John Mulaney Talks to Ted Danson About “Saturday Night Live”

Team Coco is excited to bring you a new season of “Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson (Sometimes)”! In this clip, Ted sits down with the one and only John Mulaney to talk about his time on “Saturday Night Live,” John’s Netflix talk show “Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney,” parenting, and more. To listen to the rest of John’s episode along with conversations with other guests like Sarah Silverman, Fred Armisen, Ed Helms, Andy Richter, and more, head over to “Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson (Sometimes)” now!

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Hey, Conan here with some news that's hot off the presses. Our Team Coco podcast, where everybody knows your name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson, sometimes, is back for a brand new season. This season, listen as Ted and Woody, when we can find him, have some great conversations with people like John Mulaney, Sarah Silverman, Fred Armisen, and more. Their first episode with John Mulaney is out right now. Here's a sneak peek.

• 0:22Speaker 01

  You came out of Saturday Night Live without PTSD, right? I mean, because some of your compatriots do. Some of it's, it's hard.

• 0:33Speaker 00

  Oh, it's very hard, yeah.

• 0:34Speaker 01

  And it's very competitive, yes? To get your material up and on.

• 0:38Speaker 00

  It's competitive with yourself and with the gods of show business. And I don't even mean the gods that run the show. I mean, the sort of larger, just is something playing or not? But I recognize, I had a very good experience there. I just liked having a boss. I liked fitting into a hierarchy. I like, um, I kind of like, what would be a good word? Bizarre, strong-willed people. I get a kick out of them. I liked working with some of these guys that the show had been there since 76 and were 90 years old and were just crazy and mean. I mean, really, like, I just got a kick.

• 1:23Speaker 01

  You're not offended?

• 1:24Speaker 00

  No, I delighted in it.

• 1:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's great.

• 1:26Speaker 00

  I don't want to name names, but so many of them are dead. But, uh, but there were just people go, you know, I remember Phil Himes, our lighting designer, uh, had started on NBC Radio during World War II, as did Don Pardo. And we were doing a sketch where Fred was playing Obama and it was like a, at one point, he gets up in the Oval Office, Fred, and he looks out the window. So we kind of needed a special treatment, I thought, of lighting on the Oval Office windows, so they were, uh, non-reflective or something. And I'm explaining this to Phil Himes and he stares at me and he goes, "I fucking lit John F. Kennedy in the White House." And I'm like 25 going, can you do this thing where the windows don't shine?

• 2:11Speaker 01

  Yeah. The 50th anniversary was great. I know.

• 2:13Speaker 00

  It was really cool.

• 2:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, really. It was.

• 2:15Speaker 00

  So many new pieces, too.

• 2:16Speaker 01

  Spectacular.

• 2:17Speaker 00

  I liked it. It wasn't just like clip packages, a lot of performance and stuff.

• 2:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was really good. How long were you on that, working on that?

• 2:25Speaker 00

  Um, in conversations for weeks leading up to it, but nothing got done. And then we all flew in around

• 2:34Speaker 00

  the Monday or Tuesday before, and then it really ramped up. But leading up to it was funny because you just knew that Lorne was, you just knew he was waiting just long enough that it got really scared.

• 2:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:48Speaker 00

  Yeah. It was, because we saw it coming for so many years, you had to make it

• 2:53Speaker 01

  Right.

• 2:53Speaker 00

  disorganized in some ways so that it could all come together by the broadcast.

• 2:57Speaker 01

  Were people pissed off or did they like the, um, the scripted show about Saturday Night Live?

• 3:04Speaker 00

  Oh, the Jason Reitman one?

• 3:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:06Speaker 00

  Um, no, I didn't hear anyone was pissed off. I did get a physical, though. Um, at UCLA Hospital. And I get all this blood work done, prostate. Um, they checked my liver.

• 3:19Speaker 01

  Everything good?

• 3:20Speaker 00

  Everything good. The doctor, knowing a little of my history, goes, I don't know how this is possible, but you have the liver of a 12-year-old. I was thrilled. That's really what you want in your organs, is 12.

• 3:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:31Speaker 00

  Yeah, because they've lived a little life.

• 3:33Speaker 01

  But they've got some more miles.

• 3:35Speaker 00

  Some more miles. So then we're finishing up the physical and he goes, I saw that movie Saturday Night, uh, so I have a real appreciation of what your career's been like. And I said, oh, well, you know, that movie's not that accurate. And he goes, uh, because I know Jason, he wouldn't make stuff up. And I go, yeah, but, um, I'm telling you, I'm telling you, some of it's embellished, but that's okay because it's for a movie. And he goes, from what I'm hearing, it's very accurate. And I go, sir, I don't, doctor, I don't want to have this conversation anymore. I'm trusting you with a lot of my blood.

• 4:06Conan O'Brien?

  Okay, head over to where everybody knows your name to listen to the rest of John and Ted's conversation now. And be sure to subscribe and follow wherever you get your podcasts.