Wally Feresten is about to begin his 35th year holding cue cards for Saturday Night Live. If that sounds like an easy job, think again—but no one has more fun doing it.
Through his company, New York City Cue Cards, Feresten leads a team of professionals who work not only SNL, but also The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and Late Night With Seth Meyers (where Feresten is a frequent on-camera presence).
But that’s not all: Like his older brother Spike, Feresten is also a writer whose credits include episodes of Space Ghost Coast to Coast and Celebrity Death Match. (Back in the day he even contributed jokes to “Weekend Update.”)
This week, in part one of a two-part episode of Inside Late Night With Mark Malkoff, Feresten peels back the curtain on his work for SNL and how he works with the show’s cast and hosts to make them comfortable reading off cue cards (even when their eyesight makes it difficult). Also: Wally schools Mark on SNL cast party etiquette, and shares what it was like to be thrown under the bus by Heather Locklear—on national TV.
Click the embed below to listen now, or find Inside Late Night on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Follow Wally Feresten on Instagram or Twitter/X and read his weekly column here on LateNighter. If you’d like your own personalized cue card written and autographed by Wally, visit cuecardsbywally.com.
Show Transcript
Mark Malkoff: Wally Feresten, thanks for joining us.
Wally Feresten: Mark, I am an avid fan of yours. I listen to your podcast. First of all, let me congratulate you on achieving the, um, first, brothers quotient of your podcast. You’ve had now two brothers on with my brother, Spike. Was he your first guest?
He was my first guest. I was really excited, and I was thinking about that, cause I almost got the Smothers Brothers on my other podcast.
Well, the first… you’ve achieved your brother’s quota for the podcast, so you’re good.
I have.
The other thing was, um, yeah, I listen to you every week. It’s great.
Oh, thank you.
You’re on my podcast list because everybody you’re interviewing are people that I’ve worked with mostly. And the Jim Pitt one was great because he was really good friends with my brother. They were like best friends. They started around the same time at SNL. So they had a lot going on. I wanted to give… real quick. And if people were curious, if they, you might have people that listen to every week, I’m sure.
Yeah, I hope so.
You guys were talking about McCartney on SNL, and I was listening to it and I was like, “Where, where can I call in? So I can tell them my memory of this,” because I have a very vivid memory of this, this happening. It’s a big memory for everybody. And I’m not saying my memory is correct, but this is how I remember it.
I just want to set this up. This is February of 93. Take it away.
Yeah. So Paul McCartney was the musical guest. He was coming on to play two Paul McCartney songs that were new songs. So. Yes, it’s Paul McCartney, but no one was really that excited. ’cause he, he was, he came in for Thursday. He did have a Thursday rehearsal and he played two new songs and they were good, but they’re not Beatles good, you know what I mean? So it was like, we were, we were like, yeah, the great Paul McCartney. No one was, not really a lot of excitement. Then between Thursday and Friday they added the, the third song. So he came in Friday night for, for an extra rehearsal to figure out that third song and what he was gonna play. And that’s when we’re all just working. And he just starts playing Beatles songs in every, the work stopped. Like, as Jim said, everyone stopped working, went out to the studio and now, Oh my God, this is Paul McCartney. This is the Paul McCartney we love. So that was just my, my, and he, you know, Jim told her very well, like what songs he played. And he, I think he messed up some lyrics to Lady Madonna or one of them. He kind of like, it was really funny and it was great. It was a great moment, but that was my memory. He had two songs. He wasn’t going to play a third. They added it. And that’s why we had that Friday rehearsal, um, at night.
When did they ever do that with a musical guest? Because Friday is, um, and Saturday is so down to the second, um, with, with rehearsals. I mean,
It’s Paul McCartney. They gave him like an hour. So it’s funny too, because so while he was waiting to rehearse, you know, we were doing sketches and stuff. He came, he’s just walking around the studio. He came back and sat in our cue card area while we’re printing cards. And we had some like candy and he started eating M&M’s from one of the bowls of candy that we had back there and just shooting the s*it with the cue card people, it was the craziest, craziest,
That was one of my favorite episodes. I remember he made a cameo in “The Mimic,” which was, uh, I think Al Franken, Christine Zander, and I’m leaving somebody out who wrote that sketch, but McCartney and then Jim Downey, um, and I think Ian Maxtone-Graham had a hand in it. They wrote the, The Chris Farley Show with McCartney, which is so brilliant. I mean, no, Franken, and, I think um, I Maybe Ian worked on that a little bit, but I know the first one I think was Jim.
So I just wanted to, I was listening when you guys were talking about it, and that memory is so vivid in my head, and I went to go text both of you guys, and I don’t have your number, I don’t have Jim Pitt’s number.
Yeah, Jim is such a great guy.
Yeah. And I don’t see him, I don’t see him enough. When I see him, I’m like, Hey, Jim. And it was like, he, like, I, you know, when I started, he was like my brother’s brother’s best friend. So we, you know, we were in the trenches together. But how do I know you, Mark? How did we meet? And when did we meet? And how are you at so many friggin SNL shows? That’s what, you know…
Okay, there’s, that’s another episode, but I’ll give you a couple, give me a little bit. I would camp out, um, when I was in high school for the show. So I’d see you around and you were very, very nice. Yeah.
Did you ever work on, on, on any of the shows that the late night shows?
Oh, I worked on Letterman. I had a day job at the Colbert Report and a day job at Letterman. Those are my two.
All right.
But, um, yeah, the other stuff is another, uh, it’s all right. It might be a…
I was just like, I just, I was thinking back, like, how, when did we meet and how do I, did you go to, did you go to cast parties? Did you go to any cast parties?
I did. I did.
I think that’s where we would chat.
That’s probably it. Yeah. I went to some of the parties and, um, you know what, I do want to point out, I mentioned this once because you know, you were there, you’ve been there since 1990 and you know, when I started going, the first couple of parties I went to were, uh, you know, when Will Ferrell got there and Cheri Oteri in ‘95, with David Koechner and Nancy Walls, Darrell Hammond and Jim Breuer were the new people that they hired. And I see, I didn’t know this. I walk in and there’s empty seats and I would just sit down and I have no idea that this is such a big deal. It really took till like maybe half the season or more. Until somebody was like, “You know what? You’re not allowed to sit down.” “I was like, what do you mean? I sit down all the time.” I remember it was Phil Hartman. Um, when he was with, um, uh, Gin Blossoms and that was like 96. And I believe this was on fifth Avenue, the after party where they’re like, you, you know, you’re not allowed to sit. I had no idea. And probably since then, that’s a thing. People that work at the show have to. You know, stand at the bar and…
You know, it was a different time, because the, you know, interns were allowed to go to the shows to the, to the parties
Pages at one point. There’s all this lore about what, what happened, why they were stopped.
Yeah, it was fun because you never really get to know the interns and how are they going to get to know, like, I would meet them at the parties cause they’d be at the bar and you would, you know, I’d chat with them. Oh, where you go to school and it’s nice. What do you want to do? And then, you know, you’d find, you know, maybe, maybe I recruit from, from that, you know, if I’m looking for somebody doing cue cards, if you’re interested in that. Yeah. What I, my memory, yeah, it was different. My memory was I never sat at tables unless like I was sitting down with a writer or one of the actors, like I’ve sat, in the older days, I would go to the party with Farley and Sandler sometimes. And they would be “Like, come over and sit with us tonight, Wally.” So I would sit with them for the whole night. And that was just a whole experience that I don’t remember a single thing we talked about, but we just laughed the entire time. It was fantastic. But I remember a group of interns sitting at a table next to Lorne, like, late in a party and just being rowdy and being jerks. And, um, I think they were promptly let go. And then that was the end of letting interns go to parties.
I’ve heard a bunch of different versions like that, but yeah, it started, I believe the pages then weren’t and then the interns, um, yeah, they saved a lot of money on those 12 dollar Amstel’s or whatever, except for the last part of the party. I love the fact that both you and your brother, um, Spike, I mean, both if you don’t, those, these aren’t your, your name’s Wally was never is not your legal name. Spike is not even. Close. I mean, you’re Chris. Yep. And your brother’s Michael?
Yep.
So funny. He gave you the nickname Wally because you kind of were, would wheeze a little bit. You had kind of, was it allergies?
I had asthma. I had allergies, but I also had asthma. I was allergic to a lot of stuff. So we shared a room, and yeah, I would wheeze when I was sick. I would wheeze at night. It would keep him up. So “Wally the Wheezer” came out, you know, older brother, older brother nicknames.
So he’s 11 months older than you and you’re in Massachusetts. You’re going to West Bridgewater High school, and then you go to Syracuse, and then you graduate, you go to L.A. for a couple years, and then you move to New York, and is this, you’re working at a golf course? Is that?
Yeah, before, so, the funny, this is a funny story, I couldn’t find a job, um, uh, you know, nothing was going on yet, I moved there, the girl I was living with is a nurse, and she was paying our rent, and stuff, but she was like saying, “You need to start working, you know, you need to start contributing.” So I, I thought I’d get a job as a bike messenger. And, uh, I was like, that’ll be fun. I’ll get into shape and, uh, you know, right around the city. It’d be fun. And I didn’t have a bike, but I went down and interviewed and I, like, they hired me and, uh, I went, my brother had a bike I knew. And I was like, Hey, can I borrow your bike? He’s like, yeah, what do you need it for? And he was like, uh, I’m going to be a bike messenger. They just, I just got hired. He was like, oh yeah, yeah, sure. Come on over and get it. So I got it on my way over to get it. He called my mother and said, “Call Wally and tell him he can’t be a bike messenger because he’s going to kill himself in the city. Don’t get off the phone until he agrees.” So he was like, here you go. Here’s the bike. And he let me ride it all the way back to my apartment on the east side. He was on the west side and I got home and my mom was on the phone and she was. In tears, don’t, don’t be a bike messenger. Your brother says, I go, wait, he told you, they just gave me his bike. No, you’re going to kill yourself. Please don’t do it. So I turned down a job. I didn’t do it. And then I got hired at a golf course like soon after. Um, yeah, I was working. I just like working in the pro shop at a golf course in Queens.
And that’s when Spike calls you and said that “They’re looking for somebody to do cue cards.” Now, this is interesting to me because Tony Mendez, when I’ve met him, when I worked at Letterman, I mean, the biggest jokester. I mean, we were in the elevator. He, he like hit every single button, like whatever. Kind of trouble to get into but then I never really I never worked with him in a work capacity like this, So at SNL, I mean he was a different person I mean, I mean you were you were for him and it was like I get that it’s like it You know an athlete or somebody, you know Lots of fun you get there and you’re in that zone and you have a job to do
Yeah, you almost have to be with, with doing cue cards. And back then I have a staff of nine or 10 on a Saturday. Now, I think we had six, maybe seven doing all the printing and doing all the holding. It wasn’t a big, it wasn’t a big staff and you have to be, you have to be rigid in, in, in, in following these things or nothing’s going to get done or, you know, it’s not going to get done in time. And he, he was really a trailblazer. He set up a lot of the rules that I still use today. But yeah, he was by the book and if he didn’t like, if the card was not printed neat, he would say, “Do it again. I’m not going to bring that out to the floor and show it to anybody.”
That’s what I think it’s so interesting because when you, when you start your, your, the writing was, um, Tony wasn’t using some of yours because they were a little bit messy, but that the thing that you had that I never really thought about is that you had… you were really, really good at, at holding your ability to hold the cards.
Yeah.
I mean, sometimes you’re holding a lot of cards and they get heavy, but you, that’s what you got before the, you were good with the printing. You, you were good. Hold with the holding.
I don’t understand why I, I, I try to think about it and maybe it was just being young and like, you know, I was, I wasn’t afraid of being on the stage and near the cameras because, you know, I’d been, I, I’d been doing plays and stuff like that and I didn’t wanna be an actor. I wanted to be a writer. But maybe the hand eye coordination of it, you know, being playing baseball and playing sports growing up, and golf, just, I took to it. It was something that I took to right away and I was good at right away and I didn’t have to practice a lot. I was just naturally good at it. And it saved my job, I think. I really think he would have fired me if I wasn’t good at holding.
I love that they gave you for your first sketch such a, um, just an iconic sketch. I mean, you have Mike Myers doing Dieter with Sprockets. I will still say, I have the screenplay somewhere. You know, he said it was flawed, but it was such a funny, uh, funny script. But Mike Myers to do, of anything. I mean, this is the season premiere, Kyle McLaughlin. um, was that Sinead O’Connor? I think it might’ve been.
No, was it?
I thought that it was, because she didn’t do Dice Clay, but I thought she came back to the, um, before. It wasn’t the Tim Robbins.
Oh, that’s that one.
But, um, I thought it was, but, you know, Kyle MacLachlan’s there and you do your first one and then that is when you’re like, okay, well, he has it. We’re going to give him more, uh, opportunities.
It was funny. I remember they gave me the first six cards of the sketch and I would never do this to anybody. It was only six cards. Like, you know, sometimes the sets don’t all match if they’re just reading the camera. Um, we’ll just do one set because, you know, he’s not looking at different cameras. So we’ll do. So I had those six cards that he went to different cameras and other cards were there. And, um, my boss, Kevin K, who was working there at the time, who was above Tony, whose, whose uncle owned the company that we worked for, um, was he was standing behind me. Like, I don’t know what he was going to do. Like, maybe if I freaked out, he was going to grab the cards for me. And I don’t know, but he, I held him. I held him. Perfect. I walked away and he was like, “I’ve never seen anything like that.” And I was like, “What?” He was like, he was like, “Your entire body was shaking, but the cards were perfectly still you flipped them perfect.” And they were perfectly still. I don’t know. I was like,
It was meant to be. Speaking of Mike Myers. You know, I, I’ve heard there are certain people. Jan Hooks was one, that were really visibly nervous before the show. Sometimes, um, you know, the most confident people on air, you, you, you can’t tell, um, who were maybe a few of the cast members that you remember being maybe the most visibly nervous.
Bill, um, Hader.
So yeah, he’s talked about that.
Talks about a lot. And he told me, and I don’t know if he’s said this in public, he, he was always terrified of, he was nervous about making mistakes and it was like that thing. So he, he, he realized that later as I don’t know what season he realized this was, he would make a little mistake on purpose at the beginning of each sketch, like maybe mispronounce one word just off a little bit, and then it would relax him because “It’s okay. It’s not going to be perfect. I made the mistake.” And now it gets like, so he would trick himself into making a little mistake. And then he’d be fine, he’d be relaxed, you know,
He was one of the best. It’s, it’s so interesting when you hear some of these people that, um, you’ve worked for Letterman and it’s common knowledge, how nervous Dave would get before the show.
Yeah.
I mean, the people that worked at the Tonight Show when he was guest hosting, I mean, it was, they could not believe how much anxiety he had. And then he went out there and you couldn’t tell. It went away, um, right away. And he was cool Dave.
Yeah. I mean, for the cast members, the repetition really works for them and, and they’re nervous, but they don’t, it doesn’t show that much because they’re, they’re doing it every week. I mean, I deal with the hosts every week and if it’s a new host, and if it’s somebody that’s not used to being on live TV, there’s a lot of nerves there. And my job is to, I’m one of the people that, you know, Higgins works on the creative side with them, calming them down and saying, “This stuff’s going to be funny. rust us. We’ll get it, you know, get it there.” Um, I’m the side of just getting gaining their trust in the cue cards and hopefully not letting them think about it too much, just going out there and performing and reading and not focusing too much on that.
The only reason I’m going to mention this host’s name is because Rob Schneider publicly said it, which was that he was over to visit the show, and that would have been probably ‘88 maybe, and Debra Winger was on, and he, um, they were just giving him a tour, and they were going to hire him as a writer, and he saw Debra Winger crying in her dressing room between dress and air. I don’t want you to name any host, but does that sometimes happen, that the anxiety is that high, that there are tears, there have been?
Yeah. I mean, I, you know, I probably, I don’t see that. I’m in, I’m in the dressing room a decent amount, but I usually don’t see that stuff. Um, um, and if something’s happening, talent department is on it fast to help, help out.
How often are you though with the host, with the cue cards for the monologue and their dressing room? How many of them want that?
It’s a thing that Higgins and I do, and the head, the writers that write the sketch. And it’s almost like a, a tradition we do it like, well, more Higgins look as like a superstition. So even if it’s a comedian, so I’ll go, we’ll go in 15 minutes before dress with the monologue cards, me, Higgins, and the writers. And 15 minutes before air, same thing. And even if it’s a comedian, that’s doing a standup routine and they don’t have even bullet points on cue cards, it just says, “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.” And then, “We have a great show for you,” the ending, we still go in and show them those two cards.
I was going to ask. So when Bill Burr goes out there, or, um, I know that Louis CK was, you know, wanted to do this entire thing, and Lorne’s like, “There’s cuts there.” And they. They made the cuts. So they, do you not have like word by word?
No, the comedians don’t use word by words. They’ll, I’ll put bullet points sometimes. It’ll just be like the first three words of a bit or, or the, or the toe of what the subject matter is. And that’s it. And they know it in their heads because they’re standup comedians. They do, they do this stuff all the time, you know?
Yeah, that, that does make sense. Um, Who was the most confident host that you remember a few that just, you know, it’s the first time hosting and you just can’t believe how, like, they’re like, let’s do this. This is going to be great. And you just, you just have that confidence. Who were some of them?
That’s a really good question. I mean, Jon Hamm comes to mind.
He was fun. I was there at the first one that he did and it was. So I said, I’ve said this. It was so surreal because the Mad Men cast was right behind me and they’re doing that Mad Men sketch, um, right there and watching them being played as…
Seth Meyers talks about it talks about a lot, like, you know, just no one had any idea that he had, you know, this sense of humor side.
He was phenomenal. Oh my goodness. He knocked it out of the park. That was Coldplay and John Hamm. And that was, um, I thought that was a phenomenal show. I remember that.
It really was. It was really was. So like he, he was like right off the bat. He was good. I’m trying to think, trying to think of somebody else that I was like, wow, these guys, these, this person’s really good. You know, Dua Lipa was pretty, was really good last, last year too. And what, what impressed me about her was she had her mom there, I think. Not a lot of other people, you know, around and. She knew everyone’s name on the crew that was helping her out. Me, the props people, the wardrobe people, she had their names down like the first day. And that, that is a talent for sure, because I’m horrible with names. And she comes in, she’s this big star, and she’s calling me Wally on Friday, and she’s calling the props person her name, and I was really, really impressed by that. I was really impressed.
That’s a talent. That’s amazing when people You know, um, who is it? Brian Stack who wrote for Conan forever, who’s now at Colbert. He’s famous for remembering people’s names, the interns and… Oh my good. Did you know Brian at all?
I do know Brian, yeah.
He was one of those people. I mean, that’s a, that’s a talent, especially when like somebody has so much going on in their head.
I know. It’s very impressive.
You know, I was talking to David Koechner and he was telling me that, and I know this has happened sometimes where, uh, Lorne will be off to the side and be like, we have to cut 45 seconds or 30 seconds off the sketch. And it’s like, you have to, they’re going to be doing it in like 10 seconds. We need to cut. How are you as a, doing the cue cards able to do that with them to cut off time during the sketch?
So, I mean, Usually we’ll know like we’re listening to the, we have a box in our area, which we’re, we’re, we’re just backstage, we’re underneath the bleachers, to let people know like we’re right, you know, as close to the floor as you can get most of the time we’ll get those cuts in the commercial break before the sketch. So I’ll have like three minutes or so. And script comes down, Claire will come down with it and it’s usually cuts. So we can do those pretty quick. If we have to do cuts and then add a line for like the cut to make, make, um, sense, that’s where it gets a little hairy. So we usually have that time. Sometimes it’ll be a minute and we’ll be on the floor already. And our guys will come out with frigging tape and pens and be like, “Well, there’s another cut, there’s another cut”. And then we have to do it right on the floor in front of the actors, which I’m sure is terrifying to them. It’s when we do it, and we can usually do it, the crowd loves it, and the actors are clapping, and um, it’s funny, Lorne, I was at a, we did that one time, where we were on the floor, it was last minute, we had to do it, we did, we did it, we made the cuts, and um, we get the cards up, like, I don’t know, maybe eight seconds before the sketch was gonna start, and Lorne said to me later, and he was like, It was great seeing you tonight on the floor and I was like, what do you mean? I’m on the floor all the time. What are you talking? He’s like no no on the floor when you’re on the floor making those cuts. He was like the audience loved that and he’s like he’s like that’s such a great part of this show When we can do that and do it. Well, so it was really cool for him to say that
That energy, you know Mikey Day, um with you were um, they had you in a video and Mikey and Streeter Seidell were in it and Mikey was saying that sometimes even like three minutes before the sketch, He’ll with the cue cards and making changes and I’m guessing Robert Smigel, I’m guessing would maybe do that. How often does that happen? I’m guessing not too much unless there’s like, uh, unless it’s like the last minute emergency and stuff. But is that common that the writers would be with the cue card people for like a minute or two?
It’s usually the timing thing, like towards the end of the show is usually when it is, or, you know, it, it’s funny, it used to happen a lot more because there was a system in place where we wouldn’t start, the script department had to bring us the changes, and they wouldn’t get to us sometimes till 11, 11:10 to make changes on the cold open. So that’s when it got really interesting, especially a long cold open. And you’re making changes and you only have 20 minutes to make them. It was crazy. So, one year, just by chance, one year, one of our, one of the crew left. This is before I started my company, so it was pre-2004, so it had to have been 2000, 2001 sometime. One of our guys left and we were like, okay, we can all do this job without that person. We think we can do it without, with seven instead of eight. So I went to, went to the owner of the company. We said, don’t hire an eighth person. We can do it. We want to split that eighth person’s salary amongst us all. So he was like, “Sure, that’s fine. Do it.” So we did that. And then I went to, went to the script department. I was like, Hey, just curious. When do you start getting changes for air? Cause you know, we don’t get them to 11, 11:10 and she’s like, “Oh, we start getting them during dress.” And I was like, “Could you send those to us and bring those down to us?” And they were like, “Yeah, I don’t see why not.” So that was just like one of those weird things that I asked about it, and they started sending them to us. And then they still come down and check them, make sure we did it right. And then the writers will check them. But we started getting the changes during dress rehearsal. Now we’re making changes during dress for the air show.
That’s so nice. I was going to mention that. I wanted to say, you know, you end at 11:30. So right after dress, take me through it. So the script supervisor will go through everything and then the writers, whoever, um, will, um, be doing that. And are you in that meeting when they’re deciding, um, when Lorne is going, id revealing what sketches are going to get in and not, or is that just relayed to you?
No, I’m not in that meeting. I’m in the, I’m in the meeting where the board comes down and we see what sketches are in the show.
It’s in Lorne’s office, right? You’re in that.
Used to be in Lorne’s office before COVID.
Oh, where is it now?
It’s in the studio.
Oh, interesting.
We all sit in the chairs on the floor. We stand around that Lorne has the board right next to him on home base. And he sits on a stool with a microphone and talks about the changes and what went wrong in every sketch and what we can fix kind of.
Wow. And then how much, uh, how much white artist tape are you using and during those? Um, because you know, you don’t want to, if you can, if you can salvage, uh, some part of the cue card, cause it’s so, um, it takes so much time. How, how often are you able to use the white tape and maybe cut stuff out and write over?
You use it, we use it all the time and I go through it, like I’ve had four boxes sitting in our area all summer long because we’re not, you know, SNL is not doing, we don’t use it a ton on Seth or, or Fallon, you know, occasionally, you know, a little when you make a mistake, you tape over it. But as soon as SNL starts, I guarantee you those four boxes will be at least cut in half. Maybe three of them will be gone after the first four shows. We use it a lot.
How often do you do the Continental cards, which are the half cards? Because, you know, when Chris Walken does that and, you know, they did the Continental, I think before you got there, maybe like a couple of them.
Yes.
You actually cut the cards. Cards in half. How often does that happen?
We cut them in fourths
Oh my goodness.
Yeah, so so we’ll use half car So so we’ll cut the regular cue card size We’ll cut in half and we’ll use that sometimes if the camera is really close if it’s a handheld camera sketch, a Mikey, Mikey and Streeter sketch where they have me, you know Mikey’s talking and if I’m following him around and stuff like that We’ll do half size cards because they’re not that close to the camera For The Continental, it was, you had to cut it into fourths. And we actually call those Continental size. We call those the Continental size, named after that sketch. We don’t, you don’t use those very often. Um, we used them for. Um, the Jimmy Fallon and Horatio sketch, the, uh, um, the one that we were on and, uh, Hampshire college. Remember that, that one?
Oh, yeah, no, I know that they did that a bunch of times.
So we would use those. Cause Jimmy, they were, Jimmy was right up to the camera. Cause it was like a, it was supposed to be on a computer kind of thing. So we, I know we used them for that, but. Very rarely somebody that close to camera that we have to do that.
So the host is in black ink and then you have everyone else gets four colors. And then if there are more people in the sketch, sometimes you double up and put their names on it. You know, I, I was, I think it was Chris Rock or Leslie Jones was saying that they did a sketch together. Think maybe I don’t know if Leslie Jones got Chris Rock’s. Like he, she got mixed up in the cards. How often does that happen?
It happens. It does. It, it does happen because sometimes, you know, I try to keep certain cast members in one color, like, you know, like Rgo, I try to always put in blue. But if she only has one or two lines in a sketch and somebody else is a blue person, I try to give, I’ll give them the sketch, you know, I’ll give them their blue color and I’ll say to Ego, “Hey, you’re in green in this,” but I’ll try to put like Ego’s name in front of it. So that does happen. But Leslie, yeah, Leslie got confused a lot with the cards.
You couldn’t, I couldn’t tell except for the one where she with Chris Rock, where they did that one sketch, it was like the ten to one sketch. And Chris, uh, Rock said it went very well and it went better in dress. And yeah, but that was a thing with her.
Yeah, it happens. You know, like people like, cause they’ll, they’ll change a lot of lines. Sometimes they’ll, they’ll give Chris Rck lines to Leslie and Leslie lines, Chris rock, and if they haven’t seen the changes or looked at it closely, cause there were other sketches. You know, they just don’t have, they don’t have the time to learn it. And listen, it happens. Hopefully it doesn’t happen on air. It happens on dress and, and, you know, it’s perfect on air. That’s what we shoot for anyway.
Another person that had problems with the cards was Farley. It was Chris Farley. What was the disconnect with him with the cue cards?
Well, him and Adam. Neither, neither one of them could see very well, they were, and they didn’t need, and neither one of them could wear contacts and Chris, you know, Chris wore glasses, but he wouldn’t wear them on, on air. So we had to print their lines really big and it’s really hard to get a rhythm when there’s only like sometimes, you know, eight words on a card and I’m flipping them really fast. Cause if it’s a fast paced sketch, I’m literally pulling them as fast as they’re reading them. And it’s hard to get a rhythm with that. And, you know, I begged them, like, go get contacts, go get something. They just never wouldn’t. If they were, I remember there were some sketches where Chris and Adam, where they play that old married couple, you know, that, that one.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. That was, um, they did that one, the most famous one, when David Duchovny did the, was it the season finale with, um.
Right. So they were together and neither one of them could see. So I’m printing their giant lines. Sometimes it would be like 80 cards, 85 cards. And I’m like, like freaking killing me. Like it’s so hard.
That is Bob Hope. That’s what they did. Barney McNulty did with Bob Hope. It was these giant letters. And Ed McMahon, I don’t know if you know this, up until like 80 or 82, they were trying to get McMahon, Ed, to wear glasses during sketches or during the show and he wouldn’t do it. And then they started making the giant letters and he still was having trouble with it. So then he started reluctantly wearing the glasses on air.
Yeah, it’s a, it’s a, we try to, we try to make them as big as possible, but I explained to them, look, it’s, it’s gonna, it’s not gonna, it’s going to be harder for you to read them, especially if you’re not used to reading them, especially on a live show. And, you know, I’ll do everything I can to help them out. But, like, Adam has since gotten the surgery. So he’s come when he came back, I didn’t have to print a big, he was like,”Normal size, Wally.” And I was like, he was like, he’s like, “I did it for you.” I was like, “Yeah, you didn’t do it for me. I was asking you to do it. You wouldn’t do it. “So, uh, but that was good. So that was always, that was always fun to do.
Were there any other cast members other than Farley that, um, at dress orbefore the show would smoke? He’s the only one I ever remember before, on the floor, like two minutes before the show, and all his makeup and stuff, where he would take puffs sometimes. Maybe Norm at Update, maybe would take a puff.
Maybe. Pete Davidson, I would see sometimes, uh, with a cigarette, but no, but usually not. We’re too busy. I’m too busy at that point to notice, you know, notice that stuff and
Yeah, you were quoted in the Los Angeles Times saying when Chris Rock was on the show, it was hard for him to read cue cards. And I think that’s one of the reasons why they didn’t use him enough. I never knew that, that that was an issue for him as well.
It just seems, it just, yeah, he had, he had some trouble with them and some people do, and it’s not a natural, it’s not, it’s not an easy thing if you’re, if you’re not a really, you know, good reader or you, I just don’t know what it is. Um, I, I remember Darrell asking for help when he started on the show cause he was getting into these cold opens and he was like, “I need to learn how to read these better. Um, you know, what, what can we do?” And I was like, “Come back and practice and read, read, read constantly, come back three or four times on a Saturday or a Friday and read your lines. And you’ll, you’ll get better.” And it helped him out. He became, you know, you get really good at reading them by doing that.
I heard Dan Aykroyd could, could just read cards cold. He didn’t, he’s never seen them before and he can do that. It, do you know if that is true? And if anyone else can do that, just like you see…
It doesn’t surprise me when he hosted, I was there when he came back and hosted. I, you know, and I don’t know what year it was. You maybe can tell me what you remember.
It was, Tom Davis came with him. I think it was around 2000. It was, it was like near where Al, when Al Gore came with Phsh, it was around.
So 2000. So I’d been there for 10 years. He did like, like seven different impressions for, for his sketches. Like each sketch, he had a different impression. And it was natural. And he would just pop into it. I was just like, “Man, this, he was so talented. And he was like, that was like the perfect job for him. I could see how he just had no trouble doing, you know, perform.
Effortless. When I got to, when I saw him do it the first time, when he was, John Goodman hosted and, um, Aykroyd came with him and stuff and did sketches and it was doing the Tom Snyder, Irwin Mainway. And it was, um, yeah, I’d never like, I mean, his skill set. It was unbelievable. What was it like when you were doing the Update auditions for cue cards when Tina and Jimmy got hired? Because you have Tina and Jimmy audition together and then you have Chris Parnell and Ana Gasteyer and then you had Kevin Brennan and Jeff Ross, I don’t know who else, uh, auditioned.
Did they do it together or do they do they separate, Kevin and Jeff?
They were, they were separate.
That’s what I remember.
Um, and then Jeff almost got hired, but it did not happen.
I remember Jeff. It was, it was funny because we did card, you know, we had to do cards with them and we, you know, each group Each group was their own, was their own thing. So they’d be coming back to us and checking their cards. And we had to like, keep all the cards separate. Like this is, this is, you know, Tina. And this is, you know, these guys. And, you know, Jeff Ross took some big swings. Um, I like, you know, it was really, I thought it was really funny. I mentioned to him a couple of times after I saw him after he didn’t get it. Like, it was like, “Oh yeah. I met you when you were doing the Weekend Update.” He was like, “Oh, don’t, don’t bring that up.” I was like,
Oh,I heard he was amazing.
I mean, it was really funny. Yeah, I’m just glad I’m not in the position to have to decide who to give the jobs to, because, you know, I’m there to help them out and it’s, it was fun helping them out and, and doing that. But man, that’s a lot of pressure, you know, to pick, to pick who’s going to be there.
When Norm got Update in, in, uh, 94, did he do a test with, with the cue cards before when they hired him? Did he do it? Laura Kightlinger was going to do it with Norm. It was announced in the trades that they were going to do it together. Did they ever test together to do Update?
I don’t remember. I don’t have a memory of that. I don’t know if they did that a lot. You know what I mean? I mean, you sit at the desk and read the jokes, you know, I mean.
It was down to Franken and down to Norm and Norm got the gig. And then.
We did, maybe I, now you, now that you say that, I remember maybe holding, maybe seeing Franken doing it. Maybe we did some tests, maybe we did a little testing.
And then what happened is, you know, you’re there Friday, you’re doing a 12 hour day. And then instead of going down to the lobby and getting in a car and going home and sleeping, you’d go up to the 17th floor and write Update jokes until, you know, four in the morning, five in the morning.
Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, I guess that’s the youth. You have the energy to do that.
Oh, yeah. You can’t. I couldn’t do it now.
But you were doing that for Nealon as well on Update two, right? You were contributing to the jokes.
Yeah, it was a different time, you know, because there was no internet really, you know, it was, it was, we would, it would be stats, the newspapers, and there would be, um, AP photos. Like stacks of AP photos from the week and you would thumb through them and see if you could write a joke to a picture that was on one of those photos, but the frightening thing was you, if you thought you had a good joke for that, you had to read it out loud in front of everybody. Jim Downey, Norm Macdonald, all the writers that were sitting around there. So, so we wrote, like, not just turn them in. You’re going to read that out loud.
You got, you got a bunch in. I mean, I know you’ve got a bunch in for Norm, which is not easy. I mean, you had Frank Sebastiano.
Right.
Ross Abrash. Some really, um, yeah. And I mean, you had people now when you were doing for Nealon, Herb Sargent was around, I know he was very territorial. He was okay that you were writing stuff for Kevin Nealon. He didn’t care?
It didn’t seem, he didn’t, he didn’t seem to mind. And it was almost like Kevin was, it was almost like people were like, you know, it was almost the more the merrier because Kevin, I think felt a little uncomfortable about doing Update at first, um, From my memory,
He definitely, it took him a little bit to find his voice and he was definitely made a very big choice to play it different than anyone else had played Update before it was,
Yeah, yeah, so I think, I think it made him feel good that people were pitching in to give him jokes to, you know, at least even trying to give him jokes that made him feel like, okay, you know what I mean? Like. Alright, you know, people were behind me and, uh, that kind of thing. So whether they were accepting them or not, and whether Herb Sargent was controlling that, I don’t remember that. You know, I think Herb Sargent knew my brother fairly well, so I think I got a little bit of a pass from, from Herb. I don’t remember ever having, like, any words with Herb, like, bad words with Herb, but he was always nice to me.
Doing Update was the only time that you ever got the card stuck with Norm where he couldn’t get his punchline out. Was that, is that the only time it happened?
No, no, it’s happened a bunch of times that I try to forget. I think it happened the last, the one that really kills me was, I think it was, Will Ferrell was hosting, I think he came back to one of the hosting things and he was doing, um, the, uh, singing, uh, teachers that, or they, uh, said,
Oh yeah, yeah, sure.
That character with Ana Gasteyer. And, um, Again, it’s one of those ones where they’re singing super fast or singing a rock song in their, in their voices. And, um, I, yeah, there was tape on a card and I couldn’t get, and they’re singing lyrics, and neither one of them could remember, so there was, they, I don’t… forget what they did. I don’t know if they hummed or they just, they paused or there was a pause and I finally get it out and they read it. And I’ve, you know, you feel awful because you’d kind of ruin the rhythm. And, and, uh, I apologized to them and they’re, and they’re usually always like Don’t worry about it. You know, one card out of a thousand you, you couldn’t pull for us. And they were like, we’re just mad at ourselves for not remembering the next lines. You know, we’re just so reliant on the cards that they, you know, they, we should have had that line. We should have known what it was.
Oh, Derek Jeter made errors. I mean, every, I mean, it’s going to happen. I mean, just, what you’ve been, what you guys are able to pull off every week is absolutely amazing.
Yeah.
What are your memories when Norm came back to host in October of 99? I was told, I read something that somebody that went to dress rehearsal that said he was swearing throughout dress, which I’ve never heard a host and he really, he just was like really goofing off. Do you remember that? What do you remember of that week with Norm?
I wish I could remember more. I don’t, I, that doesn’t sound unlike Norm. He didn’t take anything really seriously. You know what I mean? Even coming back to SNL, you know, he didn’t care that his monologue was going to insult some of the writers and some of the cast members on the show. You know, he didn’t, that didn’t bother him at all. I, you know, um, so I, I wish I had more memories of it. It was, it was fantastic. I love Norm. I get along with him so well. Just look at any of his Updates when Downey was producing him, they would end, usually end on a really controversial joke that wasn’t getting, they knew wasn’t going to get a laugh that was going to get a groan or even like boos and they loved it because they’re like, we can make people laugh anytime we want to. We know that, but can we make him groan? Can we make him really feel uncomfortable? Let’s do that.
I mean, what they did on Update, what they were able to accomplish. When Norm got booed, he said, “I haven’t gotten any funnier, the show’s gotten really bad.” Um, those were writers off to the side that were booing, correct?
Probably, probably, yeah. I mean, that sounds right. Um, I know people were upset about it.
I know, uh, some people that were upset, I’m not gonna mention the writers, but um, and you, you’ve been doing this forever, since 1990, it was, has there ever been a time where people that worked on the show booed the host during the monologue?
Oh, that’s a good question. No, not that I can, not that I can remember.
Were you there for Rage Against the Machine when, um, they, that whole thing happened when Steve Forbes was, you know, ladies and gentlemen, Rage Against the Machine and then ten seconds before they’re trying to hang the American flag upside down, which they were told not to do. Were you there for that?
I was there for that. I don’t remember. Any of that, and mostly because I’ve had this question before, when the, unless it’s somebody that I really, really, really, really like the music segments are when I get a chance to either sit down for three and a half minutes, four minutes, or go to the bathroom real quick, you know, um, so I usually, I usually miss all that stuff. I, you don’t, you know, see anything.
I was going to ask you about Adrien Brody, because, you know, 30 seconds of awkwardness on television seems like 20 minutes and this actor without any authorization puts on Jamaican dreadlocks, a white person to introduce the musical guest and everything’s timed down to the second. Were you there for that? What did you witness?
Yeah, I was, I was holding the card. I was holding the card, but like, like things like that happen. Like, you know, Will Ferrell, when he hosts, he’ll come out in a weird costume that he didn’t do before on dress. So this stuff happens. And I just thought it was part, like he was supposed to do this. This was something he was supposed to do. I didn’t know it was not, you know, it wasn’t, um,
30 seconds. I mean, I can’t even imagine Lorne, um, for something like that. I mean, surprises and controversy have made the show You know, relevant and a lot of cases, but I don’t think this was one of them that added anything.
No, I did. I mean, some people think, oh, this is going to be really funny. And usually they run it by somebody first, if they’re smart and they’d be like, you know what? And then Higgins would, is a good person. Like, you know that they, he tries to get them to confide in him if they have any ideas or something like that. And he’ll. Yeah. Yeah, that’s great. Let’s add that in. Or, you know what? Maybe not. Because he’ll explain it to him why it wouldn’t
work.
Tina Fey said that Adrien Brody had bad ideas all week, so it’s like, listen to the professionals maybe.
Yeah. I mean, yeah. You know, you know, just it’s, it’s, it’s one of those things where people think they’re funny and they’re, and they’re not, you know.
Sometimes. It depends on the person. I was going to ask you, you know, I was talking to, um, to Streeter Seidell, uh, Mikey day, those guys are unbelievable, um, talents.
They are, they are.
I heard, I saw Streeter being interviewed and I believe it was him or Mikey was saying when they did Washington’s Dream with Nate Bargatze, who’s coming back to host the show, um, that I think it was Steve Higgins idea to, was it to raise the cards and put them up high?
Well, we work on that a lot, uh, positions of the cards. Like I, I try to, you know, during blocking, if it’s a weird, like there was, it was a weird setup because it was that campfire setup and it was on home base and it was, the cameras were in a, in a weird thing. So I think he came out after we ran at once and we only have one set of cards for rehearsal and it’s me trying to figure out, and maybe I think he was, Steve was asking me where I was going to put the cards. I was like, well, you know, the usual, usual positions are one out in center and then two on the side, but this was weird. They had cameras in different spots. And yeah, I remember Higgins and me talking about it and we tried different positions and someone suggested, and we ended up doing four sets of cards for him, and it was two, yeah, two out in like one was up higher, one was, one was kind of low and then I had two in the front and I think I was on the lower one in the front. So when he’s standing, he’s good talk, talking to the guys, but he can also talk out. So, um, yeah, it’s a, it’s a group thing. Like, if I can’t figure it out or if it’s not looking right, Higgins will come out or the director, uh, Liz will come out and we’ll all talk about it and say, Hey, let’s try it. Let’s try to set it here and try that. So yeah.
Heather Locklear had some trouble when she was reading cards on um, she just did the finale of, uh, what was it? 94, you know, it was a really good episode actually, but she had trouble. They did this, was it a Melrose sketch or they might’ve done a Wayne’s World thing where, um, I believe she blamed the cue card people.
She did. She was on Letterman. She said it.
Is that what it was? I had never seen a host that was so this I, it, it just looked so not good. What she would ever…
It’s so funny because I wanted to go, my brother was writing at the time and I wanted to go on and defend myself. The next night I was like, “Hey, tell Dave I wanna come on.” And, and he was like, “Yeah, that’s not gonna happen.” So from my memory of, yeah, she couldn’t find the cards, uh, in that, in that thing. She couldn’t see where they are. And they were all around. They were, we, you know, rehearsed it. My memory of this is, and I’m not saying anything, and this is nothing on her. She was newly going out with Ricky, Richie Sambora, I believe. And he was around the whole weekend during rehearsals and stuff like that. And it didn’t seem, she just wasn’t, I was trying to get her to focus on where the cards were going to be. And she just didn’t seem to care that much, like didn’t think to pay attention to it as much. That’s my memory of it. And that’s why I was a little upset when she, what she blamed us. She was very nice to me after the show. She actually is really funny. She took a picture with me after the show, hugging me and like kissing, like making this really, really cool, sensual look like she’s in, like she was in love with me and I used that as my Christmas card saying that we were getting married and, and, uh, this is my new girlfriend. And I get great pleasure. So she wasn’t mad at me. And then the next on Monday, she blamed us for not, you know, looking good. And, you know, and that’s, you know.
It was just the really the one sketch. I feel like everything else she did well. And that was the season finale with her and Janet Jackson.
Yeah, listen, I mean, I’m, we’re not, we’re not, I’m not gonna say we’re perfect. And now again, that’s my, that’s my memory. She wasn’t mad at me after the show. Um, but if you, if you’re, if you’re in, maybe she was focusing on the, on acting and stuff like that. And she wasn’t really, sometimes they don’t think about cue cards until it’s too late. And then it’s, “Oh, my God, where are the cards?” And then…
You don’t see that anymore with hosts. I mean, it was, it’s been quite a while. I remember Chris Walken when he did, um, 92 or something, had some trouble. I mean, he was, he was one of the people. Um, and I know he’s one of the greatest hosts ever. And it was just maybe the 1 time when he hosted where it was like, “Oh, man,” he was a little bit Heather Locklear and some of the sketches and stuff, but it seemed to be correct. Now, are the host told? To not, to just look at the cards the whole time and not make eye contact, like, with the cast?
Depending on the sketch, yes. That’s one of the suggestions we give them. We’ll say to them, play to the cards as much as you can, because the other actors will be. But there’ll be instances where you don’t have to play the cards. Where you can grab a line and say it, say it to the thing. So we’ll kind of help, we’ll kind of, help them with that, you know, and, and where, which cards to play, you know, which set of cards to play in certain situations where, um, that, so every sketch is different and it’s, it used to be, yeah, but the, the thing is where, where else, where, when all else fails play to the cards, cause that’s the best angle and look for me cause usually I’m in their eyeline the most time we want them looking in that direction. So they look for me as well.
Has there ever been a host that came in a week earlier, wanted you before Thursday because they were so nervous that they wanted extra practice that they asked for you?
No, no, I don’t remember someone coming, but there’ll be hosts like on the floor the week before they’re hosting.
Oh, I’ve seen that before. Sure. That makes sense. I mean,
That happens a lot with like, Oh, Hey, I’ll see you next week. And you know, no, I mean, usually when I meet them, I’ll meet them on Wednesday before we throw, I’ll go in with cards to the dresser room and show them the two sizes that we have and ask about their eyesight. Ask if they’ve worked with cards before. And I’ll just talk to them really basic stuff, really quick. Just say basically what’s your eyesight like? It’s good. Okay. We’re going to do this size. Is that good? And I go, if you’re far away, we can use the bigger size, but this is what we prefer. Just a little introduction.
Who would you say maybe other than than Miss Locklear, maybe it was very, they had a tough time that you could tell on air. Because Laura Flynn Boyle, I know was very difficult only because she had eyesight problems. She had a bunch of different things. She came to you and as you said, perfectly very nice person just told you ahead of time. These are some issues I have. She wanted you to wear a red shirt to help her and she had all these things that just got her through. But I don’t. I don’t think it really affected her, did it, when you watched the video?
No, it was fantastic. I mean, but it was a lot of work. It was like, that was, I was in her dressing room the entire weekend, just running cards. We would run cards all the time, before the sketch, after the sketch. If it was a harder one, you know, just as much as she could, the more she read it, the more comfortable she got with it.
I give her a lot of credit because you had, I think it was Orlando Bloom, and I get it, said because of his dyslexia. He said no to the show and that would make sense. But for somebody to do that and then… was Jack Nicholson hanging out on the couch a little bit while you’re doing that.
Oh, man, I don’t. That’s a really good question. No, I don’t remember him then. I mean, I remember him meeting him when he was on one of the Christmas shows where he was in a sketch. Do you remember what’s that?
Yeah, he did a Roxbury piece, sketch.
Yeah, something, and it was one of those good nights that we did on the ice rink.
Yeah, and he was at home base in the studio, correct? And then he was, he was in,
No.
Really? He was down in the ice rink?
He was. One of them, he was down in the ice because that was one of my greatest moments. Like I was there holding the cards, getting sneakers. He was, had ice skates on, could not skate, was clinging to like the side of the ice skating rink. He, I, I, I walked past him and he had his sunglasses on and he was so, looked so uncomfortable and I think I said something to him like, “Are you okay?” And he was like, “Nah, I f*cking hate this ice and this ice” something like that. It was like great classic. I was just like “Ohhh, Jack Nicholson.” So awesome.
