Ted Danson Catches Up With His Boss, Mike Schur | Where Everybody Knows Your Name

Summary

In this wide-ranging conversation, Ted Danson and Mike Schur reflect on their creative partnership, from The Good Place to Cheers and beyond. They dig into why the best collaborations start with humility, curiosity, and a willingness to be wrong, with Schur describing writing as a team sport and Danson sharing how he approaches acting without ego. The two revisit the early pitch for The Good Place, the show’s ethics-driven core, and the bold decision to reveal its twist earlier than expected. They also talk about casting magic, the importance of safe and happy writers’ rooms, and how the series found a surprising second life in classrooms and among younger viewers. The discussion eventually circles back to Schur’s early comedy influences, his time at Harvard, SNL, and the formative impact of Cheers.

Highlights

• Ted and Mike lovingly roast each other while talking about power dynamics, ass-kissing, and creative egos 😂
• Schur explains why he always starts a project from zero instead of relying on old tricks 🎯
• The Good Place pitch story reveals just how much of the show’s success came from trust and radical honesty 🤝
• They revisit the genius of Allison Jones casting and the magic of finding the right ensemble at the right time 🎬
• Schur’s Cheers obsession and early comedy-geek path show how deeply his career was shaped by TV he loved as a kid 📺
• A surprising detour into ethics, philosophy, and cancelation culture turns thoughtful and very human 🌍

Key Takeaways

• Humility is a superpower in creative work, not a weakness 😌
• The Good Place worked because philosophy was baked into the story, not sprinkled on top 🧠
• Great casts can transform a tricky idea into something irresistible ✨
• A safe, happy writers’ room helps people do their best work 🌟
• Old shows can find new audiences when the writing is sharp enough to reward rewatching 🔁

Overview

Ted Danson kicks things off by joking about the creator-actor power imbalance between himself and Mike Schur, then the conversation settles into a warm, funny examination of how they work together. Schur explains that the best creative process begins with not assuming you already know the answer, and Danson agrees that actors should stay open, playful, and focused on how the words feel rather than defending ego. Their back-and-forth makes it clear that the partnership works because both men value collaboration over control.

They then dive deep into The Good Place, especially the long, detailed pitch Schur gave Danson and Kristen Bell. Schur shares how carefully he designed the show’s premise, how he worried about keeping the audience ahead of the story, and why he moved the season-one twist earlier than planned after Danson raised a practical concern. The discussion also highlights the show’s real philosophical foundation, including its use in classrooms and its appeal to viewers who might not otherwise think they’d enjoy moral philosophy.

From there, the interview broadens into Schur’s career origin story: cable access experiments, Harvard Lampoon ambitions, SNL, therapy, and the lessons he learned about creating safe environments for writers. The two also explore Cheers as a near-mythic comedy machine and Schur’s thoughts on separating art from artists in morally messy situations. By the end, the conversation has moved from jokes to ethics to craft, showing why both men have endured: they care deeply, stay curious, and keep making room for better ideas.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 12:30: Ted and Mike Schur: Creator-Actor Dynamic Ted and Mike Schur discuss the creator-actor power dynamic, with Ted joking that as the actor he is the “kid” and Mike the “parent,” while also emphasizing that his deference is rooted in respect and the need to stay useful rather than mere flattery. Mike responds that he values collaboration and sees the creative process as starting from zero, staying open to ideas, and allowing room for experimentation instead of assuming prior success guarantees the right answer.
• 12:30 - 25:00: The Good Place Pitch and the Big Season 1 Twist The creator explains that the original pitch for The Good Place intentionally withheld the full premise, because he wanted the network to judge the show based on the complete idea, including the season-ending twist. He planned to move the reveal earlier than the presumed season finale and, after feedback, realized the story should be structured around the main character actively searching for the flaw rather than repeating the same comedic beat for too long.
• 25:00 - 37:30: Building the Show: Ethics, Philosophy, and Tone The speaker explains that the success of the show was not a literal magic trick but the result of luck, talented collaborators, strong writing, and a solid creative idea that attracted the right people. The show’s blend of ethics, philosophy, and comedy made it useful in education, especially in classes about moral philosophy, where teachers used episodes and the book *How to Be Perfect* to make abstract ideas more engaging for students.
• 37:30 - 47:30: Casting and Ensemble Chemistry The discussion turns to the larger idea of separating artists from their work. The speaker argues that in a time when people know so much about public figures, it’s necessary to decide for oneself what behavior is forgivable and what is not, rather than ignoring wrongdoing or instantly writing someone off. They stress that no two cases are identical, context matters, and the discomfort of drawing these lines is part of the work of staying honest with oneself and thinking critically about integrity.
• 47:30 - 57:30: How Cheers Shaped Ted Danson’s Comedy Taste Ted Danson’s comedy instincts started early: as a kid, he and friends used borrowed access to cameras and editing equipment to make absurd, DIY comedy videos inspired by movies like The Naked Gun and Airplane. Those experiments gave him his first real sense of satisfaction from writing, filming, and finishing something funny.
• 57:30 - 70:00: From Harvard Lampoon to SNL and Early Career Lessons The speaker reflects on his early years at Saturday Night Live, describing the intense, competitive, and often hostile environment of the writers’ room. He recalls how the job’s pressure and his own unhappiness eventually led him to realize he needed therapy, a turning point that improved both his well-being and his work. From that experience, he formed a lasting belief that good writing depends on people feeling safe, happy, and comfortable, which later shaped how he led teams.
• 70:00 - 77:30: Applied Ethics, Gray Areas, and Closing Reflections The discussion opens with a candid reflection on ethics, where the speaker admits that personal secrecy is acceptable when it protects private life, but becomes questionable when it boosts status or advantage. This leads into a humorous acknowledgment that earlier behavior was ethically compromised, framed as a product of being less mature at the time.

Ted Danson Catches Up With His Boss, Mike Schur | Where Everybody Knows Your Name Transcription

• Segment 1: 00:00 - 02:30 hey I have to do a disclaimer just because it is so different to be sitting next to you talking to you because bottom line no matter how you cut it you are the writer Creator um and I am the actor so you are the parent and I am the kid you feel there's a power Dynamic switch is that what you're say yes well no it's not a switch it hasn't switched even it's like you that's who you are are and uh so if I uh am obsequious ever it's because I'm I'm still trying to kiss your ass to make sure that I work with you forever I think that I would like to think that you have gotten beyond the point where you have to kiss anyone's ass no that's what keeps me useful the scrappy still need to make my way still need to prove myself and don't ever be afraid of kissing somebody's ass it's it's good for you it's humbling it's maybe might get you something is that really your philosophy would you say that you or not kissing people's asses but that you that you consider yourself to be uh like that you sublimate your ego to the ego of the people you work with yes but comma you need a huge ego to claim that you know so I am I am as Mary likes to call me a foe faux Christ I am not you know I am not I am a pretending to be humble but I don't well this is this is confusing now because your genuine self I would say from having watched you work is uh is like egoless on the set you don't seem you don't have any of the uh superiority complex or um kind of like don't you no one can ask me to do anything else cuz I know I nailed it kind of attitude that folks who have far less than your resume and stature sometimes have and so I don't think it's Fox fax I think it's genuine I think there's a genuine I think you ride a a sine wave of like you have to have an enormous amount of confidence in your abilities in order to do all the things you've done but then when you're
• Segment 2: 00:00 - 02:30 actually working I've I have found you to be I mean I talk about this all the time with people it's it's shocking how um how egoless you are when you act when you're doing your work de here's what I
• Segment 3: 02:30 - 05:00 I think and I'm sure there must be a version of this Truth for you as a writer but every time you start something if you don't start at zero and and start with I know nothing yeah then you will be tempted to go oh I was funny last time I did something like this I'll do it that way and you cut yourself out of a you know the a big wonderful chunk of the creative process so part of it is I think smart as an actor and I I'm not uh I don't I guess I'm conflict avoidance but but I correct me if I'm wrong correct me if I'm wrong I might be wrong don't don't hurt me but it's also I like to feel good I like to feel happy that's who that's how my body uh enjoys going through life and so I'd much rather not you know I I will stick up for something that I well and sorry I'm ramly but here's how I is also trained by leson Glenn Charles and Jimmy Burrows don't come to us and talk about the character or the script until we've heard our words done by you right so then I'm willing to have a conversation but I don't have to be right I just want you to know Mike how I feel when I say the words that you wrote and as is that how you picture it is that what you wanted me to feel I will have that conversation and stick up for how your words made me feel but I don't have to be right about the words being right or wrong yeah that's the best way to do it in my opinion because what you're describing is essentially the writing process to me the writing process to me is you you have an idea and you think that that idea is worth pursuing whether it's a character a scene an entire show a movie whatever and the way I used to think of it is when you break stories in a TV writer room you brainstorm a million ideas and you put them all on index cards and they're up on a giant wall and the way I used to feel is that that when you stand back and kind of go
• Segment 4: 02:30 - 05:00 into like a soft focus and evaluate the work you've done some of those cards begin to Glow a little bit like they start to have a little a little like pulsating glow around them and your eye
• Segment 5: 05:00 - 07:30 keeps getting drawn back to them and that signals you that like this is worth exploring and so you you start exploring it and the only possible attitude to take when you begin that process is I think this is good but I don't know and let's all decide together it's a team sport and we're going to like investigate this together and we're going to throw out ideas and I'm never going to like ultimately if I'm running a show it is up to me eventually to say like okay this is this is the direction we're going in but for a very long time and even after you decide what direction you're going in or what the story is going to be you still have to maintain this kind of like 20% of your creative brain has to allow for the possibility that you're wrong and that someone else has a better idea and as soon as you close off that that entirely that pathway you're just running the risk that you're missing something good and I there are very few actors I've met who I think approach the craft of acting the same way which is to say I'm going to do this the way I feel like it should be done and then we're g to like check in we're GNA like how was that that felt pretty good maybe I could try maybe I'll I'll I'll be receptive to notes or suggestions I'll try something else just for the hell of it and that is the that to me is the continuation of the writing process as the rubber is meeting the road and if you don't do it that way I've worked with a lot of actors who come from The Improv world they're all very much like that because they know this is like the these ideas are they should be like tissue right it's like you try this it doesn't work you throw it away you pull out yeah and and but but you come from a very different place and it was wonderful to watch you work because you had coming from a completely different angle than the improvisational actors like Steve Carell or Amy Poler you had this similar feel of like just
• Segment 6: 05:00 - 07:30 constantly sort of like probing and and and experimenting and some of the very greatest moments on the good place came from that exact Instinct that you had and that is that's there's nothing better to me than working on a scene talking it out experimenting and then suddenly someone whether it's an actor or a writer or a set PA who cares has an idea right and then you try that thing and that's the Breakthrough and that that's just wonderful it's the way that all all of this work should be that and
• Segment 7: 07:30 - 10:00 it isn't always that and when it isn't I feel it you know boy I tell you that let's talk about the good place just for a second then we'll go backwards um and and and i i people say have asked me how you know oh wow you've been working for a long time and what is that and it really is once I decided early on not to have things written for me because that cuts out a huge chunk of the creative process I'd rather you know find the smartest guy in the room smartest lady in the room and if he's not available you find me yes oh you ruined it shoot okay but you know you wanted you had this thing you just wanted to say and then you go oh wow can I be part of that you know because then you're not catering to me we're all focused on the idea the project the story and uh anyway let me let me the first time I maybe it wasn't the first time but I really met you was when you came to Keith Addis my manager's office and pitched the good place to me but to us yeah you started off by giving me an amazing compliment so which is so smart because I turned my hearing aids up and I was I was ready to to hear well do you remember how that actually went I think about this a lot you said I'm really excited about this meeting and I Saidi bet I'm more excited yeah you did that's right and then you said why is that and I said because I consider you to be the greatest actor in the history of the medium of television now if you back up in my brain an hour I was driving to Keith's office and I was very nervous to meet you and I had a thought in my head very very clearly which was don't blow this by being too obsequious and complimentary like don't just be cool man is what I was saying to myself be cool don't say something insane and then jump back now to me saying I think you're the greatest actor in the history of the medium of Television within 30 seconds of meeting you but I didn't I
• Segment 8: 07:30 - 10:00 when I said it I was like I'm blowing it I don't care because that is genuinely how I felt about you and I and I I figured like look either he's going to he's going to like oil at that or he'll
• Segment 9: 10:00 - 12:30 enjoy it and then we're off and running and thankfully it was the ladder thankfully my God and then to finish that little uh meeting I I may be exaggerating but basically you know you pitched the idea and you started and you talked for I'm guessing 45 minutes yeah and with such detail that may have changed eventually when you you know started writing more and but it was with such detail but what what a bizarre idea you were pitching I mean really yeah you know um your mind first goes oh I get it it's the office and the afterlife right no right uh and we at the end of your 45 minutes Keith and I hadn't said a word we just looked at each other and it was like I don't know what this is going to be but I want to be part it yes please sign me up I I should say that I'm not in the general habit of talking for that long when I'm when I'm talking to someone about an idea I felt like when I had the idea which had been months and months earlier I was like this is a hard sell this is hard sell for anyone It's A Hard Sell for a network for a studio for an actor and I thought that I owed it to all of those people starting with NBC who had um generously offered me uh a entire season guaranteed to be on the air which at at the time was fairly rare it's more common now but at the time was very rare and then uh so starting with them but then going to people like you and Kristen Bell who let's be real you went to Kristen Bell and then me go on please I I felt like in order to give people of your stature Clarity on what you were walking into um and and the the kind of like intricacy of the idea it wasn't going to suffice to give you a 15minute overview it wasn't going to be enough to say like you're uh you run the you run heaven and there's a mistake and you're kind of running around trying to figure out the mistake what do you think are you in or out like I I I first of all
• Segment 10: 10:00 - 12:30 didn't think it would work to get you or Kristen to be in the show but more importantly the the show was going to take you in a very significant and very surprising direction right and I I didn't think it would be fair with you
• Segment 11: 12:30 - 15:00 specifically to tell you half of the idea or even four fifths of the idea without you knowing and this is a spoiler if anyone hasn't seen the show that the entire premise of the show is going to be upended at the end of the season so I I think I I I I think I prefaced it to you by saying like this is going to take a while to explain so just like bear with me um but it was very unusual to talk that long for me in a pitch and it was only because I felt like frankly you had the right to to judge right whether you wanted to be involved based on the entire idea not on half of it I knew I wanted to be involved immediately when and you would also say to any kind of question was I'm not sure yeah this is what I think might be but I'm not sure which was because a lot of times people are just in enrollment and they don't really stick to the Integrity of their idea yeah and I remember my one question was if this is brilliant I'm not sure how I can be funny yeah in the it turns out first year of the the story because nobody uh should know you know no thanks to me by the way because I'm a blabber mouth nobody should know the secret you know at the end of the episode but we you were so um you listen to me and and I and I'm so grateful for that but it was so worth the wait because as a when you read lines and you know you're in a comedy and you look at your thing you kind of my analogy is you grab your funny gun and you start shooting and I wasn't sure if I had the funny bullets yeah you know uh well you said something very smart and and it this is the why this is the best job in the world is you said and and it's something I genuinely hadn't thought about well that's not true so I I had this thought that in order for this show to survive long term I had to stay a step ahead of of the audience and what that meant to me was as soon as you set up this premise which
• Segment 12: 12:30 - 15:00 is woman gets into heaven there's been a mistake she doesn't belong there guy running Heaven is sees things going haywire doesn't understand why is actively looking for the problem so as soon as I I reason that as soon as I set up that premise that people would assume okay at the end of this season the Cliffhanger the big like heading into
• Segment 13: 15:00 - 17:30 season two Cliffhanger will be that you find Elanor that Michael finds Elanor and realizes that she is um uh not supposed to be there and so I had said to myself aha I am clever I will move that up and I had that slotted for around episode n9ine or 10 because I thought no one will be expecting it before the end of the season and then when you said what you said which was basically I am for that for the entire time I am uh searching for her I am playing the same thing I'm playing the same comedic beat over and over again which is I created a paradise and there's a flaw in it and I'm and I'm running around searching for the flaw and and in a befuddled professorial State exactly and so I had not consider I was thinking about how to lay out the story based purely on the theory and the concept and you you said you asked a question about the practicality of the actors involved and it made so much sense and I was like you're totally right and also frankly the earlier we do this big shocking thing the the more shocking it will be and the less time you Ted have to be doing only one thing and so we ended up making that right in the middle of the Season that was the seventh out of 13 episodes or something and as soon as we did that you suddenly had something else to play and so did christien and so did Will Harper and so did everybody and still believable to the madeup situation that you will discover later at the end and it it was again it was that part of what was so Charmed about that show to me is that the folks involved were all everybody was all in on the project and it was a very open and fun and free flowing discussion amongst the writers and actors and yeah and producers about what was the best way to execute this very tricky idea um anyway can I ask you a question did you um this is a podcast after all it seems only natural well most guests realize I have nothing to
• Segment 14: 15:00 - 17:30 really say and they do a monologue but okay um um just desperately covering for you as you as you lean back and take a nap in your chair he's so sweet he's a little old I will take care of him um it works too sometimes by the way um did you know when we were starting even while we were shooting the first season did you know that the Reliance on real genuine ethics
• Segment 15: 17:30 - 20:00 and philosophy meaning you had ethic professors around the country on speed dial that writers would have seminars with people who are immersed in the world of Ethics did you know it would be that real as far as the ethical yeah underpinning yeah I did and that was part of the reason that I felt like I had to break so much of the story because I I was like I'm gonna walk in to my boss's office at NBC and I'm gonna say I'm gonna do a half hour sitcom about moral philosophy and it's going to terrify them and I don't blame them that is not their fault they're in the business of entertaining America 21 minutes and 30 seconds at a time on Tuesday nights at 8:30 and I cannot um it I can't in good conscience tell them I'm going to do that without explaining how it is going to work and how the show will still be funny and entertaining and so I I I said to them um I said look I'm not I'm not going to sugarcoat this for you this is not a show where from time to time off in the margins will make a reference to some aspect of philosophy philosophy is baked into the core of this thing ethics is baked into the center of this pie and here's how I think that is going to be okay and here's how the show is still going to be funny right and were to their credit to their Everlasting credit they were uh they felt okay about what I was doing they were excited about it they thought it was a cool idea and then and I have to say I'm not just saying this because I'm on your podcast when I got you and Kristen to say yes they stopped caring they just stopped caring it was like that's Ted Danson everybody knows Ted Danson that's Kristen Bell everybody knows Kristen Bell whatever this is go ahead go with God and so it made it a lot easier to to sort of sell them on the idea once the cast started to take shape I there is one very funny moment I've told a story before but I'll tell
• Segment 16: 17:30 - 20:00 it again I I said to them in the pitch meeting I promise I will not make this feel like homework I understand that people don't want to watch homework on television so I will not make this feel like homework and then we were on the set shooting the be the beginning of episode three and Will Harper was standing in front of a Blackboard that said philosophy 101 on it and I was like
• Segment 17: 20:00 - 22:30 I'm making it feel like it's worse than homework it's school it's not even homework and I just was like H it's been going well I think I'm gonna get away with this and I and we did you you another important thing as a producer writer producer is casting and man did you I mean let's start with Will Harper yeah H who could pull that off but will Harper it it's mirle out to be not a a lovable nerd a leading man extraordinaire so all casting conversations I ever have begin with me praising Allison Jones yes our casting director she cast she cast curb um she cast uh Parks and Recreation and the office and the good place uh she cast every every great comedy on TV with few exceptions um has Allison Jones behind it and she uh we you know the miracle of Allison is I said I created the character tahani on paper and uh the deal I sort of have with Allison and I don't think I'm unique here but um the deal I have with her is I say like I'm going to tell you the general parameters of what I'm looking for but I am open to like I she her her acument and casting is so 999 percentile off the belt curve that I say like I'm going to give you the basics but like I will Ex I will I would love to see anyone you ever bring in for any of these roles as long is the core of the person seems the same so I said to her okay tahani is is Eleanor's rival and so she should be everything that Elanor is not so Kristen is a diminutive person so tahani should be tall and Kristen is a fairly provincial lived in Arizona her life tahan should be very worldly and the way that I described her on paper was a South a tall glamorous South Asian woman with an Oxford British accent who is like I described her as like Indian or or uh or South Asian Grace Kelly that was the person I thought would drive Eleanor the craziest yeah and then I was like but it it doesn't matter like if she's South
• Segment 18: 20:00 - 22:30 Korean if she's Czechoslovakian if she's if she's from bimy I don't care she just has to fit the perimeters of being the opposite of Kristen and then you know four weeks later in J Jam a six foot
• Segment 19: 22:30 - 25:00 tall Pakistani Grace Kelly with an Oxford British accent who by the way not only is her accent perfectly Posh and British and lovely she is like incredible with accents and can do all sorts of different accents and we had her do a bunch on the show and that's what makes Allison the best at what she does Will Harper was the hardest part to cast we looked at a million people we saw a lot of really great folks and I remember she she sent me an email and said some some tapes just came in from New York and I watched them in my office at at Universal and wills was I think the first one I watched and I got like a the hair on my arm stood up and I was alone and I was like I think I think this is something this feels like something and I sent it to Drew Godard who was going to direct a pilot and he watched it on his phone at like his daughter's soccer game and immediately texted me it was like this is the guy right and I was like yeah this is the guy and everyone I showed it to over and over again David Miner and Morgan sacket and and everybody it just kept feeling like oh my God we finally found him and even though we had that feeling and when we watched it I don't think anyone truly understood what we had found yeah and the craziest thing and I'll say this again is Will had been acting for a long time he done a lot in New York theater he had decided that if he didn't get aart yeah that casting season he was going to quit acting yeah yeah like it's it's so it's even now you know like if you're almost in a car accident yeah and but you narrowly avoid it and then like six months later you suddenly have the feeling of like oh no I'm oh no it's okay it's okay it happened and and I avoided it I have that feeling about Will Harper all the time of like he almost quit acting the world was almost denied William Jackson Harper that's a terrifying thought throw in Manny hito yeah throw in Darcy card who I felt so
• Segment 20: 22:30 - 25:00 sorry for on week four I went oh oh dear poor Darcy sweet girl but she has the most boring nothing to do yeah linear she's going to play a computer how much fun is that and she became this you know rock star as a result cut to three years later she's playing all of the characters in one episode yeah it was a there I think that successful shows and this should segue us to Cheers in a second but I think successful shows shows that are creatively successful all have one thing in common which is that if you look back on them they it seems like a
• Segment 21: 25:00 - 27:30 magic trick it seems like uh someone was was pulling strings and making everything work out perfectly the reality is we just got really lucky and we had a lot of really good people working for us like Allison and Morgan sacket and folks who knew how to put these things together and Steve day our assistant director and and David neednoggle our visual effect supervisor like they made together they made a thing that has this sort of beautiful smooth sailing Arc to it and that we execute it exactly the way we wanted to to say nothing by the way of the writers and all of the guest stars on the show everyone who was on the show was so good and so when it's over and it's done and you look back on it it retroactively seems impossible that could have ever happened but it it does start with an idea that feels like it has a lot of a authenticity to it and uh original and then that you the odds are pretty good that you will start to attract people who are excited by that so yes it is a magic trick and not it doesn't always work even with the same ingredients but wow let me before we go jump to me and my glory of Cheers in my late 30s um couple things um you know this but um th this um this ethics this um philosophy show this comedy about ethics and philosophy was taught in as notredam didn't they have a had a on their syllabus there was ethics there is a a professor at Notre Dame um who has become uh a I would say a friend of mine who was teaching a class called um God in the good life I think is the name of the class and it was a very popular class before the show right but the essence of the show uh sorry the essence of the class was was very similar it was like let's talk about philosophy let's talk about what philosophy has to tell us about about being a good person and living a good life it's Notre Dame so it has a little more of the religious philosophy woven
• Segment 22: 25:00 - 27:30 into it right um which we sort of avoided on the show but she reached out to me and uh I think after the first season
• Segment 23: 27:30 - 30:00 because my my wife went to Notre Dame and and my father-in-law my late father-in-law went to Notre Dame too and she reached out to me and asked if I would come and and and talk to the class and partly why she had done that is because she had started using I'm pretty sure I have the timeline right she had started using things from the show to help teach the class and there was a sort of amazing Dove tale and all a lot of the stuff naturally that she was teaching was stuff like the trolley problem the sort of basic ethical questions that folks have asked and so I went and spent a couple days at Notre Dame and it was really fun and I had a great time and I've since done that at a lot of universities I I think what I've learned is you know it's not the easiest cell for you know college first year college students to like come learn about moral philosophy like it's very impractical it doesn't suggest a high earning future in in the pr private sector and so the show has provided teachers at all levels High School College even I think you know postgraduate studies the ability to make the basic blocks of learning how this stuff works more more enticing and more fun so a lot of places are using I was just to the University of South Carolina um who uh who you know actually I wrote a book called uh how to be perfect that was sort of the distillation of everything I learned writing the show and that book which you very nicely blurbed thank you for your blurb um that book was given out to all of the freshman and fresh women first year students at South Carolina uh as like a as like a here's read this before you you know start your first day of classes kind of thing and so there's you know I've been to I've been to Duke in North Carolina and Wake Forest and been to uh Stanford and all these places and it the the sort of feeling is the same which is like if you are if you the person who's
• Segment 24: 27:30 - 30:00 inclined to get interested in the subject the show is a really good introduction because it's it's all of the basic ideas and it's also a lot of very funny funny and handsome folks are telling you how it works one of the things so there's that which just to my point um you know this is the re this is the real deal this philosophy and ethics in the show yeah it comes from a very real serious uh place and at the same
• Segment 25: 30:00 - 32:30 time this message which is you know like you said sometimes a difficult cell is wrapped in the most glorious visuals yeah special effects that blow your mind and the sense of humor of a nine-year-old boy who loves fart jokes yeah so so it's like this package of this might feel like a you know some medicine but no no this is going to make you very happy don't worry it's going to be great we're comedians we want to make jokes and before we move to my earlier career um let me just say that you you know rejuvenated my career I have PE more people coming up really yes ages 10 11 12 13 14 especially young teenagers who are at that point in their life I think this is my spin is that their sense of humor is starting to get really honed and they they're fast especially this generation is so fast that they love the fast pace of the show the fact that they can go did you see that in the corner there and their friend will say no and they'll watch it again so literally I have people with big grins on their face that makes me have a big grin in my face because I know I know literally what they're coming to say and it's not just ooing and aing about me it's oooing and aing about the show yeah and that's that's brilliant okay speaking of brilliant speaking of brilliant let's let's go back to because you said uh when I asked you if you would do this said yes I want to talk about cheers or I can talk about cheers forever whatever don't need to do that but go for it don't need to do that but do it yeah go it uh the reason as a segue because I want to go back to how you became you and that was what how old were you in 1982 I was six or seven years old okay so this is good um the reason that IEM embarrassed myself in front of you when we first met in the way I did is because a I meant it and B cheers is the first show I ever cared about and I cared about it at a to a degree that it's
• Segment 26: 30:00 - 32:30 almost impossible now for me to calculate there are episodes of the show I've rewatched it since it aired it's now available uh in a lot of other places and my I think my 30th birthday
• Segment 27: 32:30 - 35:00 present from a person I used to work with was the entire DVD set of all of Cheers it was from my former assistant Allison bought me like all of the episodes on DVD because everyone knew that that was my favorite show and there are but there are episodes of the show I've I've maybe haven't seen since I was 10 years old or have only maybe seen once since I was 10 years old that I remember with blinding clarity and I think it's fair to say that it's what made me want to be a writer I think it's either cheers or Saturday Night Live is would you I would pinpoint as like that's what made me want to write for TV I remember seeing the names Glenn Charles L Charles James Burrows on the screen and thinking like I don't understand this I don't know how this happened but those seem to be the guys whose names come up first and that must mean they're important and so I want to be them someday like I want to do this with my own show at at age literally 8 n 10 8 nine 10 11 yeah um and I think now that I've been doing it professionally for a long time it only continues to kind of reveal itself as a as a sort of Miracle of engineering to me more and more if I watch an episode I can watch any episode at any time and it's not it's it the effect of it on me has not worn off in other words I've spent the last 20 years or so doing nothing but break stories for half hour comedies and it is really hard it's a really hard thing to do it's a hard thing to do well it requires an enormous number of people to do it and when you do it you feel like you have you've scaled a mountain you feel like you've achieved something truly remarkable and cheers at 300 episodes and they're all really good that just seems impossible and the the the thing that I always think about when I think about the show is what is it a what is it called is it a fractal I think it's a fractal when you when it's a pattern
• Segment 28: 32:30 - 35:00 each part of which contains the entire pattern itself right every episode of the show contains the pattern of the show itself so every there are themes to the show um those some of those themes are in the theme song of the show like sometimes you want to go where everyone knows your name but the the family the the outside of the family family that
• Segment 29: 35:00 - 37:30 was created on the show and the relationships and the and the sort of ideas that the show wanted to talk about you can pick any episode at random and you can find them that's a really hard thing to do to say like you you basically if you want to teach someone what the show is about if I wanted to teach someone what the show is about I would have my favorite episodes I would say watch this one watch the Thanksgiving episode where they get into a food fight watch the season 1 finale when Ted when Sam's brother comes to town or something like that or watch the lucky bottle cap episode from there are certainly ones that I would send them to but if they ignored me and they turned on any episode from any season they would get a pretty great representative sample of what the show was doing and want and wanted to talk about and wanted to the argument the show was making is present in every episode that's really really hard to do and I don't think it's true of some other shows that I consider to be time classics like I I just I just marvel at the at the machinery and the engineering it's such a simple show such a simple premise but every single piece of it was holistic and and related perfectly to the umbrella scale of the of the whole project I'm gonna snip that five minutes and send it to Les and Glenn Charles and Jimmy Burrows because I I know that would mean a lot to them um okay but now you're 78 and you're looking and thinking about cheers Maybe not maybe that came later in life but you were engaged in comedy and looking and figuring out what you liked about comedy at seven eight years old and I read here at 11 years old you bought without feathers right the Woody Allen collection of stories well I was bought for me by my dad because I had started to get really into comedy I was I had seen some uh home homesick from school I watched sleeper uh and and bananas I think and then and
• Segment 30: 35:00 - 37:30 I was like that's the funniest thing I've ever seen and then my dad bought that book for me and then I started to get and then he was like if you like this you should watch Monty Python and I did and then he was like if you like this you should watch Saturday Night Live and I did so it sent me on a I was kening through the the history of Comedy very quickly at that point and I don't actually know I don't think I watched cheers in the first two years I think I
• Segment 31: 37:30 - 40:00 probably started when I was around that age probably 84 or 85 um but it it was the first it was the first long form show that I knew and cared about and understood partly hilariously because I was a Red Sox fan and so the fact that the show is about a former Red Sox pitcher that alone was I was like this is amazing I can't believe there's a show about a guy who played for the Red Sox fictionally so it just had a lot of it came along at the exact right time for me and I just remember thinking like I I cared about it deeply and I would count the days until it was on again and in those days you know obviously there's no secondary Market you can't watch it any time except when it's on live we didn't have a VCR like I had to be in front of my TV at a certain point in the evening to watch the show I think it was on at 9: for a while and so I know my bedtime was 9:00 and my mom would let me stay up and and watch it from 9:00 to 9:30 thank you Mom we weren't a neelon family it didn't help you uh but yeah so I'm sure I'll pull us back to me again in a minute um but can I can I I I read this other thing and I didn't read this in the book and I show because um that you have a whole thing about talking about separating the artist and the art yeah clearly talking about Woody Al talking about that exact thing yeah and I just think that's an amazing conversation if you want to tune out now you can if you're of that ilk but but it's a big subject and I I know this I understand the sensitivity uh some people do deserve to be cancelled but it you know or have done things that aren't good and I'm not saying that about Woody Allen I'm just saying all people you know have this balance but when you talk about artists when you all of you know are we supposed to get rid of Picasso's right paintings because he certainly was you know a womanizer or whatever he
• Segment 32: 37:30 - 40:00 was so what is your point when you talk about separating the artist from the art well the point I tried to make in the book I wrote was that we are now living in a time where um everyone knows everything about everybody and that is good in some cases because bad behavior can be noticed and pointed at and
• Segment 33: 40:00 - 42:30 stopped right and it's also bad in some ways because we now live in a world where everyone's Heroes turn out to have rough bad qualities because all human beings do and there is a wide range of those bad activities some of them are forgivable and some of them are not and the argument I make in the book is simply that you have to um decide for yourself essentially what is forgivable and what is not forgivable there will be people that you love athletes or movie stars or directors or artists or whoever who do things who are revealed to be monstrous in a way that you think like that just doesn't comport with what I believe to be a an a proper way of living on Earth and I can't buy that person's books or look at that person's paintings or go see their movies and there will be other people who do problematic things who you think like that's really bad but I think I I think as is it um oh God Brian Johnson is that his name the the um the lawyer wrote um a wonderful book and said that very famously that people are more than the worst thing they have ever done and so you can decide that too right you can decide like okay this is bad behavior but it's but I can find it in myself to forgive that person if that person you know seems genuinely remor full if that person tries to make amends whatever the concoction of stuff is that you think that person needs to do in order to climb out of the hole they dug and the argument I make is simply the only mistake you can make really is to try to ignore it is to pretend it's not there if you do that then you're basically saying anyone can do anything at any time and there are no repercussions I don't think that's the answer I don't think the answer is to Simply say well everyone's bad in some way and so I'm never GNA personally pass judgment on anyone in the world for anything they do because that's that doesn't seem like the right way to have a sort of a sense
• Segment 34: 40:00 - 42:30 of Integrity to me I think you have to kind of figure out where the line is for you you might end up as soon as you draw that line you are opening yourself up to an argument which is how can you forgive this person but not that person how can you say that I'm not going to listen to this person's music anymore but you listen to that person's music which people are fond of doing and that they
• Segment 35: 42:30 - 45:00 might you might find in that argument they have a point and then you have to kind of erase the line you drew and redraw the line somewhere else but that's okay that's not um these are not simple questions and so no and it's gray and that makes most people very uncomfortable it's much easier to be black and white right you know and and I think that's the mistake I think the mistake is trying to ignore the greyness and the mushiness and the uncomfortability you feel when you say like all right I'm going to continue Picasso really meant something to me and I'm going to continue to look upon and adore the paintings of Picasso but I can't possibly uh a drink with yeah or like but I'm I can't forgive Mel Gibson for what he did or something and then someone will say how can you still like Picasso if you don't like Mel Gibson and you're like well it's not the same thing he they're two different issues and and that that difficulty of arguing these things makes people want to either ignore all of it and just say like anyone can do whatever they want I don't care or in some cases write everyone off and say the second that anyone makes a mistake of any kind they're dead to me I they're they're you can't support that person you can't look at Picasso painting you can't see Mel Gibson movies everything is is out the door and I don't think either one of those is is the best possible way to approach us and I would argue that it also misses on another level the whole point which is take a look at yourself right this is an opportunity yes that was wrong you can call it out you can be angry that your friend did this or whatever you need to do to be real to yourself but but you're missing the point if you don't go wow I need to check myself out you know I I don't I you know wow I have said things to women that I thought was charming and designed to make them laugh but who cares about
• Segment 36: 42:30 - 45:00 your intention Ted if it made them uncomfortable you know you need to keep digging into because that's the whole point is to know yourself yeah so you know it's just a big ugly mess the whole thing is a big ugly mess and you know the the problem that you're talking about too is that no two of these things are the same no two issues that have been brought to light from any two
• Segment 37: 45:00 - 47:30 different people are exactly the same there's power dynamics at play where they were they bosses and did things to their subordinates were they guests in someone's home or movie set and did things to the folks who were too afraid because of their power and and and fame to raise an issue like we also don't know we I said we we know everything we don't really know everything we don't we don't know the context important pieces of context and all these cases so it's it's I don't think the simplest way to put this is I don't think the right answer in to living in this world is either the second anyone does anything bad or questionable you're dead to me and I also don't think the answer I really don't think the answer is I'm going to close my eyes and cover my ears and pretend that none of this is happening the real path is through this muddy murky Gray Zone that requires you to do a lot of check-ins with yourself and a lot of self-examination and a lot of which is hard and uncomfortable and a want to do it I should say I don't blame anyone for not wanting to do it I don't want to do it it's it's hard it's like love it's like Faith it's a living thing that you know you have to engage in every day takes a lot of work yeah yeah it just takes a lot of work and I and the work people have full lives and a lot of personal problems and difficulties and issues and and and things that they have to spend time and energy on and I don't blame you for not wanting to spend any time or energy on figuring out whether it's okay to watch an old Mel Gibson movie like no one wants to spend that time but I don't think that it's the right answer to say like I'm never gonna think about it I just don't I can't believe that that's the solution yeah um okay so go back uh I want to get you to Saturday Night Live I I know there was a period you said that you were involved with uh free cable access you and your friends at an
• Segment 38: 45:00 - 47:30 early age you really did do your research so you could do anything you wanted right yeah there was a cable access station in my hometown and my friend Adam Goodwin and I when we were in like middle school and high school um like I I can't remember how it started maybe we like interned there or something I mean this is cable this is like Central Connecticut Cable access no one's watching this thing right it's mostly like lowlevel informational shows it's between two ferns style informational shows about like the library has a has like a fundraiser
• Segment 39: 47:30 - 50:00 whatever so we realized that like no one no one was minding the store and we could kind of do whatever we wanted to and we went there we started going there all the time and we learned how to use all the like cameras and all the equipment and stuff and we we started like writing things like we wrote like um we I remember we were huge fans of like the Naked Gun and airplane and we wrote like a half half an hour like sort of like documentary tribute show about the abrams's and about uh those movies because we love them and it was absurdist and silly and there were terrible jokes in it and I pray I pray that those tapes have long been erased and are unavailable for viewing but we like filmed the whole thing and we like clipped in without permission at all we clipped in chunks of the Naked Gun and airplane and airplane 2 and then it like aired on TV it was like on like table access at you know to probably do in the morning um but it was the first time that I had ever sort of written anything and then like put it together and made it and then finished it and I remember just feeling this immense level of satis like we had a script that we like typed out on a typewriter I mean it was it was like the first foray into into like making you were becoming Mike sh at a pretty early age yeah I mean at least at least I wanted to be do it and and I enjoyed it and it was very silly and fun and then we did a B I don't remember what else we did we did a bunch of other stupid stuff um but yeah I was probably I don't know 12 or 13 14 something like that so by the time you got to Harvard jumping ahead you recognize and you were the president or the editor or the whatever har yeah which is a very funny huge history of producing funny Cutting Edge stuff that later became National it SP spun off into National aoon yeah right but you when you got to harbored you that inclination to look for funny and was already there in you I wrote it
• Segment 40: 47:30 - 50:00 in my application I said I said I want to I want to go to Harvard because I want to ride for the Lampoon like I they I I manifested it into the universe and so yeah that was my like that was my main goal was to ride for the Lampoon because because Conan this is 93 I got there so Conan had just gotten his show and he was on he was the president of
• Segment 41: 50:00 - 52:30 lampoon and it and there were had been a bunch of Articles all of which I had read about this weird old Humor Magazine uh at Harvard that had created you know National Lampoon Vacation and and CAD Shack and Doug Kenny and all those people from that era but then also all of the a ton of Simpsons writers had been on the Lampoon and a bunch of Satur Night Live writers Jim Downey who's the greatest sketch writer of all time uh headwriter SNL forever and ever and ever um was had been on the Lampoon and so I just I had learned about this weird Factory that that churned out professional comedy writers and that it's what my dad also went to Harvard I should note I didn't care what I cared about was the Lampoon like I had no interest in it as like a a a thing that my dad had done I had interest in it in a thing that Jim Downey and Doug Kenny had done so that was my my number one goal when I got there was to ride for the Lampoon and then I got in freshman year you graduate then what so I graduated and I um I wanted to be a TV writer obviously but I also am a very practical person and so I decided I would give myself one year to try to get a job and if I didn't get a job in a year I was going to go to grad school so I borrowed $33,000 from my uncle Steve and I used it as to pay rent on this tiny apartment down in the uh East Village I crashed on my friend's couches for a while um and then I I borrowed money from him and I put it as a down payment on this apartment and I wrote submission packets for Letterman asnl Conan um maybe I think that was it because I wanted to be in New York and so I got interviewed at SNL in so I graduated in June in July I got interviewed at SNL uh uh I didn't get hired right away I I we they had they put us in pairs to walk around and meet the producers and I was I walking around with this woman um and I remember very clearly thinking I'm never getting hired
• Segment 42: 50:00 - 52:30 here because this woman is so much funnier than me and so much obviously better for this job than I am uh it was Tina feay I was right uh she got hired I did not and I and when I got that news I was like yes that is that's correct like I spent 11 minutes with her and it was very clear which one of us was ready to work at that show so I kept working and
• Segment 43: 52:30 - 55:00 I got into the into the fall and into the winter and I was sort of halfway through my year of experimentation and I hadn't gotten hired anywhere although John Stewart um had was writing a book and through uh through Steve Higgins who was at SNL the time when I didn't get hired he said my buddy John Stewart is writing a book um and I'm going to set you up on a meeting with him and you can pitch him ideas I met John Stewart and John Stewart paid me like $1,000 three times I think over the course of a few months just pitch them ideas for this book he was writing of Comedy pieces he didn't use any of them at all uh and but he paid me enough money to like keep paying rent and it was it was amazing I'm I still I I saw him a couple years ago and I every time I see him I just like he's like my like he was like the Michi he like he just he just paid me to work um he was medich for a crappy artist like that I didn't give him anything of value um but anyway I got into December and I was thinking all right it's been like six months now and I should probably apply to grad school like I you know you have to apply by January or whatever and just at the moment I was sort of like I I had sent a couple emails I think to like get applications um and then I got a call in classic SNL fashion it was like you uh you star Monday kind of thing like congratulations you start Monday and I started there in January of 98 you and Will Harper have something in common yeah I mean I don't think I came quite as close to quitting as he did and I certainly he had been acting for 13 years and his problem was that he hadn't been like discovered I was just like I don't know if I want to make it or not right um but I started there in January of um of 98 and on day one I love this when I walked through the office I met the woman who would later be my wife oh I didn't think that's where you going JJ JJ and she'd been there for a while
• Segment 44: 52:30 - 55:00 she'd been there for like I think she just started earlier that year maybe halfway through the year before I can't remember but like we you know I was being shown around and she was the writer's assistant at the time and there was like this is Mike he's a new writer and said hi nice to meet you we shook hands I moved on that was it um and then now we've been married for 20 almost 20 years and Mary and I are giggling every night that we sit down to watch is it only murders in the building the full name yeah and see JJ's name producing
• Segment 45: 55:00 - 57:30 and writing episodes did you think I was going with that what were you expecting me to say Where Oh I thought I thought I thought that you you were uh arrived and someone died and somebody or somebody yeah it was all of a sudden an empty set in Union well it it had happened over that sort of holiday break as Chris Farley had Di died and with a couple days earlier I think nor McDonald had been fired from Weekend Update by Don D Don was running NBC and Norm in classic Norm McDonald fashion um had been telling jokes about OJ Simpson for at that point like you know four years and the trial had long since come and gone and he had long since been uh declared innocent and Norm just kept right on telling jokes about OJ Simpson that ol Meer I think was friends with OJ Simpson and called him and said like hey knock it off and nor yeah yeah sure I'll knock it off yeah and then uh and then didn't and then just kept doing it and did it so often that at the end of that half seon uh fired him and it's it's one of the only times I think I've ever known about when Lauren was like overruled by someone at NBC like Lauren is the king of that of fom um but in that instance they had fired norm and so the place was in chaos it was they had fired Norm Colin Quinn was taking over update Chris had died people were mourning his death and and he had been he had hosted the show like a a month earlier and so I started at a very weird moment and I write I wrote about this in the book like it was the luckiest possible thing for me because no one paid attention to me at all like SNL's a big rambling mess of a place there's tons of writers and actors and it's very sort of like let's put on a show Community Theater kind of vibe and so I was I sucked at the job and was allowed to suck for a good you know half a season because no one barely even knew
• Segment 46: 55:00 - 57:30 I was there and that's probably what saved my job but then you got didn't you produce the uh weekend up news that weekend update so I I eventually sort of figured out how to do the job it got a little better at it had some success and then uh my friend Robert Carlock left to
• Segment 47: 57:30 - 60:00 go write for friends and he had been writing right who you know from uh from Mr Mayor and um and he he left to go write for friends and they gave that job to me so I the second half of my time there I was producing Weekend Update with Tina Fay and Jimmy Fallon let me ask you I I know several not really really well but several um people who had been on Saturday Night Live and there it was I mean I can't remember what your quote was that involved you know heroin and it was the story was this was the most supercharged uh example of com comedy writing you could possibly endure yeah it was so high wire you know you had you started with nothing and by Saturday you had to be yeah live and all of that a lot of people walked away because it's also very competitive you know to get your material on and a lot of people the combination of the stress of just the logistics of having to perform every week and whether you'd get your material on the air left them with a little bit of post-traumatic stress yeah I mean a lot of some people thrived you know and where did you fall on that line you weren't performing so you didn't have ego I think the Performing is is really is really hard for folks H it is weird because it's one of the only shows where you're in competition with the other people that you work with most shows are team efforts right all the writers are working on scripts and all the actors are in a cast and one person success is sort of everyone's success and whatever SNL is darwinian it's it's sink or swim kill or be killed nobody uh famously like when you show up on your first day no one tells you where the bathrooms are nobody tells you like how to use the elevators to get down to the to the to 8h and it's just sort of by Design it's a little bit hostile by Design can you swim I hope you can and so I I had a very hard time with it as I think a lot of people do early on and I remember um
• Segment 48: 57:30 - 60:00 I uh I was walking to I was 22 years old when I was hired I just turned 22 and I was walking to work I was walking to 30 Rock I stopped in the Dunkin Donuts I always stopped in and I got a cup of coffee and I was walking toward 30 Rock and all of a sudden I was like oh my God I'm miserable I hate my job like it suddenly it just popped into my head that I was hating it I hated it I was so unhappy and I think what happened was
• Segment 49: 60:00 - 62:30 that I was like I'm what had happened before that was I'm 22 years old I work at Saturday Night Live every party I go to when I tell people what I do it's the coolest answer that everyone that anyone has like everyone else is like I work at Goldman Sachs I work at Morgan Stanley I work at Solomon Brothers I work at Saturday Night Live everyone yes was more interested in me than everybody else right and I think I hadn't allowed myself to conceive of the possibility that I wasn't happy and when it finally popped into my head that I was miserable I had two thoughts number one was what a relief to admit that to myself and number two was I think I have to go to therapy like I think I need therapy and I had never considered therapy before and I suddenly was like I have to go to therapy and I found a therapist and I started going to therapy and when as I did you know learned a lot of stuff about myself that had nothing to do with Saturday Night Live which you might expect but it that basically that moment is the line of delineation between me sucking at that job and me being good at that job it didn't happen immediately but as soon as I was able to admit that to myself I started getting better because I wasn't a clench have a secret yeah and and I it actually created this kind of like organizational like uh uh theory that I have carried with me ever sense which is I believe that no one can do good work in a writer's room if they are not if they don't feel safe and and happy and comfortable like it's just impossible and I I know that because I did not feel comfortable and happy and safe before that moment and I was writing crappy sketches every week because I I was just too tightly wound I was not I was not like it was not sort of like I wasn't enjoying myself I wasn't having fun and so my goal literally ever since I got into a position to actually hire
• Segment 50: 60:00 - 62:30 people on shows was to say to myself I my job here is to make these people feel safe and comfortable and happy and if they don't they're not going to be good at this so it was a very important moment for me and it was the like I said it was the everything before that that I had written sucked and after that some of the stuff I wrote still sucked let's be let's be clear but the stuff that I wrote that didn't suck was not possible until I had that Revelation were you and JJ together at that point uh I don't
• Segment 51: 62:30 - 65:00 remember if they we were together at that exact moment so we started dating she had a boyfriend um at the time there goes the whole ethics conversation no wait wait Ted so she was going to quit because she was going to move out here to be with him and like literally two days or something before she was supposed to move he called her and broke up with her on the phone and so she stayed wow uh thank you sir yeah sad sad for her in that moment good for me because like maybe a few months after that we got together but it was SNL was very weird and it was it's a very strange place and we were kind of like we don't want to like make this public yeah so we sort of dated like in secret for a while she became a writer on the show she was promoted from writer assistant we dated secretly that is not a good idea it never goes well and it was very rough and we were on and off for a long time she eventually moved out here to take a writing job we dated long distance we were on and off a million times again long distance it was it was a mess and then we broke up like for good in like 2002 and then a year later we sort of got back together and then it was like if this is going to work one of us has to move and so I was like all right I'm gonna move so I quit SNL in the after the 2004 season I moved out here to to look for work and that's when I got hired at the office and if she had moved to be with you in New York you probably wouldn't be together I don't think we would know you this was the right move I want you and I'm willing to come I think I was the right move for a bunch of reasons number one is we had already been dating in New York and it had a it was like New York's the best I love it I miss it every day but like it's not an easy place to be in a relationship when you're you know in your mid 20s but also we just needed a fresh start like the two of us specifically needed a FR start and it
• Segment 52: 62:30 - 65:00 was like the way this is going to work is if I move there so I so I left the show was she working she was working on a show yeah she was working on a few shows in fact oddly the show she was working on when I moved out there she'd been on a couple other shows and then she was working on a show called coupling which was an adaptation of a British sitcom that had very it was on NBC it had very high expectations it was introduced as like this is the next friends it's about six single good-looking single people in LA and um it was a really hot show fief Sutton who
• Segment 53: 65:00 - 67:30 wrote for cheers ran that show and um and it was like wow her career is really taking off and then that show didn't work and got cancelled halfway through the first season and then I came out to LA and I interviewed in the show I got hired on was the office an adaptation of a British show it's going to be on NBC no one really believes in it soon right away so I moved out in I move I interviewed for it in in February March April somewhere and got the job and that so when I moved year one or two that was year one that was right so I moved to LA in June I started working at the office right away um but it was sort of like oh boy here we go again an adaptation of a British show this thing has no chance of surviving and then it lasted for nine years right brilliant show I didn't watch it Mary did when it was on the air you know why didn't you watch it I'm curious because I was I think jealous of how good it was I knew it was good even without watching I just knew it was really good and I think I was at the point where I'm going I'm not sure I'm any good at this anymore and we had those kind of doubts and Mary kept telling me you really need to watch and I went no no no I I know I will you know and finally did and actually not finally I I think I think we even became great friends with uh John krinski right and Emily and then I started watching wow and was just I blown away at how brilliant it is and let me just you know this story sorry but John krinski was the person that I uh blew it with you right you know because you know first year of wait we have to set this up properly okay do it please so so when I pitched you the premise of the good place I I pitched you the whole thing all the way through the twist right the twist being spoiler alert that you are not actually the architect of of the good place you are a demon this is the bad place the whole
• Segment 54: 65:00 - 67:30 thing is an illusion meant to torture the four main characters the only people I told this to were you and Christen because again I felt like in order to sign on you should hear the whole story we didn't even tell the other four main actors in the show Manny will jam and Darcy they did not know for most of the first season what was going to happen to them or a lot of the directors who showed up most of the did not know Morgan Saget knew David Miner knew but like most of the crew didn't know and I
• Segment 55: 67:30 - 70:00 and I had said look we are making a huge bet here and the and the bet is that we can get all the way to the end of a season of TV and have something be a real surprise the way that like lost provided Real Surprises at the end of their Seasons like that I and this has to work if this leaks out it could blow the whole thing yeah and you were like absolutely I hear you buddy I hear you loud and clear then then we get all the way to the end and Miracle of Miracles we pull it off yeah and and and the and the the season 1 finale airs and people are genuinely surprised it has a genuine uh uh reaction from from audiences and critics that was like wow that was incredible didn't see that coming that's amazing blah blah blah blah blah as soon as it airs you say to me oh thank God because it turns out you had told everyone no you told you told John right away I told John right away but in my defense in my defense John I I only get I'm only competitive by the way with people who are at least 30 years younger than me smart because then it's worth the challenge so so you know I would try to beat John in a foot race and he would clobber come so anyway he was off to make some amazing movie and he said whatat are you doing I said well I'm about to uh work with your buddy Mike Shore and we're doing something called the good place and and I described uh without blowing the secret I described you know it takes place in the afterlife and I could see this is my interpretation you may have another one I could see his eyes kind of dim a little bit because he was going oh I get it it's the office in heaven right and I saw that I went no no no no you don't understand see at the end of the first year it turns out I'm a demon I'm not the good guy bad guy and he went oh that's pretty cool I went yeah a and oh shoot and then had to sit there with you
• Segment 56: 67:30 - 70:00 know Little Miss Goody Two Shoes but wait didn't you also tell me that you told Larry David or someone you you told someone else someone no I I tell Larry David's secrets to the world oh okay but I I don't know who I'm sure if I told one because we we had been laughing about and sharing the story about you telling John krinski with other people for a while and then I remember there being someone where you're like oh yeah you know what I also told this person
• Segment 57: 70:00 - 72:30 I'm sure I'm sure hey if it's a secret that is um important like your personal life I'm good I'm good but if it's something that will advance uh people's impression of me in the moment forget it not Advance the work you're doing but advance advance increase your status amongst another celebrity yeah then all bets are off especially if they're lording it over me especially if they're 30 years feature he was going off to well we we got away with it the point is you don't you have nothing to um you don't have to feel any regret or Shame about and at that point I was you know a demon who hadn't be become humanized so my ethics did suck but it was for the part it did it for the part that's a good excuse let me ask you something that I then we'll wrap up and I clearly adore you I'm so grateful you came in it's so much fun to talk to you because so many times I need you to be doing what you're doing which is making this amazing thing that I can play in I'm supposed to be there right now by the way oh I I'll cut this short sorry um I don't even know if there's anywhere to go with this but taking the world that we see on CNN or whatever wherever you get your news and then answer this question I grew up around scientists my father was an archaeologist Anthropologist but we had scientists from all over the world around me growing up and I remember always hearing about pure science and then applied science and applied science was kind of looked down on meaning pure science is in a vacuum you just are going for that truth in that Mo in that scientific moment whereas applied science you are applying it to make something better in the world I I you know I don't think that there's such a thing as pure ethics or philosophy anymore I mean I think yes
• Segment 58: 70:00 - 72:30 there is but I don't think I think it's a waste personally I think you need to have apply eth it has to be applied ethics it has to be applied philosophy where do you come down on that if it's a worthwhile question at all no it is and there are there are folks who um who I would say specialize in applied ethics and there it's a Sim there's a similar dynamic in ethics um I think the line between the two maybe isn't as bright and clear as it is in um in
• Segment 59: 72:30 - 75:00 science in part because the nature of studying ethics requires you at certain points to lay out a theory and then kind of road test it right you say like okay well here's my theory now let me devise a scenario in which I could test out how this Theory would work and so it even if those are those thought experiments are purely imaginary it's still you're still trying to apply it to the real world that's what the trolley problem is it's what all of those problems are is you're saying okay well let's try to figure out how this Theory would function on in the real world and I don't think there in this day and age there's a lot of tolerance for theories that have no practical application because problems that face us are enormous and they're they're everywhere and and we are constantly wrestling with them whether it's you know climate change or racism or misogyny or any of the sort of big gigantic overwhelming issues that are causing pain in the world if you come up with a philosophical Theory it's like all right well does it work like do do something with it right right and so I think it's certainly it's obviously worth worth thinking about I I just think that the I think the scientific version of it is a little more like because it's science it's a little more nuts and it's a little like okay well instead of like abstract mathematical theories like let's try to figure out how to launch this satellite into orbit and keep it there so that we can all talk to each other on cell phones the the philosophy part of it is it it's it's not as satisfying I think because these are problems without Immediate Solutions they're they don't have tangible outcomes if we manage to um if we manage to come up with some philosophical the for why that that's really solid and really well reasoned for why we should all Drive electric cars that's great if we can come up with a scientific object
• Segment 60: 72:30 - 75:00 that captures carbon from the atmosphere and and reduces climate change by 8% over the next two years that's life saving so I I think people just are less um focused on this on the philosophy than they are and the science for good reason we have we have scientific problems right now in addition to these massive philosophical on um thank you thank you so much I had so much fun
• Segment 61: 75:00 - 77:30 talking to you and I can't wait for us to you know new adventure new adventure yeah thanks for having me yeah thanks