics.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:One mom, one dad we had.
Marc:Oh, good.
Marc:That's good.
Marc:So you kept that number low.
Guest:That's a Catholic way.
Marc:How many sisters and brothers?
Guest:There's four girls, three boys.
Marc:That's good balance.
Guest:Yeah, it is.
Guest:That worked out.
Marc:And where'd you fall?
Guest:I'm youngest girl.
Guest:Second youngest kid.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Six of seven.
Marc:So you got the short end of the stick and all the leftover clothes.
Guest:I must have been...
Guest:Yeah, because of what I ended up doing in life once in a while.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I must have wanted attention.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, I don't remember not getting it, but I must have, yeah, I must have yearned for it.
Marc:How many years between you and the next older one?
Guest:Like two and a half years.
Marc:So it was pretty tight.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Catholic.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But it wasn't one of those afterthought things like, oh, we had one.
Guest:No, no, because there's another one after me.
Marc:And that's another two years?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So no downtime at all.
Guest:There was a downtime, yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:When they, God bless them, they tried rhythm.
Marc:Oh, they did?
Guest:And then my mom felt guilty about it.
Marc:Felt guilty about timing?
Marc:About rhythm, yeah.
Marc:So she just felt guilty about having sex without a purpose?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Oh, that's brutal.
Guest:So they're like, no.
Guest:It's brutal and yet kind of lovely.
Guest:It is lovely.
Guest:There's no wasted sperm.
Guest:yeah i know but you know you'd want people to have a good time more than the one time i want them to have fun yeah i hope they did yeah they always laughed god that's like the sexiest thing about my mom they're gone now yeah but god bless them but um right to the end they could make each other laugh like yeah honestly it was like it was sexy
Marc:And what kind of work was the family in?
Guest:My dad worked for the CPR, Canadian Pacific Railway.
Guest:Really?
Guest:He was in the offices.
Marc:Oh, he wasn't on the trains?
Guest:No, no.
Guest:But when he retired, and he'd been there over 40 years, and when he retired, we went to a party there for him, and these guys were crying, guys that he worked with.
Guest:And at one point, he and his buddy got their desks separated by their superior because they were laughing too much.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:It was like he was in school.
Guest:He just...
Marc:He was like the guy, the life of the party.
Guest:Yeah, he was a cool guy.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:No, he was shy, actually, but he had his close friends.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:So they had fun.
Guest:Now, did you get along with your... Let me try to make a conversation out of this.
Guest:I'm sorry.
Marc:No, no, I can't.
Guest:I don't like my mom and dad.
Marc:No, your mom and dad's interesting.
Guest:Where are your mom and dad?
Marc:My dad's in New Mexico and my mother's in Florida.
Marc:Oh, yeah?
Marc:Yeah, it was a little crazy.
Guest:Separate vacations?
Marc:No, permanent.
Marc:They're on permanent, not dead vacations, but they're permanently vacationing from each other.
Marc:For how long?
Marc:How long they've been divorced?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Since I was about 35, so about 15 years.
Guest:Wow.
Marc:Yeah, it was very difficult to figure out who I was going to live with.
Guest:Aw!
Guest:Aw, you!
Guest:Wait, now tell me, even at that age?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Is it difficult?
Guest:No, I'm sure it's difficult.
Guest:Or maybe it wasn't.
Guest:But do you still kind of wish they would get back together?
Marc:Oh, no.
Marc:No, you don't.
Marc:My bond with my folks was not that tight in the way.
Marc:I kind of look at them as these slightly older people that grew up with me.
Marc:They had me when they were pretty young.
Marc:It was very hard for me to... Still, to this day, I have a hard time believing their parents.
Guest:Are they that close to you in age?
Marc:No, no, they can't be that close, but they emotionally, I don't think they were.
Guest:They could be 15.
Marc:Well, yeah.
Guest:15 years apart.
Marc:My mom had me when she was 12.
Marc:It was weird.
Marc:It was freakish.
Marc:And my dad was 13.
Marc:They're not Catholic, are they?
Marc:No, no.
Marc:Oh, bad Catholics.
Guest:Oh, no.
Guest:Bad Catholics.
Marc:There's a lot of bad Catholics.
Marc:no yeah so uh so like do you get along with all your siblings was there battle in this really there's no craziness no drunken fights oh yeah that's how we get along yeah there you go specific yes yes now you are a lot of good irish drinking in the house yeah there's definitely some drinking yeah been some drinking going on yeah and we get together every summer now my husband and i bought a cottage outside of toronto so
Guest:Now we'll all live together again.
Guest:I mean, when they come to visit, we're all living together.
Guest:So you get up and have breakfast.
Marc:And there's seven of you.
Marc:Yeah, we've actually been there all together.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And is there grandkids yet, too?
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah, there are a few.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:For your older siblings?
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Wow.
Guest:That's a lot of things.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:No, I don't have that.
Marc:I don't have that family.
Marc:It is fascinating to me.
Guest:It's nice.
Guest:I actually want to see them and live with them.
Guest:They want to see me, and we live together.
Guest:Well, I'm a nice cottage.
Guest:That's why they want to see me.
Guest:But I actually want to have them as guests.
Marc:That's a very odd thing.
Marc:There's no reason why that wouldn't be fascinating.
Guest:My mom especially wouldn't let us go to bed mad.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:How did she stop that?
Guest:It was a big deal.
Guest:Well, if we were fighting?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Sounds so stupid.
Guest:I just felt like I was going, well, when we were fighting, and my mom, she would gather us in a circle, and we'd be like trying to hit each other, or one of us would be crying, and the other would just be mad, and she'd hug us, force us to hug each other, and she'd say, we're all pals together in all kinds of weather.
Guest:We won't give up, we won't give up, we won't give up the ship.
Yeah.
Guest:And then she'd hang on to us until we'd sing it too.
Marc:But was it crying?
Marc:No, it's not lame.
Marc:Could I be more of a suck?
Marc:Was it crying?
Marc:Because I just have thought of that, like being mad at each other and then your mom hugging you.
Marc:Someone had to cry.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:You're crying through it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was like, whoa, no.
Guest:I'm not going to give up what I'm feeling.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then she just beat us down until we did.
Marc:Yeah, and just beat you down with love.
Guest:With love.
Marc:Well, that's good advice.
Marc:I mean, you know, I wish I had heeded that advice many times when I've gotten into bed with one of the two wives that I lost.
Guest:Yeah, going to bed mad is a bad one, isn't it?
Marc:Horrendous.
Marc:Because you can't fall asleep and you just want to poke.
Guest:No.
Marc:What about that thing?
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Why don't you wake up and talk about this right now?
Guest:God forbid you say sorry.
Marc:Yeah, no.
Guest:No.
Guest:I know.
Marc:Would you in the morning?
Marc:Wake up, fight?
Guest:Wake up and fight or wake up and bring it up?
Guest:Under the guise of an apology?
Guest:I'm sorry, but when you... Yeah, seriously.
Marc:When I made you cry last night, there was a reason for that.
Guest:When you made me make you cry.
Marc:Yeah, you made me... Oh, see, you know.
Marc:I had no choice but to confront this horrible flaw in you that has an adverse effect on me.
Guest:Anyone in their right mind would have to point that out.
Marc:Yeah, I mean, to help you.
Guest:Of course.
Guest:I'm only here for you.
Marc:See, you have a deep understanding of dysfunction.
Marc:That's why your characters are so damn deep.
Guest:Oh, now, don't.
Guest:Come on.
Marc:Don't.
Marc:What are you talking about?
Marc:Take it.
Marc:You're like a miracle worker with problematic characters.
Marc:You make us love them.
Marc:When did you... Okay, so... I mean, thank you.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But, I mean, it is.
Marc:It's an amazing gift.
Marc:So, okay, so you're in high school.
Marc:You're doing that thing.
Guest:Let's let go of high school.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:It's too sad.
Marc:No, how is it sad?
Marc:Why?
Marc:You were attractive and popular?
Marc:No.
Marc:What are you talking about?
Marc:No.
Marc:You weren't?
Guest:No.
Guest:Oh...
Guest:I got on the cheerleading team in grade nine, as we say in Canada.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And only because the phys ed teacher who put the team together thought that cheerleaders shouldn't just be babes.
Guest:There should be some real girls on the team.
Guest:She didn't say that to you.
Guest:I'm serious.
Guest:Oh, no, it was obvious.
Guest:If you look, I'll show you the team pictures.
Guest:This is revisionism.
Guest:You've made this.
Guest:No, it's true.
Guest:Look, it was kind of, you know, the peak of women's lib.
Guest:They were like, what's... You know, equality for women and, you know, there's some big old hogs on the football team.
Guest:Why shouldn't there be some...
Guest:Real women on the cheerleader team.
Guest:But she didn't sit you down and say, look, we're going to let you do this.
Guest:No, I think if we knew, though.
Guest:But could you do the jumping around?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Very good, strong thighs.
Marc:Yeah, but so if you did the thing and you waved the things and you were in sync with the rest, it wasn't a complete tragedy, was it?
Guest:No, it was fun.
Guest:I didn't care.
Guest:I took it.
Guest:Under any law.
Guest:Okay, I'll be a cheerleader.
Guest:Oh, look, the sad girl's doing it, too.
Guest:Was that the way it was?
Guest:They're letting her try.
Guest:I don't know if anyone else thought that, but it was... Seriously, if you look at the pictures, we're all very normal girls.
Guest:It's not like... Oh, all of you are.
Guest:It's not like... Yeah.
Marc:You weren't isolated.
Guest:No, believe me, I was the hot one.
Guest:Oh, see, there you go.
Guest:No, I wasn't.
Guest:That'd be terrible.
Marc:But when did you start really thinking about doing comedy or playing in that way?
Guest:It was pretty natural in our house, I think.
Guest:It was a natural thing to do, to try to make each other laugh.
Guest:It really was the way to get attention.
Guest:The same way if you're in a room full of comedians, you better have something funny to say.
Guest:Or get mad.
Guest:Or just be louder than anyone.
Guest:Yeah, get mad.
Guest:Or be louder than anyone.
Marc:Angry or funny is the way to go.
Guest:There you go.
Marc:I try to mix them.
Marc:I like that.
Marc:It's a melding of angry.
Marc:The angry humor.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I never really thought that they're really the same thing in a crowd.
Marc:Either you can be charming and funny or you can just be like, I want your attention.
Guest:Why isn't everyone looking at me?
Marc:But then that's a hell of a setup.
Guest:You better have, I need your attention.
Guest:I could be just as funny as these people if they'd listen.
Guest:Yeah, if I tried.
Guest:Oh God, you're listening.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, I'm sorry.
Marc:Sorry.
Guest:Never mind.
Guest:Never mind.
Guest:Sorry.
Guest:Sorry.
Marc:Sorry.
Marc:I got to go.
Guest:It's okay.
Guest:I got to go.
Marc:No, but that makes sense.
Marc:And also being the second to the youngest, I mean, you've got a lot of competition.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:What did your siblings end up doing?
Marc:Anyone else?
Guest:I have a sister who you have to hear.
Guest:Mary Margaret O'Hara.
Guest:Oh, she's a singer.
Guest:Amazing singer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Great.
Marc:Beautiful.
Marc:So you're a talented family.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:What are the other ones end up doing?
Guest:My younger brother writes.
Guest:And he also drives on movies and TV shows in Toronto, but he writes.
Guest:And he's written and produced a bunch of animated movies.
Marc:I think the show business in Canada is a lot more intimate than the one we have here.
Guest:It's all in my family.
Guest:Really?
Guest:It's all you guys?
Guest:It's all I know about.
Marc:It just seems like if you persevere, they'll fit you in at some point.
Guest:Yeah, but then you'll have your time.
Guest:It's like, okay, now you've won a couple of awards.
Guest:Be on your way.
Guest:Leave a little room for the rest of them.
Guest:It's like a nice parent.
Guest:All right, now she's not getting any attention.
Guest:Look back to her for a while.
Marc:Yeah, see what you can do.
Marc:Maybe go do a show in America, maybe.
Guest:I hate to sound bitter, but it was sort of like that with SCTV, like for the TV, whenever it came time for TV awards.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, now, in kind of a nostalgic way, we seem to get a lot of lovely attention there in Canada.
Guest:But at the time, it was like, all right, now, you've gotten enough there.
Guest:Now, just sit back and let somebody else have it.
Guest:We get it.
Marc:Which is really quite sweet.
Marc:Yeah, right?
Marc:It's not horrible that you've not just forgotten.
Marc:It's actually diplomatic.
Guest:That's all right.
Guest:You've got a good job.
Guest:Now, go do it and don't make a big thing out of it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But it's kind of weird, though, isn't it?
Marc:Because I noticed that in England, too, that if people who just stay in the game and kind of remain vital somehow or good, that they kind of keep showing up.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And is it possible to make a living and show business in Canada?
Yeah.
Guest:Ask Justin Bieber.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Oh, he's Canadian too, huh?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, he's huge nationally.
Guest:I'll name a zillion people.
Guest:Yeah, no, no.
Guest:Yeah, it is.
Marc:Yeah, comedies.
Marc:It's hard to do that with comedy.
Guest:Actually, more so in music.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The film world, they...
Guest:There's several directors and producers right now trying to start another network in Canada to show Canadian films.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Because Canadian networks do not show them.
Guest:Really?
Guest:No.
Guest:They do not show their own.
Guest:And I went to this luncheon run by these people who are trying to set up this network.
Guest:And they were saying, you know, every other country, America, of course, supports its own, builds its own entertainment, has built its own entertainment business.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And field business.
Guest:And France does it in England and all these, Sweden, all these other countries have laws, basically, creative laws.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Encourage.
Guest:Encourage and grow their own talent.
Guest:And they're actually televisions, I think.
Guest:You know, much more respected than it was when I was there doing it in Canada.
Guest:But the film.
Guest:No good.
Guest:They make great films.
Guest:Actually, Quebec.
Guest:Quebec supports the French-Canadian films do really well.
Marc:Are they mostly French-language films?
Guest:Yeah, they are mostly French.
Marc:Because they can ship them over to other French speakers.
Guest:Yeah, they can go all over the world with subtitles, whatever.
Marc:Do you speak French?
Guest:Un petit peu.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:That's it.
Guest:I can say un petit peu.
Guest:No, I can speak slowly.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I think if I lived somewhere and was forced to speak it, I would.
Marc:You think you could pick up on it?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, I took it in high school, but where I'm, you know, Toronto, we're not French.
Marc:Not French.
Marc:That's like the fun city.
Marc:That's like the, you know.
Guest:Well, they say Montreal is a fun city.
Guest:Yeah, I know, but that's, I don't know.
Guest:Have you been there?
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:I've been to all of them.
Marc:I've performed in Canada in all kinds of ways.
Marc:Yeah, I've performed.
Guest:Not just comedically.
Marc:Not just comedically.
Marc:I've tried my best with at least two Canadian women.
Marc:And did you perform well, I hope.
Marc:I did okay, you know, but that's enough for a Canadian.
Marc:Oh, I ought to.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Good job.
Marc:You did what you could.
Marc:If I wasn't a woman.
Marc:So how does it happen in Canada?
Marc:So you go to high school and then you just, what, did you go to college?
Guest:Uh-oh.
Marc:What?
Guest:No.
Marc:No college.
Marc:I went to... I'm not going to judge you.
Guest:I went to Second City University.
Guest:She got right into showbiz.
Guest:Yeah, I got right out of high school.
Guest:I understudied Gilda Radner and Rosemary Radcliffe, the other girl on the cast.
Marc:In Second City in Toronto?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I didn't know Gilda was Canadian.
Guest:No, she's not.
Guest:But she came up there.
Guest:She's from Detroit.
Marc:And she came up there?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:So what was the decision process?
Marc:I mean, what made you know, like, I'm going to do that?
Marc:Was there somebody you saw?
Guest:Yeah, Gilda.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you saw her live?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, at Second City Theatre.
Guest:First I saw Gilda in Godspell, and that cast in Godspell was Gilda, Marty Short, Andrea Martin, Eugene Levy came in later, Victor Garber, Dave Thomas came in later.
Guest:A lot of people I ended up working with much later in life.
Guest:I'm right out of high school, and I saw them all in Godspell, and I was in love with Martin Short, kissed his picture in the program.
Guest:and uh and got to go to lunch with him and my brother was dating actually before that my brother was dating gilda so gilda would come to our house and i would just like look dreamily at her and think okay this is what uh this is who i want to be really and where was she in her career then like what do you mean it was god's doing a little theater in toronto
Marc:But Godspell, was that just a touring company or was it a production in Canada?
Guest:No, it was the Toronto production, yeah.
Guest:It was a big Toronto production.
Guest:Actually, and I'm sorry, I met her before Godspell.
Guest:She was in Little Theatre, Global Village Theatre in Toronto.
Guest:And my brother was involved in that too, so I guess that's where they met.
Marc:So you knew Gilda when she was like 20?
Guest:Yeah, probably.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:Before she was, you know, that's amazing.
Marc:Sweet.
Marc:And what was she like then?
Guest:She was sweet and fun and silly.
Guest:And she'd come to family dinners.
Guest:And we have whole movies of her acting things with everybody acting.
Guest:Everybody in the family were doing this thing.
Yeah.
Guest:Some kind of improv game.
Guest:But it wasn't like acting scenes.
Guest:It was like those stupid games that you get in a circle and you all get angry.
Guest:And then you all get sad.
Guest:And then the sun comes out and melts you all.
Guest:This kind of stuff.
Guest:But Gilda's in on it.
Guest:It's really funny.
Marc:But it's so weird, that list of people.
Marc:everybody in that production they were in godspell yeah but you know uh garber too like he just uh he's a big they're all big actors yeah how does that happen i mean it's it's so interesting to me that there were these communities of people that like all how could an entire production of just godspell you know churn in canada churn out all this amazing talent
Guest:Well, it was such a great show, and so of the time.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, Godspell.
Guest:So it had a really big audience.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And it was at a big theater, the Royal Alex Theater, which is still a big theater to play in Toronto.
Guest:But it ran for, what, a few months?
Guest:They were all really talented.
Guest:Paul Schaefer was the musical director, too.
Guest:Paul Schaefer, too, and they were all kids.
Guest:Paul Schaefer, Eugene Levy.
Guest:And Dave Thomas and Martin Short all went to school together in Hamilton, Ontario.
Marc:But they're a little older than you?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:A lot older.
Marc:A lot older.
Marc:A lot older.
Marc:But they were probably just college age, right, at that time?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So none of them went to college.
Marc:Yeah, they did.
Guest:They met in college.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Guest:They managed to go.
Guest:So I guess they're just that much older than I was.
Marc:So when you met Gilda at your house, because your brother was dating her, you were like, this is it.
Guest:Yeah, then she got in Second City Theater.
Yeah.
Guest:And then I auditioned and didn't get in right away.
Guest:And I was a waitress there.
Guest:So I waited and got to watch all the shows.
Guest:That was really just so inspiring.
Guest:And that really made me want to do that.
Marc:What was the format there?
Marc:Because I've talked to people that.
Guest:Samus has ever been and will always be.
Marc:But Second City, didn't that originate in Chicago?
Guest:It did.
Guest:But they came, you know, when they moved to another city.
Marc:Mm-hmm.
Guest:Or they start a touring company, they'll start with material that was already written by another cast.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Which is what they did in Toronto.
Guest:But then as soon as you start running that show, you're doing improvs after every show.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And they would, at the time, audio records.
Guest:Now the video records, of course.
Guest:Or digitally.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But at the time, it was just audio recordings.
Guest:And you would keep working on that material until you built the next show.
Guest:And then the next show would be all from your improvs.
Guest:Then you start building the neck.
Guest:That's how it has always worked.
Marc:So they show up.
Marc:You've studied the role of whoever was doing that part before.
Guest:Yeah, you just take over a role, yeah.
Marc:Oh, and that's how it works.
Marc:And then that ensemble starts to gel.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And then you guys start to slowly.
Guest:Even before you gel, you start improvising.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Excuse me.
Marc:But actually creating new sketches.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:So, all right.
Marc:So you're a waitress there.
Marc:Who's on stage then?
Marc:Do you remember?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Brian Delmarie.
Guest:No, Bill Murray.
Guest:He...
Guest:Brian Doyle Murray, too.
Guest:Brian Doyle Murray, yeah.
Guest:He's a funny guy.
Guest:Oh, what a doll he was.
Guest:Boy, he looked like a young Stephen Stills or something.
Guest:Just a sweet little face.
Guest:But he would get pissed off about the air conditioner or something in the middle of the scene.
Guest:He would just start ranting with that voice of the hour he still has.
Guest:I'm just ranting to the audience about how fucking hot it is in here.
Guest:But he'd be funny, yes.
Guest:Dan Aykroyd and Valerie Bromfield, they both came from Ottawa.
Guest:They were kind of a team and did really insane material.
Marc:What was the woman's name?
Guest:Valerie Bromfield.
Marc:I don't know her.
Guest:Yeah, she must be online somewhere because she's written a lot of stuff.
Marc:Oh, so she's here?
Guest:She was really funny.
Marc:And Aykroyd, was he funny then?
Guest:oh yeah really funny and he's yeah he could take any that guy was i was he could do something i so have never been able to do just take like three facts of any subject yeah and be able to riff on that and sound like an expert on anything so that was sort of bullshit the rest
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's one of the things he does.
Marc:Because he always did those kind of huckster sales pitch guys.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, real fast talking.
Guest:A pitch guy, yeah.
Guest:But also, he could go off on any subject and sound like he knew what he was talking about.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:But do it, and of course, funny.
Guest:And then Eugene Levy was in the cast.
Guest:Oh, all these young dudes.
Guest:I can't even imagine.
Guest:And John Candy.
Guest:John Candy.
Guest:But he came in later, too, yeah.
Guest:But before me.
Guest:Yeah, before I did.
Marc:And this is what you were doing when you were a waitress, just watching that?
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:That is nuts.
Yeah.
Marc:I can't even fucking, it's hard for me to imagine everybody as just, you know, because I remember, like, I watched SNL when I was 13 or 14, I was into it, the first season.
Marc:But then when you start to realize that they all had lives before that, and that they were doing things and then watching SCTV, when that finally came to the States, we had to wait for that.
Yeah.
Guest:But it's great to see people at that time, too, at Second City.
Guest:Because it's the perfect job in your 20s if you want to go in comedy.
Guest:Because you think you can run the world, and you're so opinionated.
Guest:And you can just get on stage and mouth off.
Guest:And any character you saw that day, anybody you saw on the bus or subway or on the street or whatever, you can tap into whatever bit you thought was funny about them and then use it on stage that night.
Guest:It's such a great place to watch people really blossom.
Marc:And I think in some ways it's a much fuller experience than watching someone struggle through a stand-up act.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Because you've always got support.
Guest:You're always doing it with each other.
Marc:And you can just push it.
Marc:It takes a lot of years to push stand-up.
Marc:I bet.
Marc:With improv, you can just sort of like, you never know when it's going to happen.
Marc:But there are people there kind of...
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Keep going.
Guest:You always have to have something to offer.
Guest:You're just constantly trying to think of something to offer, but at the same time being open to whatever's going to happen that's going to shift it somewhere else, and then you can't just hang out.
Guest:Right, right, right.
Guest:But it must be, I would think it would be hard to go from stand-up to do that kind of work, because then you've got to...
Guest:You can't just go off on your own like you can when you're doing stand-up.
Marc:Not to somebody else.
Marc:I don't really have any improv chops, but I'm pretty open.
Marc:But I can't really get out of myself.
Marc:I'm sort of locked in me.
Marc:So if we can build an improv around whatever I am.
Marc:I'm fine with that.
Guest:That's good.
Guest:I think that's happened a lot at Second City.
Guest:Some people are just really strong personalities.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I'm wrong where other people like to hide behind characters.
Marc:I imagine people like some of the bigger guys.
Marc:I imagine John Candy was always so bad.
Guest:I would say John Candy was such a character.
Guest:Yeah, just on his own.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And most of his characters are called Johnny.
Guest:And it wasn't even all his doing.
Guest:Other people would write scenes for him and call him Johnny.
Guest:It was just like, you can't make him anyone else.
Marc:He's Johnny.
Marc:But was he part of your crew or you were watching?
Marc:So he was with you.
Guest:Okay, when I got in the cast, when Gilda left to do National Lampoon and then Saturday Night Live...
Guest:John was in the cast and Joe Flaherty was in the cast and Eugene and Danny and Rosemary Radcliffe the other girl from Toronto and I first took over Chicago and Toronto used to do trades I don't know if they still do it
Guest:where their cast would play toronto stage for two weeks and vice versa oh really yeah yeah and so they did this trade and i got to go with them as understudy and we went to chicago and the cast there was john belushi and bill murray and uh betty thomas and ann rars it was crazy that's crazy and the first time we got there we got to improvise everybody improvised together on stage and i was with them i'm sure i didn't say a word i was just kind of looking around like oh my god i'm actually here
Marc:But these guys were just local stars at that time.
Marc:I mean, they were shining where they were, but they weren't the personalities that we got to know.
Guest:No, but a year or two later.
Marc:That was it, huh?
Marc:So you were on stage with Belushi.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:What was that like?
Marc:Oh, just you watch.
Marc:That's all you do.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Watch and hope that some of it runs off on you.
Marc:But there was no, but was he like a stage, was he a stage eater or was it?
Guest:No, no, not in a greedy way.
Guest:Just he was so strong.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Like you've seen and like you've imagined.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But they all were.
Guest:They were a really good team.
Guest:They were really good together.
Guest:That cast.
Guest:God, everybody kind of kept going.
Guest:I know, isn't that great?
Marc:I love it.
Marc:I mean, there's obviously people that, you know, you're so like, I don't know what happened to that guy.
Marc:There's always a few of those, but the numbers of the people that you're talking about who were involved in this that, you know, kind of kept going.
Marc:And I imagine some people kept going behind the scenes as writers or set people.
Guest:Oh, definitely.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like, when you were in Canada, though, and doing it, was there alignments?
Marc:Because I talked to Shelley Berman about the Compass Players, which is what... Yeah, what started Second City, yeah.
Marc:And there were always sort of alignments made.
Marc:Like, his big story about why he created the phone bit was because he wanted to do a bit with Elaine May, but Elaine May was locked in with Mike Nichols already.
Guest:That's great!
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I'll do my own phone.
Marc:I'll do my own other person.
Marc:Right, exactly.
Marc:That was the inception of that.
Guest:I love that people still do this.
Marc:Sure, sure.
Guest:She'll do that baby finger on the thumb.
Marc:That's Shelly's.
Marc:Some people just hold it.
Marc:You're not going to know.
Guest:I swear on stage, they still do that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:No, you do.
Guest:It's a natural.
Guest:Even though you're holding a cell now.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And the phone is tiny.
Guest:No, this is established.
Guest:That's just not as good a move, is it?
Marc:No.
Marc:Or Bluetooth.
Marc:Hello.
Marc:Unless that Bluetooth is part of it.
Marc:Or you don't even have to have anything.
Marc:Hands free.
Marc:I'm just talking.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Is that what they do now on stage?
Marc:No.
Marc:Of course not.
Marc:You hold the old phone.
Marc:And then you just imagine it just rang in a loud way.
Marc:And there's a cord.
Marc:There's a cord to all those phones.
Marc:Like Andrea Martin.
Guest:I knew you were going to say it.
Guest:She just won a Drama Desk Award the other night.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Marty Short told me this yesterday.
Guest:She won the other night.
Guest:She's in Pippin.
Guest:She apparently, like on the rehearsal shows, she was getting a standing ovation in the middle of...
Guest:Just in the middle of the show with her number.
Guest:So she won a drama desk the other night and she got Steve Martin to go up with her with him thinking he got the award.
Guest:And he did a whole bit where he went up, was so excited and took it.
Guest:She said, they said, Andrea.
Marc:Oh, that's funny.
Marc:When you were doing all this comedy, though, I mean, you seem to have some pretty deep emotional chops.
Marc:I mean, you can play serious roles.
Marc:I mean, was there a period where you tried that for the first time where you remember it or was it always comedy?
Guest:We did a lot of scenes in Second City that got no laughs.
Guest:I think we learned drama unintentionally.
Guest:It was a very poignant moment.
Marc:Believe me.
Marc:What was the first improv you remember doing?
Guest:Oh, I do remember going on stage for the first time as an understudy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And John Candy and Gilda and Danny, Eugene were in the cast, I guess, Joe Flaherty.
Guest:And they did a scene, a cottage scene where I think the suggestion was mosquitoes or something.
Guest:So they did a scene and they had, I don't know if they had anything to the scene other than, okay, we're going to be at a cottage altogether.
Guest:We'll be a couple, we'll be a couple, whatever.
Guest:And they'll just be
Guest:you know masses of um bugs you know like locusts like but it'd be mosquitoes and they're biting so everybody tries to kill the mosquitoes i don't know what it was all i did was slap john candy and i didn't know how to do a fake slap so i just slapped his face over and over and over and
Guest:i do remember that i would play insane in most scenes because when in doubt you know if you don't have anything smart to say just be crazy the excuse will be that you're crazy yeah and um and i remember but when we when we went backstage after that scene i don't know what he said but he did his hey put his fists up like i'll fucking punch you would you learn to fake a slap
Guest:How far were you doing out there?
Marc:So how did the TV show develop?
Marc:I mean, how did that all come together?
Guest:I think they tried one in Chicago.
Guest:Yeah, Chicago.
Guest:Through Second City.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And then Bernie Sons, the producer of Second City at the time and for many years.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And our producer, Andrew Alexander, got together and said, this has got to work.
Guest:There's got to be a TV show out of this.
Guest:Come on.
Guest:So I think that's what they brought Harold Ramis.
Guest:to toronto to get it going with us and and he was from we were the cast at the time so we were the ones that got to do it that's just it was timing oh really yeah so ramus was from chicago yeah and he was with the second city there yeah yeah what now he must have been in that he was in that cast with with perushi and then yeah yeah
Marc:But he's one of those guys that... He's a pretty great comic actor, but he became a huge director.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He's a smart writer, too.
Guest:He was our head writer for the first seasons on SCTV.
Guest:Really good, strong, funny writer.
Marc:It's interesting to me that the guys that have the wherewithal or the chops to do that, because that's a big jump.
Marc:So many people just remain...
Marc:comedy actors.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:But then there are those ones that, like, I always consider themselves not necessarily smarter, but I consider them like the ones that are able to have a little forethought.
Marc:Right, right.
Guest:Or step outside of themselves.
Guest:You say you're in yourself.
Guest:Yeah, constantly.
Guest:And they would step outside of themselves and see the others, I guess, and make them want to direct.
Marc:Right, that they could be a leader and sort of move these people around.
Marc:But there's a fun part about it to me that's sort of like, that's someone who had a career in mind.
Guest:The rest of us were just sort of like, I'm here, I'm funny, let's do it.
Guest:And then you get to a certain age, you're like, come on!
Guest:I'm still funny.
Marc:I should have written something.
Guest:I should have given this some thought.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:It's a way to design a career, kind of.
Guest:Oh, no.
Guest:It's scary.
Guest:Well, you're doing that.
Guest:You are.
Marc:Yeah, I'm almost 50.
Guest:I'm older and I've never done it.
Guest:I have lucked into everything I've done.
Marc:No, but you have a tremendous amount of talent.
Guest:No, but I write.
Guest:It's stupid that I don't create things.
Marc:What's holding you up?
Marc:What have you written?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:You've got books going and a TV show and you're doing this.
Marc:It took me almost 50 years to find some weird wave of something.
Guest:You're doing it.
Marc:Yeah, something came together.
Guest:Proud.
Marc:I'm proud.
Marc:When you write, what do you write?
Guest:Well, I used to write sketches.
Guest:And then I sold a thing to HBO, but we didn't get it produced.
Marc:What was that?
Marc:Now that it's not produced, let's talk about it.
Guest:Let's pitch it to me.
Guest:Well, the problem is there was no pitch, really.
Marc:That's a little weak, Kevin.
Guest:I'm telling you, I had great dialogue.
Marc:You just went in there with another person.
Guest:I had some really strong characters and dialogue.
Guest:There was just no story.
Marc:No story?
Guest:It basically was just a couple.
Marc:Where was it set?
Guest:A couple of their kids.
Guest:Because I thought, I'm not seeing anyone on TV.
Guest:Like me, like my husband, like our lives or like our friends.
Guest:And, you know, and that's I had lunch with Carolyn Strauss.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And and she said, do you have any ideas now?
Guest:No, but I'd like to see something where I'd like, you know.
Guest:I wasn't pitching, and if I knew I was pitching, I wouldn't have been able to get a thought out.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because I'm very bad at it.
Guest:I just tighten up as soon as I know I'm trying to impress someone.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Like right now.
Marc:No, you listen to it.
Marc:Yeah, I am.
Guest:You too.
Guest:You're good.
Guest:But I said, oh, what's up, Montene?
Guest:I like this.
Guest:And I told her something, a ridiculous thing my husband and I had gone through.
Guest:And she said, okay.
Okay.
Guest:And that was it.
Guest:That was it.
Guest:I said, what do you mean, okay?
Guest:Okay, we'll do it.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, that was like the coolest thing in the world.
Guest:But I didn't have a story.
Guest:I didn't have much more than what I told her that much.
Marc:You just had this one event or this story that happened.
Guest:No, I could see where it was going, but that episode didn't have any real.
Guest:How many years ago was this?
Marc:So like, you know, your kids were 10 or something?
Guest:Seven, eight years ago, yeah, yeah.
Marc:And what was it specifically that, you know, you saw the life that you were living as not being represented?
Marc:Just sort of, you know.
Guest:I guess people that aren't middle America.
Marc:Right.
Guest:That don't always say the right thing.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Guest:And aren't that cool as parents.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Try their best.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And make really big stupid mistakes in life.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And are weak and.
Marc:And troubled.
Guest:You know.
Marc:And need help.
Marc:And shouldn't even have the kids.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Oh, no, decent parents, but kind of flailing their way through and don't, you know.
Guest:It didn't end with a lesson.
Guest:There was no Mr. Cleaver.
Marc:It's weird.
Marc:I'm surprised that I, as much as I want to be kind of like a person that likes things that are different and weird, I don't mind a lesson.
Marc:You know, like, you know, maybe because my life is so chaotic, but sometimes, like, even with my show, I kind of buttoned at the end.
Marc:I didn't want people walking away from it going, oh, my God.
Guest:Well, you kind of feel that is what I was... That's what I was really resisting is kind of wrapping up.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, a lot of shows do kind of the voiceover at the end with the nice music.
Guest:Sure, sure.
Guest:You know, we all learn.
Guest:You know, you find that sometimes in life, you notice... Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, there's a lot of that.
Guest:Yeah, but there's... Because I guess people really just want to...
Marc:examine lives and show that in a creative way but then you have to finish it right there has yeah i i think i mean it's a it's a question that i had when i was working on my show because they're they're like i'm not sure that that you can't do that and still have it be sort of like not doing it yeah but not kind of like well this doesn't still not good you know i mean i'm glad you got some closure on that but then what did i learn yeah yeah i don't know if he's gonna be able to stick with whatever that is that he thinks he's got under control learned that
Guest:Because I knew that at the beginning.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, there's that, you know, like, oh my God, this guy should have had this together 20 years ago.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's very slow.
Marc:This fella.
Guest:You're watching someone get it though.
Guest:And that's the beautiful thing.
Marc:Who are some of the writers that you were impressed with?
Marc:Like when you did films where you were like, holy shit, this is a pretty stunning film.
Guest:Oh, I did a six feet under a few episodes of that in there.
Guest:Oh, Alan ball.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Oh my God.
Guest:You know that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Cause often people will say, Oh yeah, come on in.
Guest:This, the character stuff, but feel free to improvise or whatever.
Guest:And they may even said to me, I don't think so, but, but you read one of the, a script like that.
Guest:I'm not touching a word.
Guest:Oh yeah.
Marc:That's, is that a relief?
Guest:Aren't I lucky to be the one saying these words out loud?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:The weird thing about that show is that I've never had an experience with watching all of a show, and I usually do it after the fact so I can just keep watching it when I want to and not wait, where I went from loving characters to hating them.
Guest:Oh, I love that.
Marc:Yeah, where you're just sort of like, yeah, this is my guy, this guy.
Marc:And then within six episodes, you're like, fuck that guy.
Guest:And then turning around again.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:Oh, no, I see.
Guest:I see why he's doing that.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:That's the best.
Marc:Man, that was a good show.
Marc:That's kind of like life, I guess.
Guest:Yeah, like life.
Marc:Maybe.
Marc:Sometimes you end up just like sticking by the worst of people.
Marc:That's true.
Marc:For the whole run.
Guest:Well, you question yourself.
Guest:Am I insane to think this about them?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:I don't mind a judge.
Marc:Or you get your blinders of love on.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:And Nora Ephron, honestly, I got to be in Heartburn.
Marc:Oh, right, with Nicholson.
Guest:Yeah, what a group of people.
Guest:Very cool, Mike Nichols directing.
Marc:Right.
Guest:But that's Nora Ephron from her book, and that was very cool.
Guest:And Meryl Streep, who I love, love, love.
Marc:Right, and that's a grown-up movie?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That's another thing, is that there's not a lot of grown-up stuff.
Marc:You know, like most stuff is sort of geared towards younger people.
Guest:Yeah, I guess.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you've done some of those, but you know, you were, you were moms.
Guest:Oh, too many moms.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But that's good moms.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I don't mean me good, but me good.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Orange County, Home Alone.
Guest:And Home Alone was fun.
Marc:That's a huge movie.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I played some fun moms and I have, or I'm in, not I have, I'm in part of a movie that's coming out, I think in the summer or the fall, ACOD, Adult Children of Divorce.
Guest:Adam Scott is the lead.
Guest:He's our son.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:And he's trying to get his horribly, horribly divorced parents back together for his younger brother's wedding.
Guest:And the husband is?
Guest:Richard Jenkins.
Guest:Oh, he's a genius.
Guest:He really is.
Guest:He's the best.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I watched that guy from afar.
Guest:Flirty with Disaster.
Guest:Did you ever see that?
Marc:Yes.
Guest:And he's stoned.
Guest:He's the cop.
Marc:The stoned gay cop.
Guest:Oh, man.
Marc:With Josh Brolin is his lover.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And younger lover.
Guest:And Lily Tomlin.
Guest:Oh, so good.
Guest:But he's good in everything.
Guest:He's really good in everything.
Marc:And Six Feet Under as well.
Guest:Yes, and Six Feet Under.
Guest:Speaking of Six Feet Under.
Guest:And so loose.
Guest:and fun and every idea out of his head is great and what do you know what he like i he's one of those guys where it's like where did that guy come from it's like it's like brian cranston like they're these guys that are just like i'm an actor yeah meat and potatoes actor that they just act yeah and he seems like one of those guys no no i know but that's how they think of them but i think yeah they do but they shouldn't because i think of meat and potatoes actors is really just people take the job and when do i show up yes thank you very much i'm done
Guest:I mean, I knew from afar, I think, watching Richard Jenkins that he had quite the brain on him and sense of humor and was just delighted that it was all true when I met him.
Guest:But, yeah, I don't know if he thinks of himself as that funny.
Guest:He must.
Guest:Or with Bryan Cranston, yeah.
Guest:And then you see him in Breaking Bad and you think, oh, my God, this is what he does, too.
Marc:But he seems like there's a certain type of American actor, I think, primarily, where they just work, and they have a work ethic around it.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:It's like a nine-to-five job.
Guest:Right.
Marc:They don't have a movie star mentality about it.
Guest:And they don't take it personally.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:That's a rare thing.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And that's what I'm talking about when I used the word meat and potatoes were.
Marc:And I guess that was the wrong word.
Marc:But just a guy, because Cranston grew up in it.
Marc:His father was a studio actor.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Marc:So he's sort of like, my dad went to work, and he worked in show business.
Marc:He was in the movies.
Marc:He did pictures.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:so you know i'm in pictures you know there's that sensibility my dad did right the family business right there's all those you know great character actors that were just sort of the guy some of the best actors in the world are these character actors yeah but jenkins i can do anything yeah and it was i did a 30 rock with him last year uh-huh
Guest:So loose and ridiculous and just tapped every possible laugh out of every moment and kept coming up with bizarre, great physical stuff to do.
Guest:Really?
Guest:See?
Guest:What if we try this?
Guest:So loose as far as we could say, oh yeah, why don't you try that?
Guest:Which is the way I was trained to work at Second City and has gotten me in trouble on other sets where I said, hey, what if you tried this?
Guest:And they look at me like, you're telling me how to do my job.
Guest:Oh, no.
Guest:No, sorry.
Guest:I got excited.
Guest:I'm sorry.
Guest:And now I've learned where I think, oh, it'd be great if they just, no, don't say anything.
Marc:That's a director you're talking about.
Guest:Not allowed.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No other actors.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:You know, because that's the way we worked on Seconds Hit, even though we had some great directors.
Guest:Hey, you know what else you could do right there?
Guest:What if you tried?
Guest:Oh, thanks.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, are you kidding?
Guest:No, I'm going this way.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's like we weren't threatened by that or by each other.
Guest:And most of the time I was like, thank you.
Marc:But that's interesting to me, though, because like some actors like and I don't have a lot of experience acting except for this show that I just did.
Marc:But, you know, some I guess that some people have their process and they make their choices alone.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Most actors.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's how it goes.
Marc:And it's very it's very bizarre to me because my experience.
Marc:No, I don't know that that's true because there's a whole tone of show and of movie now that either embraces what you do or not.
Marc:And I think that you're probably in a position to be more adaptable in the big picture than somebody who is more controlled like that.
Guest:I'm happy to have someone say, what if you tried to, but only, it's really not, they're not saying, you know, we wouldn't say to each other.
Guest:oh, you're going about this all wrong.
Guest:Here's what your character should be thinking.
Guest:It's really just, I give a bad example.
Guest:It's really just, you know, you think of a bit to add to what they're doing.
Guest:Yeah, no one has to do it.
Marc:And it's all about connection.
Guest:Yeah, but it's also the comfort you have with people.
Guest:And I do not do it now.
Guest:I'll never do it on a set unless somebody asks me for something, you know, or someone like Bryan Cranston or Richard Jenkins says, oh, you know what else we should do?
Guest:Then they open it up and I go, okay, I'm safe.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, we can work.
Guest:I can say anything and they can go, what a stupid idea.
Guest:Or, yeah, that's great.
Marc:But is that... I mean, it seems that a lot of the stuff you do, certainly lately, is more along the lines of what you like to do.
Guest:Well, if you're... Well, Chris Guest movies... Yeah, even then, though, we're... There's no rehearsal.
Guest:We're just rolling.
Guest:And, I mean, we did on those movies, so... And all the dialogue is improvised.
Guest:And everybody just comes ready in character, so...
Guest:there's no discussion you just do it so but you have a lot of job in that case is really just to be as real as you can be in your you know do your part all the preparation is in backstory on your own yeah yeah yeah yeah and when you just show up ready to play yeah and ready to work yes play too and people are just so strong it's just so great to see people and you haven't discussed really what kind of relationship it's all new it's all yeah so somebody treats you a certain way and you go
Guest:Oh, that tells me something about who I am.
Guest:So you go with that and then you give them something back and that gives them some information about who they are.
Guest:It's sounds, yeah, it's just fun.
Marc:That's amazing though.
Marc:So you're sort of learning your parameters as a person or as a character defined on the relationship because the stuff in, in for your consideration when, when you don't, when it doesn't work out, when you don't get it,
Marc:That shit is heartbreaking and hilarious.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But, like, it's too, like, we, you know, you're in the business long enough that you know how that's out there.
Marc:So there was an integrity to the thing where it was sort of like, oh, my God.
Guest:Things that make me happy to see like that is asking to ask props for a big, like a Ralph's tray, you know, with the crudités and stuff.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like, and my coffee table.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Just because I expected to have a celebration.
Oh.
Guest:when the nominations were announced you asked him for that yeah that kind of oh there you know when you can do what we're talking about like being loose and collaborative with everyone yeah when props wants to hear your ideas when we you want to hear props ideas and makeup and hair when you're all like oh yeah let's do that right yeah oh good idea when you're doing that with the it's so fulfilling and fun
Marc:everybody has their part and everybody's excited.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Nobody's servicing an ego.
Guest:No, no, no.
Marc:But like that stuff.
Guest:Ultimately, it does service your ego.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:Because you all do better.
Marc:But everybody, right.
Marc:But everybody feels like they're like, we did it.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Not just like, oh, that horrible person, you know, is taking all the credit.
Guest:And even when, you know, it doesn't find an audience or whatever, you can still love the days you worked on it.
Marc:It does, but usually that kind of stuff will find, it may not be a huge audience, but it's going to find people that really appreciate it and are moved by it.
Marc:And the amazing thing about some of the stuff in that movie, and also all those Christopher Guest movies, is that there's such a fine line between creating characters that are heartbreaking and pathetic.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So like, you know, right.
Marc:Heartbreaking and funny is fine, you know, but, you know, it never feels like anyone's being mocked.
Marc:Do you know what I mean?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Like, because sometimes like, you know, oh, they just made that person to mock and you never really get that feeling.
Marc:And it's so it comes from a fundamental respect of you and of the actors who are who have a certain amount of care for this character.
Guest:Because you are only that character.
Guest:There's no time to stand back and judge it.
Marc:Right.
Guest:You roll, and you might repeat a scene just to get out some information that's in the outline that we missed, and Chris will go, go back to the part where you talk about where you met.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And we need to get that part about the shoe in.
Guest:Right, right, right.
Guest:And you'll do that.
Guest:But otherwise, you are...
Guest:so purely like surviving on trying to be that character so there is no there's no judgment right of you i mean before you get there you'll try to think okay who is this person and you try to and there's always inspiring stuff in the script that uh you know that chris and eugene would write to you know they give you some bit or some background yeah to jump off of you know and that would always be right something to roll with it's not like you had to completely come out of nowhere with the ideas but um but they're really yeah you just don't have time to
Guest:commented on her judge on it judge it i remember with um mighty wind my character i could not find anything really funny about her she's not a funny character i don't know if you saw that one i sure did she's a folk singer and it's really about for me it was about talking about mitch was a deeply codependent relationship uh of somebody like and scared to go back to it
Guest:Right.
Guest:And kind of excited about going back to it, too.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But the amazing thing about that movie is because you had that historical element, which is that this is a reunion.
Marc:So, you know, you guys had to explore.
Marc:You had to explore in yourself.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You know, you could totally see just how like the fact that, you know, that this guy was this menacing person.
Marc:sort of psychologically fragile, volatile thing back in the day in a folk community.
Guest:But we consider him a genius, too.
Guest:A genius songwriter.
Marc:Of course.
Marc:But that world in and of itself is so small.
Marc:I think that's another thing that's beautiful about Chris's movies is that these subcultures he's playing with, they're not self-important, but they're insulated.
Marc:So the actual effect of what he's mocking or what he's mimicking in the real world is very small in a way.
Guest:You could talk about Bob Dylan or Ian and Sylvie or someone in that movie, but he intentionally would not allow any references to any real existing people from that world.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:So that made it even smaller.
Guest:Right.
Marc:And that relationship, it felt like it had so much integrity because of the weight.
Marc:When somebody has that, and you probably maybe have some point of reference in real life, that when you have that moment in your life that it seems like this is it.
Marc:This is the shining moment.
Marc:And then that goes away.
Marc:And God knows what happens to people in between that moment.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:But to sort of reenter that with the humility that naturally occurred just by living a life,
Guest:Oh, that's cool, yeah.
Guest:Right?
Marc:So when you guys do come together, I mean, even as comedy, it's impossible to watch you guys do that song and not be moved, genuinely moved.
Guest:That's so great.
Guest:I love that.
Marc:Do you feel that, though?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We could feel it when we did it, but it didn't feel like it was coming from us.
Guest:I mean, we were all part of it.
Marc:It's a pretty beautiful song, too.
Guest:It is.
Guest:It is.
Guest:And when I first saw that, it's kind of...
Marc:Sappy?
Marc:Too sweet.
Guest:Yeah, I know.
Guest:I was so wrong.
Guest:I mean, not to say that I didn't always find it to be beautiful melodically.
Guest:Right, right, right.
Guest:But Chris and Michael McKean and Neto, too, wrote the song.
Guest:They were all going for a sweetness and a real innocent time of folk before people were really being political.
Marc:Right, like Peter, Paul, and Mary political.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So you kind of get like Lemon Tree.
Marc:That's a loaded song.
Guest:It was not Pete Seeger stuff.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:This is early.
Guest:And all the emotion.
Guest:And we're going down the road.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:We're all going to be together.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It was the sort of strange kind of middle-class interpretation of sharecropping folk music.
Guest:Up with people.
Guest:Do you remember that?
Guest:Are you old enough to remember that?
Marc:Sure.
Sure.
Guest:yeah well that was represented in uh but with the other yeah who who arranged all those harmonies oh yeah he's a freak of nature that way yeah he's kind of a comedic genius isn't he yeah yeah okay more than anyone he we would accuse him of writing stuff ahead of time all those movies yeah oh is that come on you did not just come up with that he goes how would i what i didn't even meet this guy before how would i know what he's going to say to me
Marc:That's so funny.
Marc:So you do have these like, you know, that's cheating.
Guest:Yeah, come on.
Guest:You prepared.
Guest:That goes on.
Guest:That's a beautiful fact.
Guest:Well, because sometimes you're just blown away by what comes out of people's minds.
Guest:And then you want to know.
Guest:It's like, no, no, that didn't just happen.
Guest:We actually knew that it wasn't possible to have written because, you know, because the other people were brought in that day to improvise with us, you know, so.
Marc:Who are some of the best improvisers you've ever worked with?
Guest:Joe Flaherty is great and taught all of us so much.
Guest:He directed Second City a lot.
Marc:Oh, yeah?
Marc:Is he around still?
Guest:Yeah, he is.
Guest:He was in... I think the biggest thing on TV was...
Guest:Preaching Geeks.
Guest:Thank you.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Marc:The father.
Marc:Yeah, he was great.
Guest:That's the one running bit I tried to get into and actually did it in Mighty Wind because Nancy Dolman, God bless her, was married to Martin Shorten who died a few years ago.
Guest:She got into doing this.
Guest:This was not like a menopause thing or anything, but she did it when she was younger, but she would say a name.
Guest:You'd say, okay, I was working with
Guest:Okay, you know who I'm talking about.
Guest:He's the one who was... Okay, he was married to... Oh, he was married to, you know, the hair.
Guest:The one with the hair.
Guest:Okay, she's got the hair.
Guest:No details.
Guest:Okay, she sued.
Guest:She sued, you know, and she would just keep piling... Every name that was supposed to help her would just make it worse and dig her deeper.
Guest:And her eyes would just be like, help me!
Guest:Why are you watching?
Guest:And I would just... And then it got to the point where Nancy would just say, oh, guess who I saw yesterday?
Guest:And I would go, don't, Nancy.
Guest:Don't start.
Guest:Shut up.
Guest:I'm not going to forget this.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:So I tried... Because I did think I had a funny character.
Guest:It wasn't inherently funny.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And, you know, Mickey... Sorry, what was it called?
Guest:Mighty Wind.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I did that in so many scenes.
Guest:Because my first scene was talking about... It said in the outline...
Guest:mickey talks about the um the heyday yeah of mitch and mickey yeah who they met where they played where they toured right who they recorded with who's in the studio this a paragraph i was like oh my god i'm supposed to talk about all that right yeah so then i got to talk to uh sylvia veen and sylvia on the phone someone said my friend set me up to talk to her on the phone so she gave me stuff that i could play with and
Guest:you know and uh go off on and um you know and i got to meet uh um mamas and papas yeah but in these scenes when i would talk about oh and remember the day yeah i would try to add that bit and chris didn't use one of those no i didn't like it but now i'm just living it for real i mean it's hard like that's the hardest thing to know about what you guys do or how you guys do it is that you don't think like how do i make this funny all the time do you
Guest:No.
Guest:No, if you're starting with interesting, funny ideas.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, you don't have to.
Marc:You just play it straight.
Guest:Yeah, if somebody asks me to make something funny and there's nothing funny on paper about it, I can't do it.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Then you are just adding some bullshit to it.
Marc:Yeah, right.
Guest:But some people... Actually, I shouldn't say it because some people can do that really well.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was really bad in...
Guest:scenes on Chris Gas movies where, like, say, the night before the dog show in Best in Show, and he would just, you know, it's the night before and it's a party.
Guest:And there was no reason to be there other than the party.
Guest:Maybe somebody had a story point or two, but most of us were just there.
Guest:And Chris would go around and go, okay, now let's put you two together.
Guest:Okay, now let's put you four together.
Guest:Let's put you three together.
Guest:I was terrible at that because I never knew where I was supposed to be going or what the scene was about.
Guest:I really need...
Guest:some parameters the direction yeah and a bit of a storyline i need to know why i'm there i would just be sweating long before hot flash time i'd just be red faced and sweating did he use it no no he use it yeah no thank god yeah oh you can see you can sound pretty dewy faced on a few scenes so like getting back to like to sctv now how many seasons was that on completely
Guest:I have no memory of this stuff.
Guest:Because it would go, we'd do like 10 shows and we'd go away.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Then, sorry, we don't have a deal.
Guest:Oh, we got a deal.
Guest:Let's do 13.
Marc:This is all in Canada.
Marc:The Canadian CBC.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But no, that was on NBC for I don't know how many seasons.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And it was late at night and it was a 90-minute show.
Guest:It started out half hour.
Marc:Right.
Marc:The 90-minute show was the full, like where everything was intertwined in the network politics.
Guest:Yeah, we kind of had to have, you know, we started out just sketches and then we had to have a background.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:And Flaherty played the head of the network.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Almost like a plantation owner, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I think it was supposed to be a John Barrymore kind of wheelchair for respect.
Marc:And then you had this whole backstory of the network itself.
Guest:Yeah, Johnny LaRue.
Marc:Johnny LaRue.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And all Vegas characters.
Marc:So what was the competition like?
Marc:So you were doing all these amazing characters and working with all these amazing guys, and then SNL comes along and becomes the hottest thing in the world.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So did everybody that you were working with sort of kind of like, oh, how do we go over there?
Marc:How do we feel?
Guest:like i don't maybe i was oblivious to it because it was not my goal at the time because we had our own show and we were just and right and so many of them were close friends of the people in sctv and a lot of them were second city people so it was it was just you're happy for them sure most part right yeah right i guess really didn't become the the industry that it that it is no no years later yeah oh yeah
Marc:But like Dan was on it and Gilda was on it.
Marc:So you were like, wow, this is this other thing.
Marc:Where did they come pick those?
Marc:I guess Lauren was in Canada.
Guest:Yeah, he's Canadian.
Marc:So did you know him?
Guest:He worked with a lot of them, I'm sure.
Guest:Yeah, I met him and worked bits with him, but I didn't really know him that well.
Marc:What do you mean you worked bits with him?
Guest:You know, little bits throughout like a CBC television.
Marc:And so he was a young writer.
Marc:I'm sort of obsessed with Lauren.
Guest:Yeah, in what way?
Marc:I just want to know.
Marc:I want to know what's in there.
Guest:Have you had Martin Short on?
Marc:No, not yet.
Marc:I interviewed him once when I hosted a show on Comedy Central years ago.
Marc:And he's like, I'd be interested to see if I could get Martin Short here.
Guest:Oh, no, absolutely.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:There's no wiser man.
Marc:No, I know, but I can't imagine.
Marc:I'm always wrong about what I think people are going to be like when I get him in here.
Marc:Yeah, because he's such a showman.
Marc:And I've had experience.
Marc:I think one-on-one, we could do all right.
Guest:Oh, definitely.
Marc:But I think if there was a third person, we'd be in trouble.
Guest:The big subjects in life.
Marc:Oh, does he?
Guest:Yeah, he's smart.
Marc:He's deep-toed?
Guest:He'll be able to tell you Lord stories.
Marc:I don't know what he allowed me, though.
Marc:It seems like there's some sort of oath involved.
Marc:Do you like Lord?
Marc:Yeah, I'm fascinated with him.
Marc:I mean, I auditioned for Asana once, and I kind of jumped through the hoops, and I met with him, and it was this sort of weird, life-changing thing.
Marc:I never got the show, and it's long behind me.
Marc:But he's in such rare air, man.
Marc:I mean, that guy makes more money than we'll make in a lifetime when he's sleeping.
Guest:He owns late night TV.
Marc:But I'm always fascinated to hear what people's impressions of him are.
Marc:But yours are so of a Lauren that no one knows.
Marc:And you just remember him.
Marc:Was he a quiet kid?
Guest:No, I don't know him that well.
Guest:I knew him mostly around Saturday Night Live from going to visit friends there.
Guest:And going to the show and going to the parties after and that kind of thing.
Guest:And we talk a lot about Canada.
Marc:So did you ever want to do SNL?
Guest:I did it actually for about a week.
Guest:I never did a show.
Guest:I was in the cast.
Guest:It was in the non-Lornier, Dick Ebersole.
Marc:Oh, right, right.
Marc:How'd they tap you?
Guest:We weren't doing SCTV.
Guest:It closed down.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:It was before NBC, before the NBC 90-minute shows.
Guest:And I wasn't doing anything.
Guest:And I got called and I thought, sure, that'd be fun.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm not doing my show anymore, our show.
Guest:And I lasted about a week and a half.
Guest:But it was just the writing period.
Guest:We weren't into doing shows.
Guest:And I just was so uncomfortable, and I can't even explain why.
Guest:I was just in the wrong place.
Guest:What does that mean?
Marc:It was wrong for me.
Marc:What do you mean you can't explain why?
Guest:Because really, I can't.
Marc:What was it about?
Marc:Was it too competitive?
Marc:Was it too chaotic?
Guest:No, and I remember Michael O'Donohue saying... O'Donohue.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Guest:He said I scared him off or something, and I didn't.
Guest:He didn't.
Marc:How can you scare Michael O'Donohue?
Guest:No, he scared me off.
Guest:Oh, I can see that.
Guest:he was kind of a sort of a menacing humorist he was but i sob enough at parties i wasn't frightened of him yeah yeah oh so he was still around then he was around yeah it was just uh didn't feel right yeah and and then i got the call that uh andrew alexander made a deal with nbc to do the 90 minute show so
Marc:So you're back in the game.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was still with NBC, so I guess it didn't matter to anyone.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, it's interesting because your lifelong friend is Robin Duke.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And she was on for a while.
Guest:Yeah, she got in.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And then I'm looking at the cast list.
Marc:Rosado was a...
Marc:what was his name, Tony?
Marc:Tony Rosado, yeah.
Marc:He was an SCTV guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And then he was on for like a season or two.
Guest:Yeah, he and Robin were both in Second City together, SCTV together.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:After I left, Robin was in.
Guest:Robin and I know each other from high school, grade nine.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:And are still friends.
Guest:She's lovely.
Guest:Oh, that's great.
Guest:She's got a great group with four or five other women called Women Fully Clothed.
Guest:Really funny.
Guest:They write all their own material, and it's not just for women.
Guest:Really funny stuff.
Marc:And that's here?
Guest:It's everywhere, yeah.
Guest:But they're starting a tour, U.S.
Guest:cities this year.
Guest:They played New York.
Marc:Who do you keep in touch with, though, on a daily basis?
Marc:Martin Short?
Guest:Marty more than the rest, I guess.
Guest:Andrea once in a while.
Guest:I must email him.
Guest:Eugene?
Guest:Eugene.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Because when we see things like SNL or any of these things, it's not so much you expect them to be scripted, but to see these people in a live setting where there's no cameras, like, yeah, that's a real, those must be treasured memories, I would imagine.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:If you can get back to them.
Guest:You must have had some fun here with people.
Marc:Well, no, in New York and in other places, yeah, doing stand-up.
Marc:Yeah, sure.
Marc:There's definitely moments I'll never forget.
Marc:And it's just sort of interesting that some of those moments are more important than or more resonant than any of the other ones.
Guest:Yeah, because they are just part of your life as opposed to some show.
Marc:Right, right.
Guest:Part of your show life.
Guest:Yeah, and they're gone, too.
Marc:There's never, like, all you have is that memory of it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And the story of it.
Marc:Now we've got to get Martin Short on here.
Guest:Do you know when you're experiencing it, though, that it's that?
Marc:That there's something great?
Marc:No, no, no.
Marc:A lot of times I miss it because most of the time when you're experiencing something, half of your thoughts are about yourself.
Marc:So you're sort of like, oh, I just missed the whole thing.
Marc:But I was there.
Guest:I just missed the whole thing.
Guest:If your thoughts are about yourself, are they in a confidence?
Guest:Way?
Guest:In a confident way, you're thinking of yourself?
Guest:We're in show business.
Marc:No, of course.
Marc:No, it's like, how am I supposed to be?
Marc:Am I supposed to be doing anything here?
Marc:I guess I could just watch.
Marc:It must be like how you felt on stage with Belushi.
Guest:Always.
Guest:I'm not going to.
Guest:On stage anytime, yeah.
Marc:Really?
Guest:A lot of the time.
Guest:Well, I think that's what's great about playing characters.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Cause you lose yourself and you do me like 20 years of auditioning and meeting to finally clue that maybe I shouldn't go in as myself.
Guest:Maybe I should, they should think I'm being myself, but I should suggest something as a character.
Guest:Especially in a meeting.
Guest:I mean, in an audition, you get to try to see the scene.
Guest:But, you know, I guess people think that I'd be insulted by auditioning, so it would be a meeting instead of an audition.
Guest:I'm not insulted by auditioning because it sometimes would be my only chance.
Guest:But it took me years to write, don't just go in as yourself.
Guest:And for me, sorry, it's losing my self-consciousness.
Guest:Right.
Guest:If I'm thinking...
Marc:About impressing somebody.
Guest:Seeing the world through someone else's eyes.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Even just attempting to.
Guest:It takes all the self-conscious.
Guest:I hate self-consciousness.
Guest:And I'm so buried.
Guest:That's the worst.
Guest:That's the worst.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Or it's like, ugh, I don't want to be in my body.
Guest:What a waste of time it is, isn't it?
Marc:It is.
Marc:It is.
Marc:But I think you probably could agree with this, that my sense of humor is...
Guest:directly proportionate to that yeah that's true you know what I mean so whatever chops you have of the reason you're funny is because you're uncomfortable but is a lot of that I hate to call it observational but is it observing life too and no it is also taking in other people what they're going through doesn't doesn't comedy come from that
Marc:Sure.
Marc:But there's a, there's a relief.
Marc:There's a need to relief.
Marc:Oh yeah.
Marc:You know, I think through performing and everything else that's sort of rooted in it.
Marc:So you actually will go in, you'll make choices that are, that are not to not be yourself even when they're just, especially when I don't want to be nervous.
Marc:Oh, that's interesting.
Guest:like when eugene and i sang we got to sing kiss in the rainbow that song yeah from uh mighty when we got to sing it on the oscars yeah because michael mckean and netto two got nominated good for that wow that was so fun yeah um and that's the i'm telling the best way to go to the oscars not to be nominated not even to win yeah but to be backstage for some other reason performing a number that not a dance number no a good number yeah a nominated song yeah that isn't yours yeah
Guest:All you got to do is do the song, and then you get to hang around backstage.
Guest:It's the best.
Guest:It's so much fun.
Guest:But Eugene and I were, at some point, Eugene was actually saying that we were going to sing the song as ourselves or something.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Eugene, I'll never be able to sing on the Oscars as myself.
Guest:Are you insane?
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:And maybe he wasn't even serious about it, but he was like, no!
Guest:No!
Guest:No, Eugene.
Guest:Why would anyone want to see us sing that song?
Guest:It has to be Mitch and Mickey.
Guest:Right before going on, we're backstage behind this scrim kind of thing.
Guest:We're about to be introduced.
Guest:I look way over on the other side.
Guest:We've got our band between us.
Guest:I look way over at Eugene as Mitch.
Guest:It made me want to cry.
Guest:I know I'm me, but I was thinking...
Guest:Just to help myself get into it and not think of myself, I was thinking, okay, Mitch, he's wrote these songs.
Guest:We had this time together.
Guest:We were a couple.
Guest:Then he went in and out of drugs and whatever, in and out of mental institutes.
Guest:And then they make a movie of him and us and our lives.
Guest:And now he's on the Oscars.
Guest:And I was thinking, it made me want to cry.
Marc:And that's how you walked out on stage?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Just thinking from his point of view, I was like, oh...
Marc:And it was beautiful.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:And I could cry now.
Guest:I haven't slept enough.
Marc:That's sweet.
Guest:Because otherwise, are you not nervous in front of people?
Guest:I would be out.
Guest:I could not.
Marc:Sometimes.
Marc:No, I get that.
Marc:And I can't imagine what it would be like to perform for that particular audience, especially.
Guest:There's no rougher house.
Guest:No, I couldn't imagine.
Marc:But you literally sort of gave a whole history to the moment in character.
Yeah.
Guest:But really out of self-preservation.
Marc:Yeah, but it was brilliant.
Marc:That's beautiful.
Marc:That's an amazing way to work.
Marc:Thanks for talking to me.
Guest:Aw, thank you.
Guest:Thanks so much.
Marc:That's it.
Marc:That's the conversation.
Marc:That's it.
Marc:What an amazingly wonderful woman.
Marc:The best.
Marc:One of the great comedy actresses and improvisers, Catherine O'Hara.
Marc:Just a great actress, period.
Marc:Look, folks.
Marc:That's our show.
Marc:Also go to WTFpod.com for all your WTF pod needs.
Marc:Huh?
Marc:Get the app.
Marc:Get it.
Marc:Get the free app.
Marc:Upgrade to premium.
Marc:Then you can stream over 400.
Marc:Buy some new merch.
Marc:We're going to order more of those MTV WTF shirts.
Marc:I don't even know if I talked about those.
Marc:Go look.
Marc:They're on the site.
Marc:We're getting more of them fancy mugs to Brian Jones mugs.
Marc:I sound like a pitch man.
Marc:I'll be at Bumbershoot, all right?
Marc:Sunday and Monday, or Saturday and Sunday, doing some stand-up, doing a live WTF with, who's on it?
Marc:John Wister, Scott Aukerman, Mike Vecchione, Kyle Dunnigan on the live WTF at Bumbershoot, and I'm doing a couple of comedy sets.
Guest:Oh, man.
Marc:I'm writing the show, you guys.
Marc:I'm writing the new season of Marin.
Marc:It's coming along good, man.
Marc:We just started officially today.
Marc:That being yesterday for you.
Marc:I'm tired.
Marc:It's hot here.
Marc:Met with an architect.
Marc:Wanted to buy another house.
Marc:Too expensive.
Marc:Gonna add on to this house.
Marc:It's too expensive, but I'm probably gonna do it.
Marc:Nobody says good things about the construction process.
Marc:Wow, that's a metaphor for life.
Marc:Not a positive one.
Marc:Boomer lives!
you