For 15 minutes on Friday night I thought “80’s Letterman” had returned in the form of John Mulaney.
Everybody’s in LA was a vibe for those 15 minutes. Mulaney was comfortable, funny, looked good with his hair grown out, and the whole thing had a“homemade” feel the way Letterman did when he still had the brown set and we’d get a lot of Larry “Bud” Merman and Chris Elliot. Good monologue, nice “desk piece” (although he stood up) and a promising Melmanesque set-up where he had sent someone out to look for coyotes.
The first guests were Jerry Seinfeld, and an LA Coyote expert who came out as a pair.
Two guests? Different. Quirky.
Coyote Guy held his own (with Seinfeld and Mulaney, no small feat) and Jerry made light of the awkwardness of the gimmick. Great stuff. Sign Mulaney up and let’s do this four nights a week.
Then, an unforced error.
Someone thought it was a good idea to take phone calls. Remember this, students: Civilians cannot tell a story.
Any producer (well any producer expect apparently one) knows not to take live calls. My best guess is that maybe a generation of producers has grown up in an era of not listening to talk radio, only listening to podcasts, and they don’t know that most callers are terrible.
Anyway, you had JERRY SEINFELD SITTING THERE and they took a phone call.
When I teach hosts how to handle guests I will often reference Johnny Carson. If you have a great guest then just stay out of our way. I forget who I am stealing this next point from but the adage is that Johnny would let his guests shine - say Burt Reynolds, world class movie star and not a random caller - Burt would tell a story and the next day everyone would talk about how funny “Carson” was.
There was zero chance of a caller being funnier than Jerry. The math held. She wasn’t. Her story meandered. Jerry tried. Jerry won’t be there most nights. Don’t take calls John.
Does Conan O’Brien find a way to get laughs from civilians on his podcast. Yes.
Does he do it when Jerry Seinfeld is there. Of course not.
(I have noticed, that as of late, Conan’s producer does have an issue that nobody in the room is noticing that Sona is laughing too much to the point of drowning out the conversation and they need to dial her in, but they have a $100,000,000 deal and I am wiring a substack so what do I know? It’s not like I’m in charge of SiriusXM’s comedy programming.)
Just let Jerry do his thing.
Finally they got rid of the caller and then…somehow, someway, made a bigger mistake.
A pre-taped package where John and some comedians (Earthquake, Stavros Halkias you might be like, who?, Natasha Legerro and Chelsea Peretti) did some sort of house hunting thing which wasn’t funny at all. At all. Not at all. I cannot believe it made it to air to the degree I wrote cannot instead of can’t. It was so bad I walked away and started talking to my wife!
When I got back to my couch, Jerry was gone from Mulaney’s couch.
The next guest was Ray-J who wasn’t strong enough to save the show and had zero chemistry with Mulaney.
YOU HAD JERRY SEINFELD. WHY DID YOU DISMISS JERRY SEINFELD?
This thing spiraled down fast. I bailed at 10:35 having gone from all-in to all-out. From “this is the next Letterman” to “I don’t even want to finish this, let’s see what’s on Youtube.”
Towards the open, Mulaney said no matter what, they would only do six of these The rumor is that this is a tryout for a Netflix “Late Night show” and if it is, it actually is very promising despite my previous many paragraphs. There’s Next Letterman in there, it just needs a producer who knows how to get it there. Start with maybe talking to Jerry Seinfeld.
Monday’s lineup is Jon Stewart, Gabriel Iglesias and Mae Martin. Remember the Johnny Carson lesson.
I was blown away by how much I loved Jerry Seinfeld’s Unfrosted. It’s a fun, funny, breezy campy romp. I like a movie that knows what it is, and this knows that it is having a good time for the sake of a good time.
I was prepared for the worst, having read some reviews like “worst movie of the decade” but nope - it’s really fun. Maybe consider “Weird” (Al Yankovic) as a comp.
As you watch you’ll be playing the “who is that” game as you sort of recognize people (along side a ton of no-doubters). There are even a pair of cameos (non-spoiler) that I absolutely loved.
My personal favorite is Hugh Grant who chews scenery like Ricardo Montalban in Star Trek II/
Absolute fun for fun sake. Turn your brain off and enjoy the hour 36. (Perfect movie length Jerry!)
High recommend despite the reviews you might be seeing. I’ll get into this on Tuesday’s Daily Comedy News podcast as I had to pretape Monday to accommodate my travel schedule.
And now, an opportunity for Mulaney’s producer to get back to me. It’s time to Spot The Typo. Remember, no matter how many times I proofread this, I will notice a typo 5 minutes after sending it out. Whoever spots the most typos by the end of the year wins.
John McDermott ran Sirius (and then SiriusXM) Comedy for ten years. He’s never produced a live television show and has never met Conan O’Brien although he went to see his Late Night show once. These days you’ll find him in his basement recording Daily Comedy News while John Mulaney dates Olivia Munn.