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When I was on 'SNL,' I was getting weirdly anxious about being on camera, which I had never really done before. And so my solution was just to not watch my stuff. And then I found out that other actors do it, too, and I felt less weird about it.
We hoped to get a TV show, and we almost did, but 'The State' beat us out for this MTV show. So because they were there, and 'SNL' and 'Kids in the Hall' were there, we thought, 'Let's go try to do what Python did, and instead, let's make movies.'
I'm happy because I was proud of what I did at 'SNL.' It's the only time probably in my life that I didn't have any regrets. I worked really hard. I played really nice. I threw myself into it. I committed. Beyond that, what else could I have done?
I think 'SNL' is so well-known for its musical performances, as well, and people really breaking into America through a really great performance on there. So I think me and Gotye are both really excited to be amongst such company. You know, it's great.
In my experience, 'SNL' has Lorne Michaels, who is, you know, the captain of the ship and gives the show direction and a singular focus, whereas 'MadTV' - even in my 13 episodes there - had maybe one too many cooks and was a bit more chaotic creatively.
I went to Second City, where you learned to make the other actor look good so you looked good and National Lampoon, where you had to create everything out of nothing, and SNL, where you couldn't make any mistakes, and you learned what collaboration was.
When I started at 'SNL,' I was lucky to start early. So now starting on 'Update,' I am the age when most people are when they start doing that. It feels like a different world and capacity, like starting over in another challenge. A heightened challenge.
I can apply myself to the format of 'SNL,' I can apply myself to the format of 'Conan,' but at the same time, I'm still being J. B. Smoove. I'm not changing up my style, I'm not changing up how I think, what's funny to me, my delivery, the way I carry myself.
My first 'SNL' episode was with Michael Phelps and Lil Wayne. And if you go back and watch the monologue - it was supposed to feature Barack Obama, but we couldn't get him - it was with William Shatner. But if you watch it, Guy Fieri is sitting in the front row.
I got invited to the Playboy Mansion with the Lonely Island guys after their first season on 'SNL,' and I sat in the corner drinking coffee and talking to Akiva Schaffer about what aspect ratio he was going to shoot 'Hot Rod' in. Like, that's what we talk about.
I worked at Barney's selling clothes to lonely, rich white women. Every time I would look down on myself - hating my job, hating my life - I would think, 'It's a character study. Study these people, and you'll have your SNL audition ready in, like, five minutes.'
When I'm struck by things, I want to hear more and find out more. I remember when Lana Del Rey was on 'SNL,' this supposedly disastrous performance. She's doing this pretentious torch song, and I thought, 'I don't know what she's doing, but it's really moving me.'
A lot of people think, 'Oh, you made 'SNL.' You're set. You're good.' No. All there is gigs, and you go from one gig to another. And hopefully you get a good gig, and it lasts for a while, and you get good work and people remember it, and you have good memories of it.
To be totally honest? I don't know if I'll keep doing more impressions. People told me I had a facility for it, and I was like, 'Okay, I'm the impression guy.' So you imagine the cast at 'SNL' is an A-Team, and you've got the explosives guy, and I'm the impression guy.
I think the process of 'SNL' is still pretty formal. You make an audition tape, your agent sends it in, they watch people's tapes, and then they invite people to perform at a comedy club in Los Angeles or New York. But I don't know how much actual scouting they do online.
'SNL' is one of those jobs where you are constantly reminded of how lucky you are and that you get to meet some of these people whose work you enjoy. Then you get to meet them, and they are just wonderful people. It turns out wonderfully, and you have a great conversation.
It's not like you do 'SNL' and then get handed movie roles. You work, you audition for stuff and try to get it. I think, a lot of people, it's the goal to be in movies or just to be working in general. But yeah, some of us get lucky and get some movie roles, and it's nice.
When you go into pre-production on a movie, you can spend weeks and even months working on the nuances of the animatronics on the bear head. If we were to write a sketch about an animatronic bear on 'SNL,' we'd have to come up with every aspect of the suit within 24 hours.
When you're doing a film, you're on a set and you have retakes and you have time to get it right. And on 'SNL' it's just go, go, go. If you can't read the cue cards or miss your mark, you're just left to sort of screw up. So there's a lot more pressure doing a live TV show.
Both conservatives and liberals watch 'Parks and Recreation,' and they each think the show is for them, which is really cool. 'SNL' was totally different. It was exciting because everyone was paying attention. Political humor works when people know what you're talking about.
What 'SNL' taught me that was useful on 'The Watch' was, only put in bad words if they can get a laugh - there was no need for swear words and beeps in places that weren't necessary. Those beeps should only be in there when they mean something and it's important to the joke.
I was a religious 'SNL' watcher all through middle school. I was obsessed with Molly Shannon, Ana Gasteyer, Cheri Oteri - they were on right when I found the show. Then I started watching the older episodes, and it just totally blew my mind that my dream show already existed.
I had been on this improv team at this really great improv theater. It's called iO now. It used to be called Improv Olympic. They have showcases for Lorne Michaels and other writers and people who work at 'SNL' usually about once a year, although I don't know if it always happens.
I'm lucky enough to have two different platforms to perform on - I do stand-up comedy, and I have 'SNL.' That's where I make my most controversial statements because I can explain myself and I'm in control of the microphone, as opposed to Twitter, where it's in the hands of the reader.
When you're doing comedy constantly, you're organized: you know where everything is, you know how to get out of it, you know how to stretch it. But, like, doing 'SNL,' I stopped doing spots, and then I would finally do some sets - it take me so long to, kind of, get in the rhythm of it.
A lot of the original people on 'SNL' came through Chicago - and Toronto, I'm sure - but Chicago was the center of it all. When I was there, Chris Farley - I knew him; we hung out and stuff - he went off to 'Saturday Night Live,' it was like, 'It's possible to be from here and make it.'
I was very much aiming to go into movies eventually, like a lot of 'SNL' people. But, soon after I arrived, all these really good actors started, like Fred Armisen, Bill Hader, Jason Sudeikis and Andy Samberg, and I thought, 'If I were casting a movie, I would put all of them in it over me.'
If I had the gift of Jerry Seinfeld, of Bill Cosby, of Lewis Black, these instinctively brilliant comic minds, then you go that route! But you gotta know your limitations. I'm more of an actor, more of a process guy. I did Tom Snyder, just as Danny Aykroyd did on 'SNL.' I did it in the club.
My specialty at 'SNL' was doing triage. There was always a great need for someone to say, 'Make this funnier. Give me an ending for this. What's a better big laugh for this towards the end? What's a better physical joke in this?' And I just really, over time, honed that specific thing so well.
I had this dream in my head of, if I got hired by 'SNL, what that moment would be like. And I dreamed that I would, like, collapse on the sidewalk and cry to the heavens. I got this call, and it didn't happen naturally. But I did it anyway because I wanted to have that moment. So I did collapse.
My first year on 'SNL', I made $90,000 dollars. And I bought a red Corvette for $45,000 dollars. I'm thinking, 'I've got 45 grand left!' Taxes didn't even come into my equation. At the end of the first year of making 90 grand I was 25, 30 in the hole. We live in this baller, spend-money culture.
One of the problems with 'SNL' is that, if you tried to adlib, the director would put you off camera and off the mic, so only you would know that you ever did it. The director always directed to the script; he wasn't listening to what you were doing. He was calling shots whilst looking at the page.
Everything related to 'SNL,' that was very sudden - from the time I found out I was joining the cast to the time I could read on a blog that someone watching the show thinks I'm fat, that was about 30 days. That blog part, that could've moved a little more slowly. But hey - it's all material, right?
It was weird that most people knew me as someone let go from 'SNL.' I had the best time there, and in retrospect, it was the perfect amount of time. The only thing that matters is what you do with yourself in that moment after. If you decide, 'I'm the girl who was fired from 'SNL,' you're just that.
A lot of the motivation for doing the 'Make 'Em Laugh' on SNL was because I had just finished shooting 'Inception,' where there were zero-gravity scenes and I got into really good shape and was training and did all these stunts. Coming off of that, that instilled me with the confidence to do 'Make 'Em Laugh.'
I was Obi-Wan multiple years in a row. Alec Guinness' Obi-Wan. I was a Dalmatian once because I loved '101 Dalmatians,' and I think I was a Care Bear once and maybe a Spartan cheerleader from the 'SNL' skit. I'm terrible with Halloween, because I come up with these elaborate costumes and never follow through.
I just felt like actors - I watched a lot of 'SNL,' and those guys just seemed like they were superheroes - that that wasn't a reality for anyone other than people with superhuman strength. So, I mean, I acted a little bit in high school, but the idea of doing it professionally was just never really an option.
I came from the Groundlings Theatre in L.A., and there, you're guaranteed to at least try something out in front of an audience. At 'SNL,' only the best stuff gets picked, and it's taught me a very defined language of comedy. You learn the structure of a joke, which is not something I was very good at beforehand.
Getting on 'SNL' wasn't just about getting cast. I had written all this stuff in my audition, and I wrote several things that got on the air. But to me, I've never been interested in being picked. So when I do get sent things, most of the time I do pass on them because it doesn't feel like it would be fulfilling.
I'm crazy lucky. I was trying to be a filmmaker. I was doing Second City classes as a way to be creative. I was a PA for a long time. I was working as an assistant editor on 'Iron Chef America' when I got 'SNL.' It was one of those situations where you're concentrating in one thing and the peripheral thing popped.
I started 'SNL,' and I became the one who did impressions. I did that, but then I wanted to get an original character on, and that took a long time to get one on that stuck. And then I got Vinny Vedecci on - 'Oh great' - and then it took a couple more seasons to get Greg the Alien on. You have to have some patience.
A whole generation of people that didn't know me from 'SNL' recognize me from 'Weeds' now. People recognize me once in a while and appreciate the work. It gets a little embarrassing but it's good. If you work as an accountant, you don't have people coming up to you in the streets saying, 'Hey, great job on tax statements!'
When I was in high school I was a really huge 'SNL' fan. I remember the cast around the time I started watching it - Will Ferrell, Ana Gasteyer, Molly Shannon, Cheri O'Teri, Tracy Morgan. I did research to find out how people got on the show. Their bios always said they came from an improv team, so I started taking classes.
For my first show at 'SNL', I wrote a Bill Clinton sketch, and during our read-through, it wasn't getting any laughs. This weight of embarrassment came over me, and I felt like I was sweating from my spine out. But I realized, 'Okay, that happened, and I did not die.' You've got to experience failure to understand that you can survive it.
I had a lot of bad jobs but the one big internship I had is I interned for 'SNL' when I was 21 years old and that was the joke. You intern there and you think man, I'm going to be with the writers and the great comedians. Then you're getting everybody sandwiches and then the doors close and then all the great creatives are doing the work.
The only show I ever really wanted to do was 'SNL.' It was some sort of merging of my talent and my metabolism. It suited who I am and what I do really well, though whatever I was thinking it was, it kept mutating and growing. At first, I didn't even know that the cast would be the thing everybody talked about. We thought it would be the hosts.
I knew that people were going to talk about it, I knew it was embarrassing, and I knew it was a big deal. But did I think that it was going to be this thing that followed me for, you know, the next years to come? I guarantee you, 25 years from now, I'll be known as the girl that lip synced on 'SNL.' But, you know, it was a weird thing. Not fun.