Famous hosts, musical guests and “Saturday Night Live” alumni turned out in full force for Sunday’s “SNL50: The Anniversary Special” tribute.
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00:00What is it like to be on the cast during this landmark year, and like, can you walk me through your week?
00:04Because I think we're curious, like, how does this all come together?
00:08Um, I mean, it's been pretty chill for me.
00:11They've just been bringing us in and out for rehearsals.
00:13The writers have had the really hard time.
00:15They've been, like, working 24 hours a day for the last, like, seven days.
00:19And it's cool. It's very much like an episode of SNL, where, like, everything's kind of still coming together to the last minute.
00:25They're rewriting stuff up to the last minute.
00:28So it's been kind of the same, but just with way more famous people and celebrities, yeah.
00:32Have you gotten any time with any of these SNL greats, like, to pick their brain at all?
00:37I played some basketball with Adam Sandler a couple days ago.
00:40That was awesome. We talked a little bit about stuff, but mostly we just hooped, you know?
00:45But that was really fun.
00:47And how is he on the court?
00:48He's crazy. He, I mean, he's, you know, he dimes you up.
00:51He's unselfish. He's an assist man.
00:53It was a lot of fun.
00:55Can you give us any sort of hint as to what we might be seeing tonight?
00:58You know, it's a lot of old sketches with the original people in those sketches,
01:03as well as some other people from different casts.
01:06It's a lot of mixing casts together to do, like, the iconic old sketches.
01:10So people are going to see a lot of stuff they love with, like, some new faces.
01:13One thing I'm asking almost everybody is,
01:16do you have a sketch that did not make it to air that you're still angry about?
01:21Yeah, I have a few.
01:23I'm trying to think of one that would be appropriate.
01:25Most of them don't get on because they're like, we can't do that.
01:28That's wildly inappropriate.
01:31I wrote a lot with Beck Bennett, where it would kill at the table and then would not get picked.
01:37So any of my sketches with Beck that didn't get picked would be my choice.
01:42One of the things that's deep in SNL lore is dealing with the censorship woman.
01:47Have you had any notable run-ins with that?
01:50I did. I did a sketch my first year when I was a writer that had a phallic joke in it.
01:59And it got a big laugh, but then she came storming in through the doors and was like,
02:04we can't do that. And we were like, OK, OK, OK.
02:07But she's great. She does a great job, but you can't get anything by her.
02:11She's she's sharp. Yeah.
02:12Is there something that you didn't think would work that ended up being a big triumph that you were surprised by?
02:18I mean, really, any of my, you know, we did a sketch when I was a writer with Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett
02:26called Del Taco Shoot. That was a very goofy, very weird, very wacky idea.
02:32And it killed. And I was very surprised that it killed as hard as it did.
02:36But it's one of my favorites. Who's been like during your tenure, the most surprisingly great host?
02:43Surprisingly great.
02:45You know, I think any time like a really serious actor comes in who's maybe not necessarily known for comedy,
02:51they usually are really great. So like Austin Butler was really great.
02:56Ryan Gosling, who now is obviously very funny, but he's Adam Driver.
03:02I think Adam Driver is one of the best hosts we've ever had.
03:06But you wouldn't necessarily think of comedy with him, but he crushes it every time.
03:10Is there a piece of advice that you've gotten from Lorne Michaels that you cherish or that you've taken like throughout the years?
03:17You know, he does a really good job of relaxing you and like lowering the stakes kind of.
03:23I think on camera he kind of has always just told me to like breathe, relax, just be yourself.
03:28He's very much encourages you to like just be you out there and don't feel like you have to overperform,
03:36like be charming and be yourself is kind of the thing he always says.
03:39And he's right. People also can say that Lorne can sometimes be brutal when things bomb.
03:45Do you have like any like the funniest note you've gotten from him or one of those types of moments?
03:49I wrote a sketch with Will Steven, who is a writer on the show, and it bombed.
03:54It did terrible. And we were like under the bleachers watching it with Lorne.
03:59And the sketch ended, got no laughs. And Lorne just turned to us slowly and went.
04:03The problem is there just aren't any funny jokes. And we were like, OK, yeah, that is bad.
04:09We do need some funny jokes in there.
04:11What does he think of everybody? Everybody who's ever worked on the show has an impression of him.
04:14Like what is what does he think of that?
04:17I don't know. And sometimes I do it pretty cavalierly and I worry that he is like silently resenting me for doing it.
04:24But I feel like he's got to like it. Everybody does one. He's got to like it.
04:27Who do you think does the best Lorne?
04:30My buddy James Austin Johnson does a pretty good one.
04:32But the one that Bill Hader does where it's like Lorne talking about serial killers is pretty great.
04:37Yeah. My last question, if you could plop yourself into any classic SNL sketch, what would you put yourself in?
04:46Oh, I mean, any Will Forte sketch.
04:49I'm a huge Will Forte fan. Maybe potato chip or the Falconer.
04:53Any of those. I would love to have gotten to work with Will Forte.