"Right now on "Close Up With 'The Hollywood Reporter'"..." "We're with seven hilarious actors who kept us laughing all year long." "For me, laughter wasn't merely laughter, but it was a teaching instrument." "I'm like, just leave your (bleep) funny face at home." "Give me real tension, give me something honest." "Right." "I would love someone to watch a "Key  Peele" sketch and go," ""I don't get this at all."" "Ha!" "His Hollywood stories are all alike." ""And I look in there, and it's Lucille Ball!"" "(laughter)" "My stories are like, "And then I look in there, and it's Mario Lopez!" (laughter)" "(Lacey) Anthony Anderson, "Black-ish"." "Aziz Ansari, "Master of None"." "Keegan-Michael Key, "Key  Peele"." "Tony Hale, "Veep"." "Jeffrey Tambor, "Transparent"." "Jerrod Carmichael, "The Carmichael Show"." "Rob Lowe, "The Grinder"." "♪♪" "Welcome to "Close Up With 'The Hollywood Reporter'"." "I'm your host, Lacey Rose, Television Editor." "Let's jump right in." "Jeffrey, Aziz." "I want to talk about the sort of-- the responsibility of representation, and you guys are both playing lead characters who aren't particularly well represented on television." "And I'm curious what kind of responsibility that comes with, as-- as actors, as creators, in your case." "You know what's interesting, is when we were doing the show," "I never really thought about this stuff." "What's interesting about the show coming out on Netflix is, like, everyone watched every episode in one weekend, and this reaction was, like, "Oh, my God," ""I've never seen Indian people or Asian people" ""or African-American lesbian woman," ""uh, I've never seen these people depicted in this way," ""like, normal people," and not, like, I don't know," "I think a lot of times, if you see an Indian guy or an Asian guy, they're fitting into certain tropes, and you never see, like, an Asian guy who's capable with women or anything like that." "I heard this thing that Lee Daniels said one time, in, I think it was probably one of these kind of things, where he said something about white writers writing for black performers" "(Lacey) At this roundtable-- he didn't like it." "And how it was insulting." "And I was like, wow, I've never really thought about that, and a lot of times, when people write for Indian actors or Asian actors, or anybody, someone different, it is insulting," "'cause they have a certain, uh, view of," ""Oh, this is how that person can help our plot."" "You know, I mean, the most basic thing, to be like," ""Oh, this Indian guy, let's put him in the cab or in the mart,"" "like, "Let's not make him the guy" ""who's this woman's love interest or something like that," ""Let's get the white guy for that, of course," you know?" "Of course." "What's wrong with "Short Circuit 2"?" "They got a white guy to play an Indian guy." "What the-- The robot movie?" "With Johnny 5?" "Wait, you don't know this?" "Wait, which Indian guy are you talking about?" "Dude!" "That guy's a white guy." "The robot or the Indian?" "The Indian guy is a white guy." "That's Fisher Stevens." "They used brown face makeup." "Wait, what?" "Yeah!" "They got a real robot and a fake Indian." "So I think, with our show, it worked out in this great way where we were just being true to ourselves and writing things that were just very true to us and I really believe the idea that the most personal things end up being the most universal." "The more personal you get, the more universal everything becomes." "Yeah, it feels like it should work the other way around, but that's how it works." "Because, I mean, you know, as cliché as it sounds, it's like," ""Oh, oh, we do all have the same experiences" "Yes." "And it may not be in the same context, but it's all the same experience." "And that's not even just political stuff, like, there is relationship stuff we did where I took very, very specific things and people were like..." ""Why did you do that?"" "Yeah, yeah." ""You shouldn't have put that in there."" ""That got a little too real." ""I got into a fight with my girlfriend because of that scene."" "Jeffrey, what about you?" "Is there the responsibility that comes with that?" "And how does that sort of manifest itself in you, and in your process?" "Jill Soloway changed my life." "I mean, she just handed me this role of Maura Pfefferman and I'm a cisgender male actor essaying this role, so it's a great privilege and a huge responsibility, that even in the third season," "just keeps tapping at me every day, and my motto is "Do it right," and it weighs on me." "It really weighs on me." "I mean, it just goes on." "I'm having these conversations on the set in terms of Maura talking, and I'm having these conversations in life!" "And people are coming up to me, and I remember a gentleman coming up to me on the plane and he was all xenia'd and cufflinked and coiffed and shoed and everything like that, and he went like that to me and I went, "Oh, so here it comes." "Here it comes."" "And he came up to me and he went like that, and he put his hand in mine and he said," ""You." ""Thank you for introducing me to a subject I had no knowledge of."" "And I went, "Well, there's the revolution."" "And I've had the other conversation, where I say, "You can't say that word."" ""You can't talk like that."" "And so, my life has changed." "Do you plan on getting breasts?" "Two, please." "Do you plan on undergoing gender reassignment surgery?" "I'm gonna have to get back to you on that one." "Mrs. Pfefferman, do yourself a favor and get to know your body." "What I think is interesting is that for me, laughter wasn't merely laughter, but it was a teaching instrument, and in the laughter and beyond the laughter, you can change." "Yep." "So Rob, I mean, to Aziz's point about sort of opportunities not perhaps being open, you've been vocal about, sort of earlier in your career, doors not opening because you were the sort of quote-unquote," "sort of "pretty boy"." "Oh, yeah-- What do they" "The list is actually kind of long." "Rob, can we switch problems?" "(laughter)" "They don't" "They didn't want me playing, like, cops or detect-- whatever it is." "They just kept wanting you to play leading men, love interests..." "Yeah!" "That's boring, that gets boring!" "That's right, that gets boring, yeah." "Well, you know, what's the interesting thing is, whenever we did" "We did an episode of our show called "Old People,"" "and the whole episode," "I'm pretty much hanging out with this woman who is my girlfriend in the show's grandmother, and I was talking to this actress, and she was telling me, like, she was like, "This is so great," ""I'm so excited to do this part," ""'cause normally, when I get stuff, it's old people parts," and I'm like, "What is that?"" "And she's like, "Oh, you know, I'm like, falling down," "I'm a rapping granny" "I'm a rapping granny!" "Everyone has their thing, everyone has" "Everybody has it." "No matter who you are, everyone" "You get pigeonholed somehow." "Yes, someone's like, "Well, I'm used to seeing, you know, whether it's Rob," ""I'm used to seeing him do these kind of things."" "If you're someone older, "I'm used to seeing this."" "If you're a minority, "Okay, this, this, this,"" "so I feel like everyone does have those things, and I don't mean to kid your-- what you were saying." "When did that" "I mean, when in your career did that change?" "And is, is "The Grinder" a role that you previously wouldn't have been able to have?" "I mean, I think, 'cause, I mean, I" "There's lots great standups here, and a lot of people who are way more well-versed in comedy than I am, and who have been way more well-versed longer than I am." "I come to it as, from being a dramatic actor, so I have more of a focus, because I'm transitioning to that, to being funny." "Like, like, on "The Grinder," we gotta be funny, and that was new for me." "It started probably when I started teaming up with Mike Myers and Farley and Spade and all those things, that's probably where it started to happen for me." "But what makes you good in comedy is, it is dramatic." "It is" "It's tension that needs to be broken and you have to be able to create that tension in order to let the air out." "And so, coming from a dramatic background is so beneficial to comedy." "I'm always" " I'm like, leave your (bleep) funny face at home." "Give me real tension, give me something honest." "Steve Carell has a quote," ""An actor in a comedy shouldn't be aware that they're in a comedy." "Correct, right." "And that's so honest, like, "Why are you smiling?"" "Right, right." "This should be the most serious thing that's happening in your life right now, and it" "The situation can be funny, and it can be funny because you maybe said, like, a very serious, perhaps absurd thing in that moment, but it has to be real." "(Rob) We do" ""The Grinder" opens every episode with an episode of the fake show, "The Grinder,"" "and there are times, I'm telling you, it looks like it's "Scandal"." "I mean, it's like, we're doing "Grey's Anatomy" now." "Right, right, yeah, yeah." "For sure." "And I'm definitely doing Caruso in "CSI", but for realsies." "Yeah." "And every once in a while, the network will be like," ""Will people know that it's funny?"" "I'm like, "They'll know."" "(Lacey) They got it." "They'll know." "Right, right, right." "But that's the thing, you gotta" "You gotta play-- to your point" "You gotta play for keeps." "So, you can either be the bigger person and just tell us who it is, or I will be forced to open that envelope." "All right." "You know what?" "I'll do it." "(stammering) Well, well" " Uh, uh" ""Grinder rests"?" "Yeah, you see, I, I" "You were supposed to say the name, right?" "First?" "And then open the envelope, read "Grinder rests,"" "and then be burned by that." "Yeah, that would have been better." "(shouting) Why did you destroy his office?" "!" "Who are you working with?" "!" "I just had to throw this in, though." "When I got the script of "The Grinder,"" "I couldn't believe that Fox was gonna make it on a network, because I've pitched a lot" "I think we've all pitched a lot of things-- and anywhere else, they would have said," ""We love it, this is amazing," ""This is a role you were born to play."" ""Does he have to be an actor?"" "Mm." "Right." "Without a doubt." "Right, right." "Any other network, without a doubt, would have said that." "(Lacey) Mm-hmm." ""Could he be, like, an accountant?"" "'Cause" " Well, the point is, he's an actor." "It's the whole..." "(Lacey) The entire show." "Yeah, so that was a great step." "(Jeffrey) But that is" "That is, that little rock that weighs 5,000 million pounds is moving, Mm-hm." "because guys my age are moving on, and... (laughter)" "And the kinder  are coming up, as my" "Yiddish for "kids,"" "they're coming up and they're throwin' down." "There is a guy in New York who's doing "Hamlet" as Gary Busey." "(laughter)" "I am not kidding!" "I read a review, he's doing it as Gary Busey would play "Hamlet"." "(Lacey) I love it!" "What's going on?" "That's the world we live in." "But it's great." "♪♪" "♪♪" "Welcome back to "Close Up With 'The Hollywood Reporter'"." "We're here with the comedic minds behind some of TV's funniest comedies." "All right, Tony, so Julia recently talked about how "Veep" has become-- given the sort of current political climate, and the sort of circus, if you will, that's going on, that "Veep" went from, at the beginning, a political satire," "to now, on some level, a somber documentary." "(laughter)" "And I'm curious, do you guys feel pressure to now amp it up?" "I mean, all of a sudden, what you guys are doing are not that crazy anymore." "Yeah, yeah." "I think that's the thing, like, if they had written what's happening in the news today, the people would come in and be like," ""Nah, it's not real enough."" "So I can just speak to the joy that I get from the show, and the joy that I get from the show is," "I think, even though I want Trump completely gone from everything, there's something about his crazy that I think is actually everywhere, but people just don't talk about it." "You know, it's like, his crazy's out there, but everybody's a work in progress." "Everybody's got some crazy." "Where are you from?" "Birmingham, Alabama." "Underrated city." "You're telling me." "You're telling me." "They call it "The Pittsburgh of the South."" "You come from a big family, do you?" "I do come from a big family, I do, I do, I do." "It's actually just me, I'm an only child." "Our show takes you behind the scenes and shows the crazy, like, you know there's a lot of these politicians, like, they put perfect, you know, they say perfect sound bites, they do what they do, but you know, behind the scenes," "they're, like, getting insecure, they're freaking out, they're trying to position themselves to get forward." "They're cussing out their assistant, whatever, you know, and it's" " I love that we just kind of show the crazy that I think is there." "I don't know." "I-I-I think Trump is completely bat (bleep), but I'm kind of like, "Yeah, well, that--"" "There's some crazy there, and I think there's some crazy other places and we just happen to highlight that a lot of times." "(Lacey) Yeah." "So Anthony, your show this season has tackled some really powerful subjects." "I think the most powerful, arguably, was the episode that tackled police brutality and what was interesting about that was, you did it through this" ""How do you have those conversations with your children?"" "And I'm curious, how the sort of-- the tone on set and what were the conversations when the cameras were off, with both the adult actors, but also, there are kids on that show," "and on some level, those conversations have to be had in that process." "You know, what's interesting," "Kenya, who's my partner in this, and who created our show, actually wrote that episode based on what was going on in Ferguson." "He has five children and he was watching the news with his younger sons, who were maybe five and seven at the time or maybe a little bit younger, and one of his sons turned to him and said, "Dad, why is everybody so angry?"" "And you know, he was forced into that conversation with-- with his child, and before that, how do you have that conversation, with-with- with your child?" "And that's what forced him to write this episode, and looking at the young actors who play Jack and Diane on our show, those were the same questions that they had, you know, because they were so innocent and so pure," "and they're only ten, ten years old, and it was like, "Well, why is this happening?"" "You know, what's going on where this-- where-- why everybody's so upset about this and we had to have real conversations with these young actors about what's going on in the world and why it is important for us to tackle these issues" "and talk about them, but you know, we pride ourselves on-- on dealing with divisive topics on our show that bring people to a table not unlike this, who have differences of opinions and, you know," "create that dialogue and hopefully, when we leave this table, we have a better understanding of who sat across from us." "Oh, is this the guy that got shot in front of the college at the traffic stop?" "No, that was Charleston." "Charleston..." "No, Charleston was the unarmed guy who got shot in the back." "Cincy was the traffic stop." "Oh yeah..." "Wait, wait, wait, then what was New York?" "Oh, New York was the unarmed guy who was selling cigarettes that got choked." "Cigarettes!" "Yeah, this is the unarmed guy who was selling DVDs that got tased 37 times." "Wow." "Is he okay?" "He got tased 37 times, so you know..." "He's not great." "Your children are older now." "Are these conversations that you had with them and how did they differ from how your character portrayed them?" "My personal children are 16 and 20." "Uh, so, but these are conversations that we've had in the past." "I mean, but you have to tackle these things head-on, you know, so your children know what they're dealing with in the society, in this world." "My daughter is a sophomore in college now, dealing with racism on her own for the very first time in her young adult life, and I've tried to insulate her, protect her, as much as I could, up until this point," "but now, she's a young woman and she has to go out in the world and fend for herself." "Yep, yep." "And she's dealing with that on her own, and I think she's dealing with it, uh, masterfully, but those are the realities in which we live." "Sure." "So you just mentioned Ferguson." ""Key  Peele" was still very much on, Sure, sure." "as those conversations were very much in the sort of zeitgeist, if you will." "How much sort of pressure did you feel or responsibility did you feel to-- to tackle and include skits about race?" "Quite a bit, actually, because I think people" "You know, you check your Twitter feed and everyone's like," ""Why isn't Luther talking about this?"" ""You know, why isn't Luther talking about that?"" "And, I have to give quite a lot of credit to my partner, who" "It's like, he's the base of the light bulb and I'm the filament, so I need him to go, "Hey, man," ""let's just keep writing our reality" ""and keep leaning into what we find comedically" ""structure-wise, is gonna work for us."" "Then our reality is going to reflect off of other people and they'll think about it, based on what we're just doing in regard to our reality." "So if you think of a sketch like, "White Person Hoodie,"" "which is really great, because Jordan, what Jordan did, is he" "He made a proactive sketch that was comedic, like" "It's fighting that didactic nature of satire sometimes." "So, "If I live in this world, what would I do to make my life easier?"" "was the question he asked himself to write that sketch, and I think that that became a mantra for us, 'cause very often, if you're a person of color, the fact that you have melanin in your skin" "makes the sketch exist on more than two or three levels." "And if those don't work, you know I'm working up that Plan B, brother." "You have a gun!" "Hell, yeah." "3-D printer, baby." "100% polyurethane." "They can't detect these mamma-jammas." "They have-- They have a" "They have a weapon, they have a weapon!" "(people shouting)" "Where you at, Terry?" "Everybody relax!" "We taking control of this plane!" "(people shouting, screaming)" "My hope down the line, 100 years from now or 200 years from now, if you're looking at an archive," "I would love someone to watch a "Key  Peele" sketch and go," ""I don't get this at all."" "(laughter)" "I would" "I'd love them to hate how stale our show is." "That's my" "My prayer for the-- for Earth, is that our show has no meaning in 200 years." "It's so interesting that people talk about," ""But you have to tackle Ferguson," "You have to do this stuff."" "We were never in a place to make topical stuff, because the show took so long to make." "And I always thought some of the most revolutionary things that we did" "So, like, we wanna do a sketch about Victor Hugo in "Les Misérables"." "So we're gonna do that sketch." "We just happen to be people of color." "We're gonna put on our powdered wigs and our cravats and do our sketch, and that should just be okay, you know what I mean?" "Uh-huh." "Let's just do that sketch, you know what I mean?" "Or these two guys" "Why do we have to justify why we have melanin?" "Right." "Now, Jerrod, obviously, you" "You've talked about sort of wanting to be that voice of challenge and you kicked off the current season of your show tackling the sort of tarnished legacy of Bill Cosby, which was a bold move and I'm curious," ""A," why you felt it was important to do, and "B," how it was received once you did, particularly in the black community where he had opened so many doors?" "The Bill Cosby episode was the same as when we did the protest episode, when we did the kale episode, we did all these things that were based on conversations and real life things that were happening." "I have an obligation as a comedian, as someone who exists in the world to just reflect those conversations, and so I just do it as honest as possible." "What's interesting, and speaking to what you were saying, is, this is one of the first times in American history where black people are able to be genuinely just human beings." "We're able to really exist in America and our conversations cannot necessarily fit into a box or be inhibited in any way." "We can argue, and we don't necessarily take one side of an argument and it's balanced and the intention of my show is to reflect that." "So when we did the Bill Cosby episode, it's like any other episode, where it's like, well, what's the honest truth?" "What are the honest feelings around this topic?" "And we just put that out there." "Just face it." "Talent is more important than morals." "More important?" "According to who?" "According to you." "The same woman who, despite many accusations, continues to listen to Michael Jackson." "Well, if she's listening to Michael Jackson," "I can go see Bill Cosby!" "Did anyone, black or white, tell you not to do it?" "Yeah, sure." "Mostly lawyers." "(laughter)" "Yeah, yeah, of course, that's the" "It was the most legal note session of, of" "Of the season!" "Right, yeah, yeah." "But it was, uh" "I mean, not doing it wasn't an option." "Mm-hmm." "We were just gonna do it." "(laughter)" "♪♪" "♪♪" "Welcome back to "Close Up With 'The Hollywood Reporter'"." "We're talking to seven comedy actors who keep us tuning in." "Who has taught you the most about being funny on screen?" "For me, it was "Saturday Night Live."" "You know, as a kid, you know, being a 13, 12-year-old kid in those first two seasons, I'd" "I'd watch that and then my mom would wake up in the morning and I would recreate everything." "She probably wanted to kill me, but everything I learned early," "I learned it from "Saturday Night Live."" "I don't know, Jack Benny, Bea Arthur." "How old are you?" "Jack Benny?" "But I" " Just-- Like, I loved watching" "Jack Benny, to the point, where, in editing," "I have to edit myself, literally just breaking the fourth wall, 'cause Jack Benny just, you know, kind of grabbed space just, like, kinda look" "And I have to stop myself from doing that, it's kind of my natural response to absurd things." "So, yeah." "What about people you've actually performed with?" "Oh, oh." "I would be remiss, of course, if I didn't say my partner, 'cause there's a lot of things I've learned from Jordan that have shown me, it" "It's interesting, he has a great way of saying," ""Hey, let's tackle this subject this way," ""but let's play" ""Let's do what we can to make sure we play characters that aren't mean," you know what I mean?" "Because I think sometimes when you're mean and you're yell" "A character's mean or yelling, they get didactic, and you go," ""All right, I get the point of the sketch!"" "Why don't you have the people livingthroughthepoint as opposed to making the point with their mouths?" "Lorne Michaels said-- said to me," ""I don't like comedy where people yell." "It reminds everyone of their childhoods."" "Well, for me, I would have to say Bernie Mac." "Working with him on a film called "Life"." "That was actually my first feature film and-- and to watch him come alive during his close-ups, and I was like, "Oh!"" ""That's what I was supposed to do when the camera was on me."  Right, right, right." ""Okay, can we-- can we-- Can we go back?" "Can I get a do-over?"" "And I was like, okay." "So I learned specificity from Bernie Mac in that instance." "I'd say, um" " I've never worked with him, I'd love to-- but Tim Conway, was a big..." "Oh, yeah?" "He would do kind of the smallest thing and it had" "He just kind of trusted these crazy circumstances he was given, so rather than push the comedy, he would just kind of sit in it and sit in the tension, and it was just funny to watch," "and actually, this guy right here," "Jeffrey on "Arrested," like, he had a" "He had kind of a" "'Cause I was very new to the business with "Arrested,"" "and Jeffrey scared the crap out of me, whatever, and still does." "(laughter)" "Um..." "No, but he-- he had a confidence to his-- to his style that was incredibly, I don't know, inspiring, just 'cause he trusted that-- his-- what he brought to the table, and it was" "it had a strength to it, so it was very fun to watch him." "Tony, do you feel like he was in his skin?" "That did-- The comedy was in his skin?" "Yeah, I felt like he was-- he was" "It wasn't-- I feel" "I mean, I've done this, too, where, with comedy, it's like, you're not so in your skin, so you're pushing, you're pushing to get the joke, you're pushing." "And Jeffrey was very in his skin," "Tim Conway seemed very in his skin, to where you" "It kind of-- you just liked to watch him 'cause there's a comfort there, you know." "(Jeffrey) You know, when I would watch him" "Now we're just gonna get "Development."" "Well, we rehearsed this-- It's going really great." "Almost word-for-word what we did" " Um..." "But we" "I remember Mitch and I, he was working, I would say," ""Where" " Where did this come from?" "Because there was an entire character that was so-- so" "And I don't know if it gets funnier with the hook," "I mean, you know, um, but you go." "Who are your...?" "Um, I would say, definitely Amy Poehler." "Not only just in terms of comedic acting, but just, as far as being a leader on set and just was our leader in so many ways, just ran that show with such class and I was always in awe of her, and stole whatever wisdom I can," "but everyone in that cast, there was just such a wide variety of different types of comedic talent, Rob included, and I feel like I just learned so much from watching all these different amazing performers and their different styles" "and it was a treat to work on that show and learn from all those people." "I'm throwing in David Allan Grier, 'cause it is" "He was, like, a hero of mine, like, working-- just growing up." "(Keegan-Michael) Me too." "It's something about Dag, there's something about him-- Yeah." "on that show." "He had an Eddie Murphy quality where you'd go," ""That person's an actor?"" "He's an actor." "He's an actor." "Right." "Yeah." "And so I'm noticing, what I'm giggling at is a sense of surprise, but a truthful surprise." "It feels-- It feels honest." "It feels honest, yeah." "It's very, very honest, and it's not just leaning into the joke." "It's really, it's personalizing it." "Yeah, yeah." "And he's amazing." "(Lacey) Oh, yes." "I have to honor somebody." "Please do." "Well, my guy was Garry." "Yeah." "You know." "I remember when he did "It's A Garry Shandling Show"" "and he broke the fourth wall and he went," ""I'm gonna go to the bathroom now." ""They're gonna play the theme song and I'll be right back," and I went "What the hell?" ""What the hell just happened here?" "And I said, "Whatever that is, it's really funny,"" "and he was very instrumental." "(Lacey) Yeah, absolutely." "I just killed the room." "(laughter)" "♪♪" "♪♪" "What's the most embarrassing thing that's happened to you as a performer?" "Well, listen, I think, this is, like, we're in a poker game and I know I've got a royal flush." "(laughter)" "He's gonna let everybody else go." "I mean, you can-- I check, I check." "You guys can talk whatever (bleep) you're gonna talk." "You got, you got the one?" "(all talking at once)" "I've never pulled this out." "I might have jacks, I might have cowboys." "Okay." "Jordan and I did a live standup show at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Silicon Valley for 12,000 people, and right beforehand, one of the comics who'd just walked off stage is like" "He had been talking to us earlier, and he's like," ""So you guys are kinda gonna just go out there and work off of each other?"" "And we're like, "Well, we're improvisers," ""that's kind of what we do." "And he's like, "God, that's terrifying," ""what you're talking about right now, but good" ""You know, hey, have a great set."" "They say, "You have 20 minutes." "20 minutes?" "20 minutes, 20 minutes." "Wow." "So Jordan looks at me and he goes, we're gonna do the" "We'll do some East-West Bowl names, say some funny football names, we'll get out there and make some observations, shibbady-doo, blah-blah-blah." "I know any performance that starts with shibbady-doo blah-blah-blah" "(laughter)" "Neither of us" "Jordan's done one standup gig in his life, right?" "I've done none, you know" "What do I" " I'm a classically trained actor." "Learn the lines, right?" "So we go on stage and Aries Spears had just left the stage." "Killing fields." "So we walk on stage, we have our-- kind of our energy, and it was the first time in my career, I was like," ""Hey, you know, one thing--"" ""Boo!"" "(gasps) Oh..." "Ooh." "And then it starts rolling back." "And it's one of those amphitheaters where there's seats and seats and seats, and then there's a rolling hill, and the night, as the night had gone on, it gotten decidedly bluer, and the comments had gotten bluer and bluer and bluer." "(Jeffrey) Oh, wow." "And I look over at Jordan." "And we always end our set when we do shows at colleges with a song that we were singing." "We're six minutes in, and I'm trying to tell the most ribald jokes I can think of, and it's just like, "Yo, yo, yo, um..."" "I got decidedly black." "I was like, "Yo, I think, you know, when you go to prison," ""and someone's trying to rape you in prison and the--"" "Nope, that didn't work." "And Jordan looks at me, goes, "Keegs, Keegs, Keegs."" "I'm like, "Hmm, yeah?" Flop sweat." ""Yeah?" and he goes, "Wanna sing a song?" "(laughter)" "We were out these seven-- Nine minutes." "We're on stage for nine minutes, we turn around, we walk off stage, and there's Jo Koy going..." "It was sublimely horrible." "All right, I did it." "I just laid-- I went all in." "That's good, that was good." "I leave my kings on the table." "Are you still good?" "You still got a good hand?" "I still think I got a royal flush." "Oh, wow." "Let's find out." "Let's go" "Let's go around." "If anyone else has one, yeah!" "I attempted, uh, standup early in my career at the Comedy Act Theater, off of Crenshaw, and it was open mic night and I went by the name "Tasty Tony, the one and only," ""if there's another, he's a phony."" "(laughter)" "That is a long name." "But no less great." "So I was there by myself." "So I'm dealing with my own insecurities." "Am I gonna be funny?" "You know, and so there were three comics that went up ahead of me, and I foolishly heckled each comic before I went up." "And I was (bleep) hysterical as a heckler." "Oh, no, no." "As a heckler, I was hysterical." "Your confidence was up, your confidence was up." "Yeah, and I got my biggest laugh as a heckler and the guy happened to call" ""Tasty Tony the one and only, up next,"" "and I was like, "Oh, should I go up?"" "You know, I was like," ""No, I've already proven that I was funny,"" "I was like, "No, no, no!" ""That's not why you came here." ""You came here to tell some jokes, Anthony."" "So I was like, "Okay," so I got up and started to walk and nobody knew who I was, you know," "I was just, you know, crazy heckler in the audience, so I get up and it's a room full of comics, and so I was persecuted as I took the walk to the stage." "Oh." "Oh... (Keegan) Oh, man..." "I get on the stage, I grab the mic," "The host of the night says, "You better be funny, (bleep)."" "Oh, no!" "And so before I could get anything out, they turned my mic off." "(gasps)" "And I was like, (bleep), I don't need a mic." "And so now, I'm going back" "This is ten seconds into me being on stage." "15 seconds into me being on stage, they shut my light off." "Oh, no!" "So now, I'm standing in darkness as everybody is throwing darts at me from the audience." "Oh, my God." "And I walk off and I go into the bathroom and I'm shaking uncontrollably." "And, uh, Guy Torry, he just happens to walk in, and he looks at me and he was like, "Hey, man."" "We have no idea who each other are." "And he says, "Hey man," ""now you know what not to do the next time you get on stage." ""Hey, but don't let that stop you."" "Oh..." "And I was like, "Okay, cool, thank you."" "I didn't get on stage again for four years after that." "Oooh!" "Oh, wow." "(Anthony) Yeah." "Unless anyone has anyone, I wanna hear" " Oh." "I, uh..." "You do, uh-oh!" "Here we go." "Here we go." "I've never told this story, but I was doing repertory theater in 1967." "It was the year of the Asian flu." "I had to pull my own curtain to walk on as the fourth baron." "(laughter)" "And I was in faux chainmail." "I don't know if I should go ahead with the story." "Oh, you've got to go now." "You gotta go now." "Asian flu, I went, "Wow, that seems a little" ""Wow, what's that?" "(gasping) Jeffrey." "Well, I better just get rid of that little gas before I go on." "So I kind of, like that." "And completely fouled myself." "(laughter)" ""Fouled myself."" "And I had to walk on..." "Gloosh, gloosh, gloosh, gloosh, gloosh, gloosh, gloosh." "And I talk to Becket, and I remember him going," ""How are you, fourth--"" "Oh!" "(laughter)" "And then I remember people in the audience going, "Oh, it's..."" "(laughter)" "But, um, it was terrible." "And burning your costume afterward is always interesting." "Uh-huh, uh-huh." "Especially hard." "All right." "How you doin'?" "Yeah, how you doin' there?" "Here's the thing." "I'm asked to open the Oscars." "The idea, in theory, was that I would sing and dance with Snow White, while Merv Griffin would then appear singing "I've Got A Lovely Bunch of Coconuts."" "And all of the old Hollywood establishment" "Roy Rogers, Dale Evans" "Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah." "would be acknowledged, and finally, Lily Tomlin would come out of a bunch of fruit." "Sounds great, right?" "Yeah." "What could go wrong?" "I'm gonna give that a chance." "We would all wanna be a part of that, right?" "Yeah!" "So, first of all, we start, and it's apparent that the old people, God bless them, can't rise or wave." "So they're just" "They're, like, just sitting at the table, so that's flat, so it begins to die," "Then the girl playing Snow White, she's been rehearsing with those placards on the seat that say, "Meryl Streep," "Tom Hanks"." "It's a placard." "Now she's got actual Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, and so she freaks and her voice goes up one whole octave Oh, God." "from what she's meant to be" "(high voice) She's up like this!" "And it's-- So I finally come out and I give her that look like "Whoa, hey."" "Like that, like, "Hey, it's me and you."" "(laughter) No Meryl." "So I start doing my bump and grind" "By the way, I'm singing "Proud Mary" with" "Tina Turner?" ""Proud Mary"?" "Yeah, yeah!" "'Cause that's what you think of when you think of me." "(laughter) Okay!" "But with lyrics adjusted to the Oscars." "Yes, of course!" "So this is the year that "Rain Man" was nominated for everything and won everything and Barry Levinson, the director, is, like" "He's, like, the biggest thing in the world, and I'm in the middle of singing, and I think, actually, I'm kinda killing it." "Right." "And I look out and Barry Levinson is doing this." "(laughter)" "And he turns to the person next to him and he goes... (mouthing)" "(laughter)" "Awful." "Oh, my God." "I'm like, "Oh, okay, that's not good." "So, I finish, I go off, I go, "I thought it was good," ""Barry Levinson didn't like it."" "And I go into the dressing room like your story, and there's this redheaded older woman in the green room." "It's the beginning of the show, so none of the celebrities are there, and she says, "Young man," ""I had no idea you were such a good singer."" "And it was Lucille Ball." "Oh, wow." "And she says, "Come sit with me." "And I sat with Lucy." "And we watched for 20 minutes of the Oscars, just the two of us." "That's what's great about hanging out with Rob," "Like his" "His Hollywood stories are all, like," ""And then I look in there, and it's Lucille Ball."" "(laughter)" "My stories are, like, "And then I look in there," ""and it's Mario Lopez!"" "(laughter)" "That's good!" "♪♪" "♪♪" "Welcome back to "Close Up With 'The Hollywood Reporter'"." "We're here with seven of the hottest comedy actors on television." "What do you wish you knew about success in this business when you were first starting out?" "And would you do anything differently, knowing what you know now?" "I was raised in a house where the napkins were," ""Don't celebrate, they'll take it away from you."" "So, uh, uh, and really, that was on" "I mean, it was, like, on the arch over the door." "(Lacey) Uh-huh." "So... (laughing) Don't celebrate!" "Any sort of success was always" "Explains so much." "Don't celebrate, they'll take it away from you!" "That was my dad's motto, you know?" "And so I've always, always, always been very, very" "I mean, I'm sure, it's, um, tricky." "It's tricky." "It is tricky." "You know, Rob's from Ohio, I'm from Michigan." "We both have this Midwestern people-pleaser ethos, right?" "And I think, I wish I had known" "The problem is, you don't have a crystal ball, right?" "So you wish you knew at the beginning, everyone at the beginning says," ""You gotta make hay while the sun is shining." "You gotta make hay."" "And then you say yes to every single thing." "What he said!" "And the problem is, there's no one" "I did a film recently," "Anna Kendrick said, she said, "No one comes to your door on a particular day and goes..." "(knocking)" "'Hey, hi, we're the famous people, here's the manual.'"" "Yep." "So you have to apprentice yourself to someone, because you don't know when to say no." "I'm still learning now when to say no, and there's this amorphous moment" "Oh, so that's where it came from when you told me no?" "(laughter)" "Is that" "I'm just curious." "Because you do know how to say no!" "Yes, Anthony." "Oh, wow..." "Yes, you do!" "(Keegan) I have learned to say it." "Can we just shut down for, like, five?" "(all talking at once)" "I'm just saying, he knows how to say no!" "He learned, he learned." "Yes, he did." "But why then?" "Why did he learn then?" "Because, like, it's, it's being able to" "And everybody says this, right?" "It's like following your heart, and you hear people say that and I go, "Oh, that's more difficult than I thought it was gonna be."" "So the thing is, I love him," "I love his work, I love Kenya," "I love Tracee, the kids are amazing." "And then my agents go," ""Don't point at us, Keegan." ""You said you wanted to do features." ""You said you wanted to get into that space." ""We're doing what you asked" ""No, no, but not" ""But Anthony's gonna be mad."" "You know what I mean?" "Uh-huh!" ""No, but this is what you said you wanted to do."" "And then it's like, be careful what you wish for." "But the weird thing is, I wish-- I wish I knew a little earlier that, okay, my heart is really in this thing." "You don't know what these are." "Don't worry about them, go for that one." "To add to that, I would say, there's something about," "I think in this business, or anywhere, it's like, you'll have value "When..."" "Mmm-mm." "Yes, yes." "Your value stays the exact same way before, however you define success, before you have success, until" "And then, after you have success." "Outside of everything, value as Tony Hale has stayed the exact same, and that's not something I think you-- you hear." "(Lacey) No." "I'll just add this, that fame is the only drug for which there is no 12-step program." "I wish I had that, uh, that internal skill" "Like, you ever see "The Devil's Advocate"?" "And you just" "Where you just see the demon?" "With Keanu Reeves?" "Yeah, of course  with Keanu Reeves." "Uh, yes, I've seen it multiple times." "(laughter)" "You know how, like, you see the demon in, like" "Not saying people-- But there's a lot of, like, disingenuous rhetoric that gets said and like, you can tell when agents are "agenting" you and you can tell when people are doing those things," "and I just wish you could kind of see, like," ""Oh, wait, oh, wait!" that took" "If you could put up a lens and go" ""Oh, he's a demon, he's a demon!"" "Yeah, there's a demon in there, run, you know, get out of there." "I was just gonna say I think the thing I've learned and still have to keep reminding myself of, even now, is that you kind of have to make your own way and for me, I felt like writing my own stuff," "especially with "Master of None,"" "like, no one would have given me a show like that." "No one would have believed I could have done that." "It would definitely have gone to some white guy, you know?" "I mean, I just don't think they would have given it to me, and I think it's easy sometimes to kind of just sit around and wait for an opportunity and wait for someone to open the door," "but I think if you look at people that have really done interesting stuff, you" "There're people that make their own doors all the time and then hopefully, something opens and I have to always remind myself of that, to always just make your own way and write your own stuff and..." "(Lacey) Sure." "You know, growing up in Compton, in the inner city, here in L.A., you know, just piggybacking on what you said about, you know, making hay while the sun is shine." "No one ever teaches you about balance." "Right." "You know, and I learned the hard way, being a husband and a father, missing out on some of those key moments in my children's life and just in my family's life, because I was so focused on getting this," "so we could have it better." "Right." "You know what I'm saying?" "But then if I get this." "This, exactly." "We'll get even better." "It never, it never, it never stops." "What you were saying, right?" "It just never ends, yeah, yeah." "Stay tuned for more from the year's best comedy actors." "♪♪" "♪♪" "Welcome back to "Close Up With 'The Hollywood Reporter'"." "We're here with seven of the hottest comedy actors on television." "The first time you got that real paycheck and felt like," ""Okay, this is-- this is happening for me,"" "what was the big splurge?" "You didn't splurge, 'cause you were worried it wasn't" "Yeah!" "Yeah!" "Oh" "Next!" "What was the thing you-- you spent that paycheck?" "What'd you buy?" "Yeah, what'd you buy?" "I just-- I was so" "I-- (laughter)" "I was just, like, store it." "It's not gonna last!" ""Under your mattress" store it?" "What are you talking about here?" "Well, I mean, 'cause it's so gig to gig, so I" "My first big gig, I was just kinda, like," "(skeptically) "I dunno..."" "Yeah, yeah." "That's an actor." "You don't know if it's gonna come again." "Yeah, yeah." "No, the moment I got the check," "I went to the bank and cashed it." "I didn't deposit it, I cashed it, and put the money in a shoebox in my closet." "In the shoebox, the shoebox!" "Nike shoebox in the top of my closet, yeah." "Yeah, 'cause you never know." "I think that I-- I was married at the time, and I think what happened is" "I went out to eat twice in one week, and I'm not answering your question accurately, because that was after three years of getting a paycheck, right?" "'Cause we were in that shoebox mentality, and then you went, "What if we just went out again today?"" "So you went out on Monday, and you went out again on Thursday!" ""And like, what if we went... (whispering) to, like, a steakhouse?"" "You know what I mean?" "It's that" "I think that was my-- that splurge was that we went out to dinner twice in one week." "I don't even think I noticed restaurants until I could begin to afford them." "Like, you only know" "I didn't even know-- Sometimes I looked up" "I was like, when did La Scala get there?" "(laughter)" "Right, right, right, right!" ""It's been here nine years!"" ""It's been there for nine years?"" "I noticed the McDonald's next door." "That's great." "I didn't even know it existed." "I knew the La Scala was next to McDonald's-- Exactly." "How peculiar that seems to me now!" "I watch ESPN's "30 for 30:" "Broke" every Sunday." "Woo!" "Every Sunday, as just a reminder" "Just a reminder!" "Just as a reminder of, let's just be cautious." "There was a long time where I didn't realize that I had money that I could spend, you know?" "I was still kind of living like a college kid or, like, a young standup, and then one afternoon," "I was hanging out with Louis CK, we had brunch together, and then he wanted me to look at something he was working on at his house, and I was like, "All right, should we grab a cab?"" "He's like, "No, no, I can drive."" "And he has this, like, nice Porsche, and we went in the Porsche on the West Side Highway, and then we went to his apartment." "He had this nice apartment-- I'm like," ""Is Louie, like, trying to (bleep) me or something?"" "I'm getting wined and dined here, this is very nice." "And then I was like why the (bleep) am I not doing this?" "I tour, I do (bleep) theaters!" "I could be doing this." "What am I doing?" "Like, he's like" "He was like, "I bought this nice, like, record player."" "And I was like, "I want to buy nice things!"" "And then, it, like, clicked in my head, I was like," "I should start spending some of this money I'm making." "I'm touring all the time and not spending any of it." "Any of it, right." "All right, Rob, do you have-- Do you remember?" "Um..." "I-I sort of second Aziz's thing." "I was doing a lot of-- a lot of work as a young, young actor and doing big leads in movies." "And then one day, I saw this agent, who I thought was an idiot, driving in front of me in this tricked-out Porsche, and I'm driving my Mazda 626 that I've had, you know" "I said, "Wait a second." ""If that (bleep) can have a Porsche..."" "Right." ""I'm on the cover of 'Tiger Beat,' (bleep)!"" "(laughter)" ""Tiger Beat"!" "Ha ha ha!" "I love it." "Well, thank you guys so much for doing this, wonderful." "Thank you." "Thank you." "♪♪"