This episode is brought to you by Airbnb. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much@airbnb.com. Host hey, everybody. Welcome to episode two. And I gotta be honest, this is a huge turning point episode because we're gonna talk about the first digital short that aired. It is Dane Cook. James Blunt, the 7th episode of your first season. Gentlemen, let's talk about lettuce. It's the Lonely island and Seth Meyer's podcast.

Let us talk about lettuce.

Thank you for giving the host and the musical gifts a lot of memories.

We can talk about the fact that Dane Cook managed the rarest of feats he hosted twice in a calendar year.

Oh, my God.

Whoa.

Yeah. Yeah.

Back to back seasons, I think.

Topped only by Mulaney, who hosted every episode the last three seasons.

Yeah.

There haven't been two episodes he hasn't hosted since he hosted his first.

He's basically the newest Eddie Murphy. That's what everybody says. Yeah.

So, guys, before we get to lettuce, you guys, of course, wrote other sketches that week that did not air or even make it to dress.

I immediately wanna talk about the James Blunt musical before we talk about that.

I don't think James Blunt musical was written this episode. I mean, obviously you wouldn't have written it when James Blunt was there, would you have?

Yeah, I think it was written after. You're right.

The kernel of the idea.

Yes. In case you're wondering, James Blunt, when he was a musical guest, December 3, 2005, did sing you're beautiful.

Hell, yeah.

He gave the people what they wanted.

Which later inspired the James Blunt space.

Musical sketch that did not get picked.

How far did James Blunt's space musical go? You brought it to the table more than once.

Yeah. Well, it never got picked, but I did perform it once.

Oh, yeah.

I hosted a stand up night someplace in New York, and Carrie Brownstein came up and played it with me, and it played great.

It did play great. Do you want to explain James Blunt's space musical? There is some real acrobatics involved in the premising of it.

I feel like I do want to explain it, but that we started off this entire thing, like, immediately getting sidetracked.

Yeah. Okay, so maybe we put a pin in James Blunt space musical. And again, a lot of this podcast is going to be foreshadowing grand events.

Andy, I'm sensing the hesitancy. And is it actually because you're like, do I want to blow it on this podcast, or are you still holding on to the hope that the James Flint space musical could make it to the show one day or become a feature.

I mean, definitely has a shot at being a feature film. A bare minimum second chance theater, maybe on Seth.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, that's legit.

Before we get to it, I think maybe. And again, hopefully listeners of this podcast will take away that. I'm a huge fan of everything you guys do. I think I dug in my heels pretty hard on James Blunt musical that.

You were like, this is not gonna air on my show.

Not my show. I just thought, despite all the work you did, I just didn't quite think it was fair to mister Blunt.

You thought it was a hit piece?

I did.

Ugh.

You might feel guilty if it had aired now. And what if it was a big hit and now people remembered it more than the original song?

It is interesting because on the surface, I think it could be interpreted that way, for sure. But it wasn't born of that.

It was born of lazy writing. But, yeah, inadvertently it was born of.

Me singing I'm sucking balls to the melody.

All right, well, now you've said it. Great. All right, so now do it.

Yeah.

So I was wandering around the office after James Blunt was a musical guest, and as is my want, I was putting stupid words into a different melody. And he had played his smash you're beautiful on our song, and I was just wandering around going, I'm shaking bones. And then we reverse engineered to that. Cause I couldn't stop singing it. Like live theater, space musical. It was an ad for live theater. James Blunt, space musical about robots invading earth, taking people captive up under their ship. They don't have food up there. They force feed them ball bearings.

Ball bearings.

Ball bearings.

Right? Yeah.

This was the save.

Yes.

This was Andy coming to my office, like a real Eureka moment, telling me he had cracked, how this was no longer a song about fellatio.

I was like, we did it.

And I'm pretty sure most of the lyrics were James Blunt explaining, yes, the.

Robots came down to earth, all that. Yeah.

But then a lot of him within the body of the song, also explaining why this was not a dirty song.

Yes, exactly. There were a lot of explainers saying that when I say balls, I'm not talking about human balls. I'm talking about ball bearings, the thing that robots force the humans to eat, but they can't eat them, so they're sucking them.

And I think the most important thing to lay out here is you never thought that James Blunt would sing a song about sucking balls. This is simply that you Andy Samberg are incapable of not changing the lyrics to a popular song to be sort of ball baal or nard or wean nard or Willie.

Related.

Yeah, yeah.

And I think this is helpful for all aspiring sketch comedy writers of just like, you just need to find a logic that works, and then after that, your gold.

Yeah.

Now, we should know that over the years, Lorne became a great supporter of you guys, you know, to the point that he thought you should stay at the show forever and still be there working yourself to the bones.

But he drew the line at this one.

I mean, I think he sighed so hard, his edamame flew across the table.

Here's the thing. I don't know if this had happened yet, but there was definitely a moment where my brain broke because I was like, no matter what I put at the table, they're just not gonna pick it and say, do a short. And so I switched gears a little emotionally and mentally to I'm gonna write stuff that gets laughs at the table and makes everyone feel happy during the table read. And subsequently, there would be a lot of stuff that I would do at the table that would make everyone laugh super hard and then definitely not get.

Picked weirdly, because I think people assume the SNL table read is a joyous celebration of comedy when it's really a slog. So, strangely, you were almost like the court jester for the SNL table read. Like you weren't there for the same reason we were there. You were there to sort of cheer us up between real world, the drags.

Yes, before I crashed into deep depression working on the short one. Day later.

All right, but we're not there yet. No, we are really good at the tangents.

Look at us.

I had another one planned, but I'll let you get back to it.

Speaking of tangents, there's a digital short called the tangent. Should we talk about that?

We're going to. I think it's only a few away.

Oh, shit. We're allowed to cuss on this, right?

Yep.

Well, you just have to reverse engineer it. You didn't mean like shit?

No, no, no. I was talking about Schitt's creek.

There you go. So. Oh, cut on air. Akiva Nyorma. Do you remember Egyptian?

Yes, I remember it.

You wrote it with Liz Kakowski. I remember it went so well that you then married her.

She was so upset when it didn't air. I had to make her happy somehow. You know, it was cut for time. It made it into the rundown for air.

Oh, okay. Basically, your proposal to your beautiful wife with who you have two children. This was all because Egyptian got caught on air and you panicked because she was super bummed.

That's exactly right.

Let's do something else. What was egyptian? I have no memory of Egyptian.

It was a exercise class being, I think, led by Dane Cook, where he just kept playing walk like an Egyptian over and over and making people walk like an Egyptian. But each time he presented it, it was like it was going to be a new move that was really going to work out a different part of their body, and then it would be just walk like an Egyptian, and they would hit the pose again, and the song would come on again. And I think Chris Parnell was one of the people in the group class who really enjoyed it and thought he was getting a great workout.

I feel like that's something that would make it on.

It made it to air. It just didn't air.

Right.

Okay, well, hold on. It did not make it to air. Well, okay. I just mean it was between dress and air. What Akiva's trying to say is there's a categorization of a sketch called cut on air, which is between dress and air. It made the show, and then the show went long, and it was the last thing cut.

Correct.

But it did not air.

That's one more little notch, though.

Yes.

Yeah, you're right. The saddest way to have something not air.

Correct.

I have a question. Do you now, looking back, because I think early in your career at SNL, nothing is more gutting than getting anything cut. But when you look back, there are, like, ten things you've got on air that you wish had been cut because they were sort of dogs. Are you relieved that Egyptian was cut, or do you still. Do you wish it was out there?

I think I was even sort of relieved that night where I was like, I don't quite think this is good enough.

Okay, gotcha. Yeah, that's good honesty.

That's a real Akiva answer. I feel like.

I think, Akiva, faster than most people, realized that it was better to not have something air than to air and have it go badly.

My one from the entirety of Bestnell that I was so glad didn't air was something that I wrote with Jost as a joke called monkey business, about a kid who has to cut out the monkey business. And then he goes upstairs, and there's a bunch of monkeys working for him.

Yeah.

And I was so glad it didn't.

Air, but it went to dress.

Yeah, yeah.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say Fred was in a monkey suit.

Yes. Yeah.

Hey, do you remember this, Andy? You and Jason Sudeikis wrote an update called brokeback.

Oh, no.

We can't possibly guess what it was about.

Was it about two cowboys boning each other?

I don't know. All I have is update brokeback, but it is 2005 and it's YouTube dudes.

So I'm gonna guess the thing that's craziest maybe about that is that I wrote with Jason.

Yeah.

Sandberg and Sudeikis.

I don't think that ever happened again. We just never wrote together.

You probably blamed how brokeback went on each other.

I'm sure that's what it was.

Deep seated.

By the way, me and my wife Liz never wrote together again either.

Wow.

Is that true?

You were writing with her more, Seth? I think that's part of why, too, of just like, we had a fine time, but it was like, ah, we don't need to do that. But also, the short aired that week and then we kind of got a little momentum in a different direction.

Be honest. Is there ever a time where one of you mutters under your breath that the other one fucked up? Egyptian?

It comes up, yeah.

Okay. So now the three of you are not working on anything that week. Did you film lettuce that week or was it in the can?

Excellent question. No idea. But let me just start by saying this. We did not write lettuce. Lettuce was written by Will Forte and he had it in his back pocket and we'd have to ask him why. He knew from LA that we made short films and so he knew as he had his office right across from ours that we were looking to do another short, but we didn't have any ideas. It was a brand new thing. And he went, I have something. And he brought it to us.

This is a good time for listeners of the podcast. You know, lettuce was in the title and you all did your homework. But for those who don't want to do that, one of you please explain the premise of lettuce.

It's like a dramatic scene between two friends sitting on a stoop with sort of cliche sentimental music playing. And then they keep stopping to take huge bites out of raw heads of lettuce.

Yeah, I believe you maybe lost a loved one.

Yeah.

It's will sort of telling you each day the hurts a little bit less. And then big, real big bites of lettuce.

Yeah.

Increasingly big, I think.

Hey.

Hey.

I got your message.

I'm so sorry.

Thanks.

I just keep trying to tell myself he's in a better place, you know?

Hey, you know, it's all right to.

Feel sad, but the pain goes away.

Yeah.

I just wish there was a way to make it go away faster.

And then at the end, to really add some logic to it, as we've discussed, really helps a comedy sketch go down. It turns out to be a commercial for lettuce. Like the lettuce growers of America, I.

Believe.

Through good times and bad lettuce.

You're also forgetting there's a very nice tag that you're a part of yorm.

Oh, right. I'm walking by, eating some lettuce, I believe.

Yes.

Oh, right.

It implies that there's a universe where this isn't just two weird guys, but actually, in this version of New York.

City, the lettuce first.

Everyone casually eats lettuce.

Yeah.

It's like having a Starbucks coffee.

Yeah. Lest you think it's only like a morning food, by morning, I mean, mou are n I n g copy.

Thanks for that.

This is just what the cool kids are eating in New york City now. I should note a couple things. I think you guys probably got a lot of good feedback on lettuce.

Oh, yeah.

Lettuce did not burn the house down.

I don't remember it killing at all.

It just airing was such a huge home run for us. Just the fact that something we had shot on mini dv and edited on our little writing computer just aired on national tv.

Yes.

We truly went out and did it on our own. Like, went to the bodega, bought a few heads of lettuce, and then went and shot it.

Yeah, we borrowed a video camera from.

Maggie same way as we'd done the other one from Maggie Carey.

Maggie Carey, who was down at the.

Tribeca film school, is down in Franklin.

Yeah.

So she would go and get it from their lockup, and then we'd meet her at a train station to borrow a video camera. And then we bought whatever tapes we were using to record it.

Yoram held the boom, I held the camera.

And Lorne never reimbursed you guys for the lettuce, right? No, it cost like $20.

I'm still fucking pissed about that.

Well, it's Manhattan lettuce. I feel like people might not believe this, but it's true. You guys really were working for an iconic television show on a major television network. But we're doing this completely on your own now. It doesn't last forever.

We talked about it last week. I think a little bit. But basically we wanted to do it that way so that if it came out bad, we could just throw it away and not be embarrassed in front of everybody.

Right.

We kind of liked it.

Yeah.

While we were shooting, though, I do remember Yoram kept saying, oh, we gotta bomb the system. We're bombing the system.

I did say that a lot.

Yeah.

Just like, what? That's so weird. He's like, we're all, yeah, we're gonna.

Stick it to the suits.

And I was like, what? Just trying to get a sketch on, man.

I remember Ken among was always running down the hallway being like, they're out.

There doing their own thing again.

Yeah.

I was a big graffiti writer back in the day, though, so I was just like, anarchy. Anarchy.

Yeah.

He was like, we're like four banksies. He kept saying, it's like the four of us, but we're all four banksy. Four banksies.

That made it even more confusing. Cause then you have to figure out who are the four real banksies, right? It's not as easy as just having the one bank seat. The Lonely island and Seth Meyers podcast is supported by Airbnb. Hey, Yorm.

Yes.

I want to tell you real quick about a trip I took at an Airbnb in Pittsburgh. We got there. My family was there. You know, we love sports. My family.

You guys are nuts for sports.

The personal touches were really nice. There were old Steelers newspaper articles framed. Pirates articles framed. But also a big old picture of Mister Rogers and another big old picture of Wiz Khalifa.

That is everything. Pittsburgh. That is a black and yellow Airbnb.

And it made our visit very personal. And this is just a shout out to anybody who might be listening, thinking, hey, my home has personal touches. People who visited my town might want to stay there. You might as well just go over to Airbnb and see what your hosting opportunities are, and you can enjoy it as much as I enjoyed it, your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much@airbnb.com. Host hey, everybody, if you've been listening to this podcast, wishing there was more of me and less the lonely island. And also my brother was there. Check out family trips with the Myers brothers. My brother and I talked to celebrities about the trips they took when they were little. Go to Apple co familytrips or listen wherever you get your podcasts. Do you guys wanna go to Seth's corner for a minute?

Oh, yeah, sure.

Seth's corner.

You're all invited. Seth's corner. It's happening right now. I think it was.

So I wrote one sketch that aired school announcements and it was the drama club doing the school announcements.

That sounds familiar.

Very dramatically, I would imagine.

I wish you were the son that had fallen off that raft.

What do I have to do to make you proud?

Be a man and go to the job fair in the library this Tuesday to Thursday, t through G. This is the sort of thing I was doing. Pre update.

Yeah.

I was desperately trying to write group sketches where I would have a small part so that my face would be on television that week.

What was Fred's part in this?

I think Fred was the closer doing his one man show character.

Yeah.

Which was a bit. Fred already did that. I took part in parcel and just threw the anime sketch. And Fred was super happy about as well. But it wasn't like it was inspired writing by me.

It also didn't stop Fred from like, doing one man show jokes like 20.

More times, including when he came back and hosted. I basically wrote it for him again for his monolog.

Write his monolog.

Yeah, it was great.

Did you hear the new gossip?

Everyone was talking about Kelly and Matt West, Bedford's golden couple.

Did you hear about Kelly and Matt? What? Don't tell me you didn't hear.

You see, they were our Brad and Jennifer.

They broke up. No, I don't believe it.

It was one of those bits that when he did it, people would sort of squeal with the light in the room. I should know. The greatest all time table read, squealer. And you guys only overlapped with her for a year was Dratch.

Dratch, yeah.

Yeah.

Dratch would say ew.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. If you did a joke that was like a real bummer joke on purpose, you'd go, ew. And you knew you were doing good.

She would also sometimes go, no. So, guys, are you super psyched at that after party about the fact that lettuce has been on television?

Yes, of course.

I also feel like it's a perfect alternative to egyptian. Right. If egyptian had aired, you would have thought, well, we wrote an SNL sketch, whereas lettuce was not in any way, shape or form, including the whole process, an SNL sketch. But in a year or two, something like lettuce would feel like an SNL sketch. Because of the success of the shorts.

I think it's easy to say Kiev that you were glad didn't. In retrospect, if it had aired, you still would be psyched.

Yes.

We're so new to the show at this point. Anything we write getting on the show, especially with me actually in it on camera and speaking personally is, like, such a coup. Still, like, we came in, we got that update feature on the first episode, and we did the Jack Johnson thing, but, like, nothing's crushing. We're just there, like, trying to stay above water and get anything on and prove that we're worthy of being there still.

Yes.

That feeling didn't end for, I don't know, maybe ever.

There was a moment that we'll get to it where we were like, Lorne, you do not have to air this short. This is a bad short. Don't make us do this short. But we will build up to that.

It shifted in that way.

Yes.

There was one in particular that I begged him not to air all week, not make us do.

Do you think he aired it in the way that a dad who catches his kid smoking a cigarette makes him smoke the whole pack? You smoke the whole pack, motherfucker.

Just embarrass you on national tv so you don't do that again.

We didn't get to really talk about Seth's corner enough.

I thought, well, it's because we don't remember the sketch, so we don't have anything to say. But what I can't say nicely is that you saw Fred do something funny and put it in there. And like you said, he was probably really psyched to get it on the air. Cause he hadn't figured out how to put that character on the air. And that kind of is foreshadowing of your later thing of becoming head writer and helping everybody kind of be the best versions of themselves.

Yeah, there are a few group sketches like that that I'm super proud of. Hey, I do want to figure this out. Kevin. For those of you listening, Kevin is our producer, who every now and then I'll say, Kevin. And that means he's going to pull something for us to look at that we'll talk about next week. There's an update cut that just says, Fred Elvis.

I have no memory of that, but.

I'm super psyched to know what Fred's Elvis take was. No idea. Here's Taco Town. I feel like Taco Town had already aired. Taco Town was a very good commercial parody.

Yeah, I believe Matt Murray.

Yeah, Matt Murray.

Matt Murray wrote taco town for sure.

People still come up to me and say, taco Town. It was definitely one that hit great.

Taste all rolled into one.

Taco Town.

The new pizza crepe taco pancake chili bag only at Taco Town, Taco Town.

Did that air more than, like, any commercial?

It aired so many times, a million times. I feel like the digital shorts sort of pushed this out of habitat. But my first few years on the show, if there was a good commercial parody, it got used all the time.

Right.

Because what a short piece of film, be it a commercial parody or a digital short, allows the show to do is have two live sketches in the same act, because you can't do a live sketch into a live sketch because there aren't enough cameras. But if you do a live sketch and then you have a two minute break, they can move the cameras over to another sketch. So it was a key thing to have.

Well, also, if you have crossover of casts, they have to change.

Right.

Which is why there was sort of, like, a time restraint.

I know you care about the cast. I'm a camera guy.

You're always thinking of the crew.

Yeah, we started cutting some of them really short at one point, and I remember Lorne even coming to us pretty early, going like, you gotta give me a minute 50, please. Try to keep these, like, about a minute 50 or longer, truly, to try to make those things.

Yeah.

My last season there, when Kiv and Yoram were both kind of gone, but would come back and help sometimes. But generally speaking, I was so afraid I would just cut them down so far because I was embarrassed of all of them and hated all of my ideas. Just like, it's over, it's over.

I can't fucking do it anymore. A minute 50.

I think there's a few that last season I was there that are, like, a minute 40.

And if you go back and watch those episodes, they are super short. And the next sketch, the cast is only, like, half dressed.

They got mascara all over their face.

When Lauren's pissed.

I will say for lettuce. It played out a few dress rehearsals before it aired. You asked us if we were excited that it aired. We were excited that when we handed the tape to shoemaker and Higgins, you know, having done what they asked us to do, which is make another short, but include some cast members, and they went, okay, let's see if Lorne wants to put it in. And then we got the dress rundown and it was in there. Cause obviously, a dress, you always need more pre tapes than even you do at air. Just the fact that it was gonna play at dress was, like, a huge thing for us. We were so psyched about that. We couldn't believe something we had just shot was gonna be a dress rehearsal. And then I don't know if it was two times, three times that it did that before. One time, all of a sudden, it was on the board. When you go into Lauren's office and see what's gonna be on air, that.

One in particular, obviously, the first time, something that we had done kind of independently of the show, but with the show's approval, I mean, it's mind blowing. And it never stopped being mind blowing, of knowing that it's being watched right now by millions of people.

The other thing, as someone who, until very late at my time of the show, only wrote live sketches, even if you have a banger of live sketch that crushed a dress and you're super psyched about, you don't watch it thinking it's going to go as well as it went at dress. You're so worried that somebody will say a line differently or cut will be early or late. And it must have been so nice for you guys to go down and at least know no matter how it played, it's going to be the version of lettuce that we cut together and signed off.

That was a massive thing, too, because every time anybody would critique the show and critique live sketches in particular, I would always be like, we're cheating because we already made the timing of this, so we sort of know that it works as a comedy thing. Whereas when you're doing a live sketch, they're reading along to it going like, camera one, camera three, camera four. And if that is off by a second, you may cut to a joke before someone says the joke and then subconsciously it's slightly ruined. So, like, to have it, you know, we're cheating.

Wait, guys, I'm sorry to jump in. I feel like we might need a new song or maybe just a siren. Kevin has sent me Fred.

Elvis, this just in.

Update Elvis. Amy. At the update desk, Amy Poehler. Walk the line to film about the life of Johnny Cash. Bah, bah, bah. Paramount Pictures is developing a biopic about Elvis Presley. Here to comment is the star of the film, our own Fred Armisen.

Oh, it's a pitch he wants to star.

Yep. Fred has his guitar. Thank you, Amy. Thank you very much. Just want to give you all a little preview. Then Fred sings blue suede shoes lyrics the same.

Yep.

Amy. Wow, that's great, Fred. Congratulations.

Thanks.

I'm so excited. Can we hear one more jailhouse rock again, no parody lyrics here. What could possibly be the turn of the sketch? You're going to be awesome, Fred, are you nervous at all? Well, there is only one thing I'm worried about. The studio wants me to do it without my glasses. Amy right, because Elvis didn't wear glasses. Fred that's what the studio keeps saying. Can you do it without your glasses? Fred I think so. Amy do you want to try? Fred okay. Takes off the glasses and then has real problem finding the right cord on the guitar.

Oh, my God. So frustrating.

So it's really bad. Heartbreak hotel, really bad. And then Fred Amy, be honest with me. Could you tell the difference? And Amy says, yeah, your guitar playing was really bad. A lot of the lyrics are wrong and you seem really nervous. And then this is just some real clean writing. Fortunately, Amy, we have a lot of time to work out the kinks. When do you start shooting? Not until December 5. Monday. Is it Monday? Uh oh. There we go.

Great. And that did air or did not?

Did not air.

Did not air.

We should get that for the extra features on the Elvis movie for the DVD.

Yeah, this is a good place to.

Pitch it, you know? Cause you get screen tests and stuff. Like, I saw on Bas Luhrmann's Twitter, he put a screen test of Austin butler to show, like, how good he is. Right. And in a similar way, it'd be cool to see kind of some of the process that led to the film.

Now that you've said that, keev, I am so desperate to watch the Elvis auditions. That would be so fucking funny.

I mean, imagine getting that call.

You're like, I gotta try. What if I'm great at it? There's just so many actors being like.

Oh.

It'S such a big swing.

Also.

I want it. I know they're not gonna do it. I want it. With all the pre chit chat, like, hey, how are you? I'm good, man. I'm good. I wanna hear as much of their regular voices.

Oh, God, that is like the nightmare of Hollywood to be exposed like that.

All right, whenever you're ready. Thank you so much reading for Elvis. It's like, no, no, get out.

It would be even better if it was just ten famous Elvis's. All of them stopping and excusing themselves, like, watching it dawn on them that they're not gonna be Elvis.

Thank you for your time.

NFL life of a place kicker. I actually think I remember what this is about. And it's really a timestamp. And I kind of can't believe it was in the show.

I don't remember. I don't.

Yeah, I think a new York giant place kicker missed two field goals. Jay Feely, I think, was his name. But he missed the really easy field goal. And I think Dane Cook played him on the show. And I think it was about being on the plane when you're a place kicker.

Got it.

And Yoram, I'll say it so you don't have to because I can see you thinking it. Yeah, I bet when he missed, he didn't feel he too good.

Yeah, that feels like a joke Andy made. But we could all see Jorm's face. You guys can't. And that was definitely what he was thinking.

Yeah, deep, deep, deep down it was coming. I think it was on the way. And I was just like, I'm going to take this burden off of him.

That's really nice.

He always does.

I think this is a spivey classic sweater sketch.

Remind.

Yeah.

What happened?

Sweater sketch was Dane Cook with a really, like, giant roll neck sweater that was super itchy. And it was just Dane Cook at a party. And it was Emily Spivey, who was a brilliant writer, would find a very small thing like going to a party and a sweater you're super proud of. A guy walks in and everybody's telling him how great his sweater is and he's immediately just pawn at his neck due to how scratchy it is.

It's like it's merging with my skin, you know? Just take it off. I can't. I can't breathe. I can't breathe.

Okay, you know what?

Let me help you.

No, no, no. I'm gonna do this. Ugh, that feels good. Don't get back to that. I need to do this.

Target. Target lady. Beta target lady.

If you had on an old fashioned top hat, you'd have a hard time getting into my apartment.

That was you, Andy. Were you the target lady?

Yeah.

You ready?

Yeah.

Oh, do we have another scented can down?

Hey. Or do we have.

I can do it.

Wig is fine with it.

Approve. Baz Luhrmann's doing a target lady movie. Will you just slate. Will you just slate yourself?

Hey, Andy.

Sam.

We're greeting for target lady.

Hey. Hey, boss.

How you doing?

Yep.

Nope. Oh, and so do you live out here or. Great.

Cool. Cool.

He's not on Mike. That's why you're only hearing me. But he's here.

All right.

When I'm ready. Great, thanks.

Can you eat?

Wait, I can do it.

Do we have any more of these?

Do it, but then realize you're not gonna get it halfway through.

Okay.

Approved.

You know, I'm just gonna go. It was great seeing you guys. Thank you so much for your time and godspeed. I can't wait to see it. Truly, truly. I'll catch you on the next one.

Damn it. Fucking damn it.

On my way out.

So stupid idiot.

Wait, where did lettuce err in this rundown?

Lettuce aired early. Lettuce was act three between sweater, sketch and target.

Should we talk about why the titles are always so bland? SNL titles never want to give away the premise.

Right, because they're called that at the table read.

Yes, because you see the title before you read the sketch at the table read. So it's a table read thing, and then it constantly backfires because you're trying to figure out what sketch is which. And they have these titles that kind of don't say anything. So the rest of the week, you're always like, dad, wait, what's dad? And then you realize it's about something completely else, and what's funny is on. I think you should leave. Tim and Zach, coming from the SNL mentality, also named their things in a way so that no one knows what they are. But then we get towards the end and, like, essentially we just need to rename them something that makes sense so everyone can remember what they are.

It's a nightmare for when they do a podcast and they try to remember.

Yeah, but, like, the hot dog car sketch is called Brooks Brothers.

That's not helpful.

Now, it should be noted, when I saw lettuce on the run through, I remember turning to pull her and say, these motherfuckers are gonna be eating lettuce like it's snacks.

So you got way ahead of it.

I got it right away.

And then he'd watch the whole thing, arms crossed, kinda smug.

I mean, my classic stance.

Yeah, you did a lot of saying, like, prove it. Under your breath.

Prove it.

Can I say something else genuine about what happened with lettuce?

Yeah.

So leading up to that, for God knows what reason, rumors and murmurs of hot rod were already kind of coming down the pipe from Lorne to Andy and then from Andy to us of him just sharing, like, hey, they're sharing a feature script with me. And he was not signed on yet. And I remember Dane Cook was the other person they were really looking at to do it. And basically, there was a new regime at Paramount, and Lauren was a longtime Paramount big dog over there, and he had a bunch of comedy scripts, and they'd gone to Lauren going, hey, let's get some of your comedies going. And they'd pulled out the script for Hot Rod that was written for Will Ferrell and it was kind of like Andy was going, whoa, they are thinking about me. And we'd only been at the show for, what, two months? So it was kind of crazy. And he had just been talking about. But, like, me and Jorm had read it just as his friend to be like, oh, my God. A feature script and lettuce aired, and I went to the party afterwards, and Jimmy Miller, who is a big comedy manager who was an exec producer on the movie.

Cause he repped Will Ferrell, who it was written for, came up to me and went, why don't you just direct it? Andy will be in it and you'll direct it. And all I had done was that one short that had just aired a half hour earlier, you know, 2 hours earlier on SNL. And here he was being like, you'll direct a movie for Paramount this summer. And I was like, okay, buddy.

I was like, sure, if you say so.

And then it didn't come true for another month or two, but it was like, we were unemployed two months earlier. It was like 60 days of employment before that.

I think this is a good story because if you're listening and you ever have wondered why doesn't everything in Hollywood work all the time? Just know that someone saw lettuce and said, hey, kid.

Wild, weird, wild stuff. Remember that?

Oh, God, I do.

Yeah. Yeah.

Well, that was a bit of a taste of what's coming next. Because believe it or not, the second short you guys ever had that aired was lazy Sunday, two weeks after this, the Christmas show of your first year. I gotta be honest, that's a big one. But remember, at the end of each episode, does it make the criterion collection of digital shorts?

Yes.

We are gonna do that.

Yeah, we are gonna do that.

Lettuce.

Okay.

Yeah, it has to. It's the first one that aired.

Well, a criterion collection is for, like, completionists. So then everything gets on there.

Not everything. All right, maybe I need another.

Be more judgmental.

Does it make the best of.

It's more than a best of VHs.

Best ofs were really curated, right? Would this make it honorary lead? Because it's the first.

I think it has to.

I think it has to.

Yeah.

But if we're going in how we like to do it, I would say no.

Ooh, interesting.

If it's a curated smaller amount, I'm going to say no as well.

But are you saying that because it was written by someone else?

Is this professional jealousy?

No. Cause it doesn't get laughs as much.

Can you do Forte talking to Baz Luhrmann? And then auditioning for it'd be a.

Lot of small talk.

Hey. Hello. Nice to see everyone. I'm doing Tim Calhoun. When you're on a warm mic, it just becomes Tim Calhoun. Hey, how's it going, everybody? Will Forte here reading for Elvis. Is this good?

Yeah, but remember, you're reading for target, lady.

Oh, shit.

Do Forte for Elvis.

Forte for Elvis. I'm known to be bad at impressions. Why are you doing this to me?

Just do Larry David being Larry David and then we'll be done. Okay.

That's all I got.

There you go. All right, guys, this was our second episode.

Yeah.

This is so much fun.

It's very nice to get to just get on here and chat with you guys.

Join us next week. We'll discuss the digital short known to all as lazy Sunday. Thanks for listening. The Lonely island and Seth Meyers podcast is supported by Airbnb.