Listen Again: Julia Gets Wise with Catherine O'Hara

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Good thing, you can try it risk-free for 90 days right now and get $75 off with code HMDK. Visit mill.com slash HMDK. That is mill.com slash HMDK. Hey, it's me, Julia Louis-Dryfus. We are officially back with a brand new season of Wiser than me. To celebrate your out of this world's support for our show, we've been brewing up something special. A Wiser than me, mere traveler. It's a versatile, sustainable travel mug to keep your coffee hot and your tea cozy all year round. It's perfect for wise women on the go. Head over to Wiser than me shop.com to grab yours now. Okay, here's the show. So in my career, I've done mostly comedy and my fondest memories are working with other actors to perfect a bit to like mine a moment for the most comedy possible. Honestly, I don't think about kudos or awards or reviews or paychecks or anything like that. And it's actually not even the laughs. It's rehearsing to get the laughs. There's a scene in a Veepe episode, for example, when I'm telling Tony Hell who plays Gary that the president is resigning. So my character, Selena Meyer, the Veepe is going to become president. And we're in a bathroom, a dingy bathroom, and in the scene we're kind of laughing and crying, and then he gets a bloody nose. And oh my god, we worked on that scene forever. It was exhausting, but over and over and over. Looking for like little things we could bring to the scene, you know, like things that sort of, in fact, pull out of a bag within the scene, I'm pulling stuff out of a bag. And when I watch it now, that's what I remember. The work, the joyful teamwork that Tony and I did in rehearsal and while shooting, you know, not the laughs per se. But when you don't get the laughs, oh my goodness, you certainly do remember that. When I was just getting started, I was part of the practical theater company in Chicago. And our show, which was called the practical theater company's Golden 50th anniversary Jubilee, which was a joke, of course, because the company was new, hadn't been around very long. It was a giant hit. And I'd never been in a giant hit before, and it was incredibly exciting. We were the toast of the town. The show was selling out and the laughs we were getting, were incredible. It was the culmination of a huge amount of work and joy, exactly when I was just talking about. So the producers of SNL came to see the show and they loved it and they hired all of us to come to New York and be a part of SNL Saturday Night Live. Of course, we go to New York and the SNL producers really wanted the current cast and writers to see what they had seen in Chicago. So they rented this very cool off-Broadway house and they brought in a big, enthusiastic audience and they had us recreate the whole hit show. Oh, wait a minute. Sorry, no, they didn't do that at all. Uh-uh. They had us four complete and total unknowns perform the first act of the show. Oh my God, in the SNL office under fluorescent lights in the middle of the day, in front of 20 very cynical, unfriendly SNL cast members and writers who already hated us because a bunch of their best friends had just been fired to make room for us, okay? We never had a chance. Sketches that had killed in Chicago died a terrible, terrible death that day. It was excruciating. And that's when I learned what a flop sweat really is. I mean, I can feel it now as I'm recounting this. And I think that humiliation influenced our whole SNL experience for the next couple of years to tell you the truth. I mean, if I could do it all over again, well, I can't do it all over again, can I? I mean, you live, you learn and whatever. I've learned a lot since that cringy day in a carpeted office on the 17th floor of 30 rock. But one of the most enduring lessons that I have learned on Wiser than me is that there are so many ways to move forward confidently and positively even in the face of great challenges. And it reminds me of one of my favorite improv lessons, Yes and. That is the great Viola Spolen's first rule of improv. You always say Yes and in an improv. So like, for example, if somebody comes into a scene and says, Hi, I'm an astronaut, you don't say, No, you're not an astronaut. You say, Yes, and I'm so looking forward to hearing your astronaut poetry tonight or whatever. Yes and. That is so applicable to life off the stage as well as on it. Really, honestly, all of life is really a great big improv in the end, relationships and work situations. I mean, it's all about collaborating and paying attention and accepting what others bring to the party and building on that and of course making big choices. It's just a great thing and paradoxically, another great thing I've learned from the women on this show is that no is a complete sentence. Weird how that too is in the end, a positive, empowering kind of truth, two sides of a Wiser than me coin. And I have to say speaking of Wiser than me, I really, really want you to know how happy I am to have you nice audience people listening to and enjoying these conversations, saying yes and to our show. I'm so grateful, I really am. So thank you dear listeners and yes and right back at you for real. How apropos then that today we are talking to the inestimable improv queen Catherine O'Hara. Oh, yeah. I'm Julia Louis-Dreyfus and this is Wiser than me, the podcast where I get schooled by women who are Wiser than me. There's nothing like improvisation. I love it. In my experience, the best improvisers are pretty much always the best listeners. That's the key to any great performance, comedy or drama listening. Our guest today is one of the finest listeners in the business and to me, that means one of the finest actors. Catherine O'Hara and I share similar origin stories. She started on stage at Second City Toronto. I started on stage at Second City Chicago, although it was a touring company. She went on to Second City TV. I went on to SNL. She's been with her husband 36 years. I've been married 37 and we both have two perfect boys. We've known each other for decades through mutual friends, but we've never actually gotten to work doing other god damn it and I vowed to change that. Catherine's TV career took off alongside fellow SCTV comedy legends, John Candy, Eugene Levy, Joe Flarity, Andrea Martin, Dave Thomas, and Harold Raymas. This was pretty much the exact same time that SNL was exploding here in the States. SCTV, frankly, was always sort of the cool Canadian step sister to Saturday Night Live. It was weirder, it was deeper, hip-hop, for sure, more daring, and for me the heart of the show was always Catherine O'Hara. She's not just funny, she's fearless, and that's an absolute joy to watch. She followed up SCTV working on tons of TV shows, often with her SCTV pals, and even dabbled in fancy director land with Marty Scorsese and after hours, and then came home alone, and just like that, she was the blockbuster mom, which I rewatched last night, by the way. It holds up completely. And then Christopher Gas started to make his improvised movies, starting with Waiting for Guffman and Best in Show, and she's basically stolen every scene in every one of them. And I haven't even mentioned her Emmy award-winning turn on Shits Creek, and I'm not gonna go through every credit and every award because Holy crap, Catherine O'Hara likes to work. But you get the idea she's unbelievably funny. Truth is, if you're watching something and Catherine O'Hara comes onto the screen, you just know that every time she's gonna score, every time, follow SCTV alum Marty Short set of Catherine, she is one of the most loyal, wise human beings I've ever known, which of course makes her perfect for our little podcast here. I couldn't be more excited to welcome to the show and actor, mother, comedy legend, and woman who is truly wise within me, the exquisite Catherine O'Hara. Hi, Catherine. Oh my Lord, yeah, that's too much, thank you, too much. Oh, it's not too much. It's over now, right? That's it. That's it. That's the end of the podcast, Catherine. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining. I love that. I love to hear it all those nice things. Yeah. Okay, bye. Yeah. They're true. So are you comfortable if I ask your real age? If you tell yours, yeah, I will. I'm 70. I'm 63. Oh, you baby. I know, I'm just a we-thing. You are a dear little thing. And how old do you feel? Really? How old do you feel? I don't know. Well, I feel what I am. I don't know who knows what anything is supposed to feel like. Yeah, I know, but when you hit 70, which is a big marker, did you think like, wow, this isn't what I thought 70 feels like. The only reason I said that is because that was true for me when I hit the markers, even starting with 30 hours, remember like, 30, it sounded so adult. And I was like, I don't feel like that, you know? Well, that's what I'm saying. You never really feel like you've been told you're supposed to feel or the way you imagine others feel. Yeah, right. I feel, I don't want to say young, but I don't feel old. Oh, that's a good answer. That, yeah, I feel the same. I feel the same. Yeah. Why? I just feel like I'm lucky to be alive, for sure. Yeah. And I don't know. I don't know what it's supposed to feel like. What do you think is the best part about being your age, though? Is there a best part? Oh, boy, being alive. And I don't think of my age. Except sometimes I'll be around a bunch of younger people. You know, working sometimes you work in my case, you work. And you're often the oldest person on set. Yeah. And I don't even think of the age. But if I did, I would say, oh, we're all the same age, even though we're not. Yeah. But we're all human beings, relating. We're all, you know, on a set. We're all working on a show. We're all, you know, serving the story and having fun. And, you know, working together. And then I go in, sometimes I think, wow, at best, maybe the look at me is like some adorable old lady. I'm saying it best. No, I know at best. But it's funny that you say that because as you're saying, I'm thinking, well, yeah, it makes sense because particularly in our business, you're on set with other actors, you're playing. It's playful. God willing. It's a playful environment, right? And so that sort of age drops off in that environment. Yes. But I've had the same experience of being on set and thinking, well, what the fuck? Like I just did this Marvel movie and, well, first of all, I don't know any of the references anybody's making to the Marvel Universe number one, but also like, culturally and everybody is my children's age, like almost everyone on set. Wow. Yeah. That is funky town. This doesn't have to do with anything at all, but we both have both have, it doesn't. It's not really even appropriate for the spot. But it cares. We both have Pope stories because I heard you got in trouble. Yes. I heard you got in trouble at the Vatican and you got yelled at by a priest. And you talk about that what happened? What did you do? Etc. What happened? This is so stupid to even tell it, but I will anyway. I met my husband, Bo Welch. He was a production designer on the first Beal juice movie. Yes. And Tim Burton basically made him ask me out. And because I was grousing to Tim that this guy was talking to me every day and never asking me out. And so Tim said, let me see what I could do. He did talk to him. And Bobby gradually asked me out. And now we're still married. They're goodness. But Tim also gave us an amazing wedding gift, which was a private tour at the Vatican. Oh, it was a wedding gift. Yeah. Only Tim Burton would give a present like that. That's amazing. Somebody had given him the gift and he'd been blown away. So he passed it on, which is really wonderful and generous. So this lovely priest, Cardinal took us all around the Vatican and he was wild. He took us everywhere, including I swear the Pope's closet. He took us on the elevator that the Pope takes down to the St. Peter's Basilica to his name Mass. He took us in this beautiful little museum, private museum full of in glass cases, all the gifts given to the Vatican from all over the world. Wow. Crowns and jeweled. I don't know what are and he'd let us open the case and take out crowns of pretend to be putting them in my husband's backpack. And we're laughing. But when we were where we thought was the Pope's closet, then another priest came by it. It's our guide that got yelled at us, actually, although we were part of it for sure, because we're all in there laughing. Got it. Yeah. Not a big closet. It was a small closet. Well, it's just probably the same thing over and over again, isn't it? Yeah, it's not that much for our ideas, sir. What happens is the closet used to wear. What's your Pope's story? Yeah. The story is that I give an email from Stephen Colbert that says, the Pope wants to meet a bunch of people in comedy. Are you available to go? So the first thing I do is I text Stephen because I think maybe this is like, he's been hacked or something for real. And he said, no, no, that's real. He didn't ask for money though. No, he didn't ask for money, but that could have been in the second email. So I was being careful. Anyway, it's true. Long story short, a bunch of us end up at the Vatican. Yeah. So I was very, very happy with the Pope who wanted to have make a speech about the importance of laughter and comedy and the spirituality of that and, you know, which is very, very nice. I was totally flabbergasted at the pomp of it. Yeah. I mean, it feels very, and I don't mean this as disrespectfully as it might sound, but it feels very wizard of Aussie, you know what I mean? With, well, you know, with the guys and they've got, they've got their costumes that these, what are they called the Swiss guard come walking in with the stripes and the feathers on top of their head? Yeah. And you expect them to say, oh, you know, you know, you're grading on a Pope curve. This Pope is a, is a good guy. Yeah. Yeah, I is. But I, I highlight grading on a Pope curve. I knew that event happened and I was very jealous. You should have been there as silly that you weren't. Yeah. Come on. I'm Catholic. I know. Did you get to speak with him? I shook his hand. Yeah. Wait. You had a picture. Oh, shit. Where did I put that fucking picture? Anyway, whatever. I shook his hand and I said, God bless you and he said God bless you too. That's great. So that was nice. And then, but the real kicker was David Sideris was there. Do you know David Sideris? Yeah. Okay. David, of course I know. Okay. So we're talking afterwards and David says that he's going to go to the Pope store there. It's that store in, in Rome that sells all the Pope clothing. And actually, I was going to go there too because you can get like good red Pope socks and stuff. And I said, okay, I'm going to go with you. And we ended up going to that store together. And he bought all of these robes, all of these like priestly robes with the red sashes and all the rest of it because, you know, well, he likes to dress in costume a lot and he said he thought he would wear this to do his work. I'm amazed that that is available. Yeah, I'm amazed too. I didn't know that. Yeah. It's not, um, what's that called appropriation? What's that? Yes. He wrote about it in the New Yorker and I'll send you the, the story because he wrote a whole story about going to the Pope. It's very good. Excellent. But there's a joke at the top of it that I totally credit him with. It's not my joke, but it's incredible. And it goes like this, two priests were driving a car together down a highway and they get pulled over by a cop. And the cop comes up to the window, this is rolled in your window and he says, we're looking for two child molesters and the priests look at each other and they look back at him and they go, we'll do it. No, no. I'm sorry. I know. It's terrible. It's terrible. I know. Bless yourself. I'm sorry. I wonder if good Catholic girl. Apologies. No, don't apologize. A good joke is a good joke. A good joke is a good joke. Yes. Speaking of Catholicism, I read your first role was playing the Virgin Mary in a nativity play. It's really sad. No, it's a, it's a starring part. No, it was in a thing at the park, up the street from our house. Yeah. Well, we have to all start somewhere. What are they going to do put you on on stage and Broadway? It's however old you were. It's great. I mean, how did you remember it? All I remember is my mom would bring it up here once in a while. Was it I lost her lovely blue house coat? Oh, your mom let you give it to the costume department and you lost it. Baby blue. Yeah. Is that a cute hilarious story? It's hilarious. It's so sad. But you know what? This reminds me of when what was I watching that you were doing? Oh, it was waiting for government and you and Fred were doing a scene and you did something so brilliant where you were mouthing his lines. Do you remember that? And it reminded me of watching kids in a school play. Oh, yeah. Yeah, right? Yeah. And always somebody who knows the entire thing backers and forwards. And in fact, I remember once we went to some play at school on my son Henry's class, I think. And one kid on stage when he didn't have a line, he would turn and start to talk to his friends who are watching in the audience. No. Yeah. Get no sense of keeping the thing going. If he didn't have a line, he didn't need to worry about the show. Wow. Isn't that incredible? Yeah, it worked with people like that. Haven't you? I actually have. No. If they're not talking, there's nothing going on. Right. There's nothing worth seeing completely. Talk about not listening. I love that. That's really good. Yeah, it's funny. Much more with Catherine O'Hara after this quick little break. 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I know you were long-term friends with incredible guilds or radener. And you met her when you were young because she was dating your brother, which is extraordinary. By the way, I had when I was growing up, I had a picture of her on the bulletin board of my teenage bedroom just as an FYI. Did you? I did. Did you ever get to meet her? No. Oh, sorry. I know. What if being close to her teach you? Well, now that I think of it, I think she was just a great example of doing her work and being so lovely and talented and hilarious and also being just a lovely person. Just being a kind person. Like there was no... Yeah, that it was two different worlds, but it was also just one beautiful person that she was. It was just she was consistent. Consistent like she was just herself on stage, even though she did a ton of characters and totally herself. I'm not explaining it right. What are you doing? Are you asking chat, GBT? Where? No. For help? No, because you looked away like you're going on to like a computer to look at something nice to say about Guilder Adner. That would have been great. Nice thoughts on Guilter. Oh, wait, I had these memorized. I thought. What happened? No, and then when I got in second city, I got in because she was like, you know, I was no, and then when I got in second city, I got in because she left. I was understudied to her and Rosemary Radcliffe, the other woman in the cast at the time. Wow. Yeah. And Guilder went on to do National Ampune, which led to her during Saturday Night Live. No, I so I only knew her for that period, but I really could honestly say I wouldn't know anything about... Relaxing or improv or comedy, I don't think without watching her or have all the opportunities. I know without knowing her at all, I just really imitated her when I understudied her. All I do was try to imitate her before I could develop my own characters. You know, I got out of high school. I shouldn't even admit this. I didn't go to college unless you call second city university of comedy. Why can't you? I'm going to forever. Yeah. To my kids anyway. Yeah. No, I got out of high school and she was in our lives and then she went and did second city and I followed her there and got to understud here. I wouldn't have known about any of it. I didn't... You know, this is pre-internet and I'm so glad I got to have this experience pre-internet. Yeah. And to be that blindly optimistic about thinking, hey, why not just try this? Like, there's no one else in the world except these few people in Toronto who are trying to do this. So why can't I try it too? That's kind of incredible. So you didn't have any feeling of... Well, I mean, of course, if you're trying something, it could fail miserably, but you have to be willing to take that risk and then you... And if it does, then you do it again and you try something else and hopefully it doesn't fail, right? But how great. But how great to be able to fail. Yeah, you have to be able to fail. To not have strangers watching and commenting. Oh, yes. That's the internet. I feel bad. I feel bad for people starting out now because it just takes away your ability to take risks. You don't try things. To take risks. Yes, your sense of confidence, your sense of abandon. Abandon. Yeah. And when you're starting out to have to lock into something so quickly instead of trying you know, a thousand different things, why not? Why not? Either you can't. I don't think you can have that same experimentation if you're sending it out to the world. So you felt that experimentation doing second-city. You felt that abandoned there for sure, right? Oh, I didn't even think about it. That was the way it was. Isn't that the way it was when you got in? But I was in the tree. Well, wait a minute. Let me be clear. I was in the touring company. So we were only doing other people's material. Right. It was obviously very male centric, but everything is, it seems. We can get into that. But it was not particularly, my group was not a particularly happy group of people. And there were a lot of drugs and there was a lot of drinking. Wow. And what year was that when you got in? 80, 81 in that area. However, I had the experience that you're talking about doing a theater with another theater group, practical theater group, which is in Chicago. And that was my husband's theater group, then boyfriend or not even actually. Anyway, whatever. And so, but I had that feeling of like, wait, this might be funny. Let's try this. Let's see if that. Yes. It was like a playful thing without inhibition, which is a really like a gift, the gift of all gifts, right? Isn't that the best? And what a great age. I've often thought of this, what a great age to be in an ensemble because you, you know, in your early 20s. Yes. It's great age to be at because you look at the world. You just think you know more than everyone else and you look at the world and you say, if I had that power, I would do that better. If I had that job, I would do that better. I just, you just have a great natural cockiness at that age. And you're oblivious. Really. That's why. That's what I would miss for people about the internet that you could be oblivious and just think, I'm going to try this. Why not me? And it's such a good point. And it's that way. And it felt that way. Yeah. That cockiness at that age. But you're not really, you don't really have it together. So you surround yourself, if you're lucky, with really good talented people who are all kind of at the same stage, right? Like, nervy cocky, but with talent. So you're lifting each other up, you know, challenging each other. But so it's a great mix of great confidence and oh my god, take care of me. Oh, I'm following you. You know, give me something to work with here. Yeah, it's great confidence. And it's a team sport. Yeah. Hey, Katherine, do you remember any of the improv games you used to play back then? There was one Joe Flairity had us do. Remember when I first got in the cast, maybe I was still understanding. I got to hang out with all of them at rehearsal. And Joe had a play game where you had to do, had to imitate a stand up comic at the time. But you had to do it instantly, like improvise, improvise a stand up act. But you didn't have to have the jokes. You just had to have the rhythm of the jokes. So I don't know if they would give us a name, but they would definitely give us a topic. And at the time it was this comic, Tody Fields, who would be out of touch. Sure. Yeah. You don't remember. Okay. No, I do. I remember. Everybody was so good at it. Oh my Lord, they were all so good at it. I was not particularly good at it, but I do remember what I did. What did you do? I tried to do Tody Fields, but I said, I, I, uh, it's like, I met a fella and I asked him if we could go out. I said, how about you go out Friday? He said, don't I'm busy? I said, how about you go out Saturday? No, I'm busy. How about you go out with me Sunday? No, I'm busy. I couldn't get a date. There's like no joke. There's rhythm of the jokes. Sorry, I didn't even do it right. No, you did. It's perfect. Good game. This is such a good game. We gave my nephew roller skating and George Carlin and he used the mic so beautifully about swish. What's it feel like? Where are you going? You know, all like my sister, my name was Scabies, Scabies Lice or something. She was like, you know, a heady kind of comic, you know, with her notepad. It's kind of, what's on my mind right now? It would be really easy about it. This is new comedy. I don't know. It's sort of like Stephen Rape. It's a good game. Remember Stephen, right? Yes. Yes. Love him. It's a quote. It's a big world. I wouldn't want to paint it. Right. Open 24 hours. I knocked on the door. It was closed. I knocked some more. I came to the door. Is this 24 hours? Not in a row. Do you still, sorry, I'm going to ask you a question, please. Yes, sure. Do you still draw on everything you learned at Second City? Well, maybe not. Maybe more of your other company. Practical theater company. Yes. Yeah. Maybe, yeah. Do you feel like you draw still on what you learned there? Yeah. I draw on that and I draw. But it's not one specific place. I mean, there's a lot to be said for experience. And I draw on all of it. You know, for real. I mean, I draw on being live on SNL, performing live, that schedule, which was grueling. You would go in on a Monday. You'd meet whoever is hosting. And then Monday and Tuesday, writers, actors and actor writers would stay up all night. It was a very sort of drug-driven schedule. And it's still like that. I don't mean to suggest they're doing drugs. But it was sort of driven by late night partying. But at any rate, everybody's staying up late, writing sketches, writing sketches. And then Wednesday, you would have a table read in which you would read all the sketches. And then after the table read, the producers would decide what's going in the show. And then you would rehearse that Thursday, Friday, and then Saturday, your live. And so what was the schedule for you guys at SCTV? We would start writing. I guess, I don't know, months before shooting. We would just sort of continue writing and shooting all along. Like I've heard at SNL, if a scene doesn't make it into the show, it's more than it's dead. It's dead. It's dead. It's crazy. It's crazy. We would rework stuff and over and over. We never gave up on a good idea, the way you thought it was a good idea. Wow. No, it was a whole different, we never had an audience. So we were just trying to make each other laugh. Yeah, it was way a thousand times more relaxed. Yeah. That's incredible. We had no sense of anybody watching the show until years later, people would come and talk to us about it. My dad thought I was just making a big mistake. Oh, he did? Why? Because he was nervous for me. He's nervous for all of us. There's seven kids. Nervous for all of us about what we're going to do with our lives. And I said I wanted to be acting. And it didn't, I don't think it made sense until people at work said they saw me on SCTV. Then it was like, oh, okay, she's safe. It's okay. It's okay. Oh. Oh. But yeah, no, very relaxed. I hosted Saturday Night Live twice and was shocked at how many good pieces that that read through didn't make it to show. Yeah. The stuff that I thought was funny, I guess I've done wrong taste. Well, I mean, good stuff made it. But so much good material that would get laughs and it's gone then, isn't it? It's gone. It's totally dead. I mean, occasionally something will come back, but I don't know. That's the culture of the place. But I mean, it stands to reason that good things get lost because you read so many sketches. I mean, it goes on for hours and hours. It's a pile, you know, two feet high of sketches. Wow. You know, it's funny because when I went back to host, I've hosted a couple times and it was hugely, it was like going back to high school and getting to redo things. Do you know what I mean? Oh, nice. Yeah. It was because I knew how the show worked. I knew what I needed to do to succeed on the show. And the schedule hadn't changed since I was there in the 80s. It was the exact same thing. The only thing that was different was obviously a different cast, definitely more female, friendly and different producers. And they wanted to find material for you to do? Yes. As opposed to she can be the waitress. Your coffee, Mr. Gumby. And Andrew and Caster can come in as the wives. They'd come in as the waitress sister. They'd come in as a tell me about it. What about, I read that you were when I guess was at SCTV that you would tell your ideas to Dave Thomas and he would pitch him? Isn't that sad? Yes, it is sad. No, he wouldn't pitch them on my behalf. He would just pitch them if it was a good idea. Yes, but you gave a permission to do that. Well, I'm spoken, I guess. I would say, well, what if we, what if we do? And they'd say, hey, what if others have, and if they laugh, he'd just go along with that and sometimes I was, that's my idea, which is really sad. Excuse me, that's my idea. Hello. When, was there a moment in your life when you thought, I'm not going to do that anymore, I'm going to pitch it myself. Do you remember? No, I don't. I don't remember. No, I'm still scared. See, this is what I want to talk to you about because I was wondering when I read that my thought, I was so used to being shut down. Oh, yeah, that was just part of the thing. It was, I don't know, if I think it's a woman thing, I think it's a woman thing. Anyway, I think you're probably right. I think I am. But let me see, I would say that, are you looking at, are you looking at chess? Yeah, I'm looking at AI to help me get through this because I'm having, what would you mean? Let me just keep it. Julia, you are one of three women in the, okay, yes, AI is helping me here. Yes. But there was, and I still fight it, a remnant of, for example, when I'm pitching something, you know, whatever, any aspect of a scene or this or that, there's a part of me that has to push through that pitch because that's a remnant of from way back then, of not being heard. And I think it also leaves me with a little defensiveness about my ideas that's probably not healthy. But I mean, I'm aware of it as it's happening. Do you kind of know what I'm talking about? Oh, yeah. Oh, I would start most, if I'm conscious, try to be conscious of it, then I'll try not to do it. But I would start most ideas with, sorry, this might not work, but what about this? Yeah. Sorry, I know you're doing that, but, yeah, I'm sorry, always a sorry. I'm going to do that at a restaurant, though, sorry, could I get more tea, please? Yeah. Yeah. Sorry, remember I asked for tea in our account, it's okay, sorry. I'm so sorry, I didn't order this hamburger. I'm so sorry, I ordered a salad. Sorry, sorry, would you mind taking it back? I'll still pay, but please, sorry. I'm sorry, this is a question. I think I'm sorry, I was standing in line here. Oh, you want to go ahead, yeah, go ahead. Oh, it's fine. No, no, no, it's fine. I said, sorry, I said sorry to a key on my, on my iPad or computer, if I hit the wrong one. Sorry. Oh, dude. Is that bad? Well, you might want to get a cat scan after we finish this conversation, just saying. It's time for a break. We'll get more wisdom from Catherine O'Hara in just a moment. Spring invites a reset. Windows open, shelves cleared, only what's useful and well made, kept in rotation. Closets can follow the same rule. Fewer pieces, better pieces, nothing wasteful. 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Only in the last few years, that I find out that John Candy also got. Okay, explain that. The two women in John Candy got paid less than everyone. Now, John, God bless him turned it around big time as the years went on. Yes. He got a lawyer and he got more than anybody and good for him. Well, so maybe it was about why you just had shitty representation or was it? We had no representation. Oh, well, so there's the real problem. These are the days when you didn't need representation. They just said we're going to pay you $200 a week. And you're like, yes. Oh, that was exactly what it was like for me. I know. I remember. And I'm not kidding. Of course you're not kidding. I remember that when I got first hire to do second-city and I was doing, I was in, I was still at school at Northwestern in Chicago. Yeah. I called my acting teacher and I said, guess what? But his name was Bud Byer. He's passed away. And I said, guess what? I just got hired to do second-city and he said, how much are they paying you? And I said, yeah, he said that as opposed to anything else. And I said, oh, I don't know. I forgot to ask. And then he laughed at me and made me feel so bad about myself. I mean, he was like, oh, God, you're kidding. Oh, he's. It was a real asshole move. Boy, was he jealous? Like he wouldn't be able to teach you. He wouldn't be able to, you would stop doing classes with him or something? Well, guess what? I kind of did because that was coming. See, he knew that was coming. Yeah. I started doing theater in Chicago and I took a lot of pass fails and put off semesters and things like that. But anyway, it's all good. It all worked out. Talk about when something ends. I know when a show ends, it can be so emotional. And I know that Marty Shorty threw a party for you and he played a bunch of clips of your time at SCTV. It was so emotional. That's the very sweet of him to have done that, isn't it? Why are you laughing? He didn't do it. Yeah, he did. I think he did it to torture me. I don't know if he was doing it to be sweet. Oh, for real. No, there was a party. No, it was a party. It was a party at the end of a season, I guess. And I had given my notice that I was leaving. And it was all about my personal life. I swear, my quitting. I got out of high school and got into second-city. That was my life. Right. And second-city to SCTV. I just went along like, oh, never do this. Never get paid. Oh, it's amazing. Yeah. And then I finally hit at some point at this reality, like, where is my life going? And I need to focus on that other part, like meeting someone. I mean, I was raised to think you get married and you have children if God willing. And that's your life. Yeah, so I quit mainly for that reason. So it was really emotional. I didn't want to leave the show really. I didn't want to quit, but I thought if I don't focus on, I don't know. I'm not sure it was the smartest thing. Really made my dad sad because he was so happy at the show was doing well. And he heard about it at work. That was awful. But yeah, anyway, so yeah, there was a party at the end of the season at Marty's house. And he put a clip package together of my work. Oh, it was just like, why? Why did it do this to me, Marty? That was my reaction. I just were going outside the house crying. It's like, Catherine, I thought it'd be fun. Sorry. Oh, I see. Tell it. Okay. Got it. I did work with Chris on all the movies that you worked with him on. Chris Guests. All of that stuff's improvised, although there's an outline, correct? The way Larry David does on curb. Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's no dialogue right now, though they would have food. They definitely have great running jokes. Yes, of course. You know, like in Best and Show, it was in the script that I would run into guys who had the best sex of their lives with me. I mean, and couldn't be better. That's what I wanted for all my characters. And Chris never repeated it. From take to take, when you're improvising all your dialogue like that, and you do, you don't want to three takes, whatever you think, I came up with something there. Just happened. And now do I repeat it? Is that cheesy to repeat it? And how can I get that joke in? What if that take isn't used? And maybe it's a sound problem or whatever the shot and it's like, we came up with that. Like, where does that go? Can we don't have to be? There's always that challenge in the brain. Like, no, open up, just be open to whatever happens. You know, just listen. Chris Gas would never repeat a thought between takes. Oh, really? As an actor, he would. Crazy. As an improviser, just so free thinking. Wow. We did that on VEEP. We used to, it wasn't necessarily an outline, but very often there would be scenes and Armando Inuchi, who created the show. Yeah. He would say, okay, forget the script. Just go and do something. Go. Just go, try this in rehearsal. One for fun, whatever. You know you've got to get to point A to point B. And it was so much fun to do that kind of thing. Terrifying. But as long as you know what point A and point B is, then you can't. You know the parameters? Yes. I find when it's just open and says, hey, why don't you improvise something? Like, what? Within what? What are you talking about? Right. How in time are you working a lot? Well, you're doing a podcast. So obviously you love working. You know, I love working. I don't love being away from home. And even now, I mean, my kids are grown. Let's talk about that. So you have two sons and so do I. Yes. Don't you just want to raise them to be lovely partners to somebody just? Yes. You do. And are they? Are your sons partners anywhere? Yeah. They both live with their girlfriends. They are good guys and they and they really love each other. Do you two get along? Like that. They're like the biggest thieves. I mean, I think they're like that wonderful. Yes. It's all. That's my biggest triumph in life, actually. Yeah. Yeah. How did you do that working when they were little? How'd you figure that out? I didn't. I really didn't work much. Oh, you didn't work much. No, I didn't. No. And I'd work in town. The first offer I got to work, they were both how old were they? Probably about five and eight, maybe six and nine. And I got offered a job in London. And yeah, and it was a six week job. And we had a great nanny at the time. She wasn't living, but she was a great, great, great girl. So they came for two weeks. I was alone for two weeks. They came back for two weeks. You don't got them out of school, whatever. So you've always heard that with relationships with couples, two weeks is the limit, it should go longer than that apart, unless it works for both of you, I guess. Right. Same for kids. Yeah. So that worked at that age. What about you when they were little when they were little? When they were little. I mean, yeah, I was doing sign film when I had both of them. So with their five years apart. And so with my older son Henry, I bring him to work. I had a nursery on set. And so he came to work with our nanny. And so I go back and forth. Frankly, that was really hard, because there was always this pull in one direction or the other. And it was sort of hard to a certain extent to kind of be where you were. But that's how I did it. And then I had our second son Charlie, just it was just that last year of sign fell. So he was just a baby. And then I realized it was better for me to leave him at home and go to work and then come back. But I mean, we were in we were all in LA. So it wasn't like I was on location or anything like that. So Henry had a memory of me working. He remembered craft service. He was just like crazy. Oh, yeah. They love that. They love it. Does Charlie just Charlie Phil ripped off because he didn't get to be on the set all the time? No, I don't think so. There's a picture of him on set in the in the sign fell diner that I have him on the tip. No, he doesn't feel ripped off at all. But what I was going to say is that a couple years later, I did go back to work. I was doing a series, but it was a single camera series called watching LA. And I was I had not been gone from home while he was young. And so now he was like four. And he came to set one day and I was showing them the sets inside the studio. And one of the sets was a bedroom. And so I was pointing it all out. And then that's he was leaving. He says, Mommy, I love your new bedroom. I thought this child. I've moved here. Oh, the guilt. That's great. That's cute. Oh, but now, but your boys are in your boys are in the business. Is that right? Yeah. Well, the older one, the 30 year old is doing was doing set construction. And the younger one who's 27 is a set dresser in Vancouver. There's tons of work there, but they're so lucky. They have jobs. They're so lucky. They have jobs and both of our boys too are working in this industry. And it is quite a remarkable thing to witness, isn't it? To see them. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm really glad they're artistic. Aren't you glad that your kids are artistic? Yeah. I mean, obviously they're creating making things. That's cool as shit. Well, we definitely encouraged that at home, didn't we? Yeah, we did. Because it's all we knew, frankly, I didn't know anything else. I can't even... Like a sense of humor. I think you're so lucky if you're raised with a sense of humor. Boy, isn't it the truth? It's a gift. It's a gift you either get given or you don't. I don't know how you get. I don't know how you get it on your own. You know, it was Fran Lieberwiss was on this thing and we were talking about that. And she said, it's a sense of humor. It doesn't mean that you are funny, funny, but you have a sense of humor. You understand what is funny. And... Yeah. Which is sort of the beginning for me anyway of all the relationships I have that is top of the list. I mean, or aligned with kindness, I think. Right. It has to be there, doesn't it? Yeah, well you and your husband met in comedy, didn't you? Yes, we did. Yeah, yeah. Talk about your husband, Beau. And can you tell the story of what you wrote in your journal? Do you still write a journal by the way? Do you keep a journal? No, and journal is such a lofty name for what the fuck I was writing. What were you doing, you were... Hey, woke up at 11 again. What am I going to do? Yes, look at her. You could published a pattern. That's your memoir. Oh, sad. Well, that's it. That's called a dead giveaway. Yeah. Tell me what you wrote. Lame, lame, lame, but I did. Yeah, why? This guy, Beau, well, she talks to me every day. Why won't he ask me out? Where's the supposed to get buried? And did you fall in love with him like straight off the bat? Kind of, yeah. And once we did go out, that was it. There was no... Not go. Well, when we've had a couple of breakups, but yeah. You never had a breakup with your husband, have you? No. Have you gone through periods? Sure. Oh, of course. Always. I mean, anybody who says they haven't is, that's life is lying. Yeah. I mean, there's always going to be some conflict, but he's a very nice person. So it all... Aw. I mean, he is, actually. And I get the sense Beau is, too. Yeah, he's a good guy. And we just, we really laugh a lot every day. And your parents were married a long time, right? Yeah, 50, something. 56 years, I guess, when my dad went. Goodness. Well, you're on your way. God bless you. To that. Wait a minute. And then your parents were married that long, and then they died within 10 months of each other. Is that correct? Yeah. Oh, my goodness. That must have been brutal. Well, it was for them. I remember being really grateful. Oh, really? Well, I mean, I always was, but especially grateful at my mom's funeral that my mom and dad had given, because my dad went first. And then my mom died 10 months later, that they had given us each other, because we were all together. They get, you know, they had seven kids. And we're all still going. Thank God. My will just brought this 83. Oh, my goodness. Yeah. And that they just seemed like the most beautiful gift that they'd given us each other to be with. Yeah. Yeah, my mom, you know, you hear that a lot about couples, you know, one dies and the other dies soon. I kind of predicted that about my mother. She was really vivacious and loved, loved painting and drawing and dressing beautifully and talking to everybody on the streets wherever she went. She was friendly with everyone and just, you know, really loved life. But my poor dad had gone through a lot. My mom took care of her for years. And I think that really just wore her down physically. So wasn't, I don't think it was a typical like, oh, my world, he's gone. So my world has gone. She was, she was physically done. She was done. Yeah. What did they teach you about marriage? Do you think in retrospect? Oh, you got a laugh laughing, making each other laugh is a very sexy thing. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. It is. Yeah, I love that. Yeah, it is. It is. It is. Oh, yeah. I think back on everybody trying to date everybody at Second City Theater is because we're making each other laugh. You think, well, we should be together. I'm talking about it. And funny, I find you funny. That joke is amazing. I am fucking you tonight. Right? For real. You're funny. I'm going to have you totally like my old fashion wave saying, I'm going to help my way with you. But sense of humor for sure, I agree with that. And faith, faith, my mom and dad were devout Catholics, but never forgetting that the greatest gift is a sense of humor. So, very faithful, but definitely with humor. When you were talking about having all those siblings, did you ever think you would have lots of kids like your parents? Yes, I did. I really stupidly assumed it. Yeah. Why didn't you? You just, if you don't mind my asking. I got married late. Oh, I say. Uh-huh. And my body was, you know, every time I had cramps every month, the worst cramps. My sisters and I all got them really bad. And they would take, they would take two twenty twos. It was a codine. You could get in Canada. And I would never, if I took one, I would hurl. Nonstop. So I could never take anything. So I'd have to like play these mind games to will the pain away. Um, but I would think when I had those pains, I thought, well, someday I have children, I'll be worth it. I'll have seven kids of my own. But no. Yeah, two good ones. That's good. They're wonderful. Yeah. Yeah. I often think, oh, I wish I had one more. You're thinking, comedy, threes, I actually am. Hey, thank you for giving us so much of your time today. You're really very generous. She is. She's generous. It's really nice to talk to you. You will edit, won't you, please? Yeah. You're going to sound like a million bucks by the time we're done with this thing. Oh, you're beautiful. I love you. I got you back, baby. Thank you, Julie. Um, I'm going to ask you a few sort of rapid fire questions. Yeah. Tell me, is there something you're looking forward to? See my sons. Yes. Yeah. It has been a while now. How long has it been? Oh, you know, a couple months. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Is there something you go back and tell yourself at 21? Say good for you. You nerfed little thing. Oh, I like that affirmation. Good for you. Is there something you wish you'd spent less time on in your life? Oh, maybe sleeping. I have never in my entire life heard somebody say they wish they'd spent less than I sleeping. I guess that is. What is that? Can I use a mirror? You are fucking lucky. You've sleep too much. Seriously? I didn't say recently. I just said in my life. In your life. In my life. So when you were like a teenager, when you were a teenager, you would sleep until like two o'clock in the afternoon, right? But I was also, you know, hormone like yes, and 16, 17, I was just, I would come home from school and just sleep. And then my mom and dad yelled for dinner and I'd go, no, you're alone. I just wanted to sleep. And then when I worked at Second City Theater, you know, we did the show and then we would go to one of our houses and stay up all night coming up with ideas. It was so fun and all that. And I'm very excited. Yeah. I didn't want anything else in my life. It was so great. But then I would sleep most of the day. Got it. So that's why I think maybe I missed some things. I think I missed John Candy's wedding. For reals? I was asleep. No. Why am I admitting? You're like Barbara Walters. You're just kidding. Everything out of me. I am. You're going to make me cry now. Any minute it's going to happen. Here this will make you cry. Is there something you want me to know about aging Catherine or shall I say, I guess, is there something you would like me to know about aging Catherine? Let you find out for yourself. I don't want it. I don't want it. I don't want it. I don't want to change it. I don't want to change it for you. I don't want to tease you. In case it's not as good as what I'm getting. Oh, God. Catherine, you're fantastic. You are. You're awfully good at this. I adore you. I love you. Thank you. Thank you. I love you too. Are you going to call your mom? Yeah. You're going to call your mom? Yeah. Who are you actually going to say you talked to? Catherine Hepburn came back from the dead. Oh. All right. There you go. I'm sure. You know, Jane Fonda was on this podcast. She talked about Catherine Hepburn being very, very competitive. Wow. I guess so, eh? Oh, yeah. That's not a surprise, though, is it really? No, it's not. I quite did her once with Jane Fonda and a bunch of women. She was being honored the next evening. Yes. And she told us about shooting coming home and how the director, he said there would be no sex scene because John Boyz character couldn't feel anything from the waist down. And she said, but I can. Do you know the scene? I sure do. He services her. Yeah. It's the only thing I remember from that movie. Yeah. But she had to fight for it. It gives new meaning to the title because that was, uh, remember because she was having sex with Bruce Stern. Bruce Stern. Yeah. And then John, John Boyz knew what to do. Yeah, because she told them off-carver. That's what needed to be done. I love that. There was going to be no sex in the movie because the man said the man couldn't feel anything. So why would there be anything? Why would anyone get anything out of the deal? Yeah. I didn't know that. Yeah. It's funny because I mean it. It's the only thing I remember from that movie. I was like, ooh. I don't. That's kind of interesting. Isn't it? Yeah. Anyway, thank you again for being so kind and generous. Thank you, Julia. And I give you all my love. Thank you. And I look forward to seeing you. I hope soon. I would love that. Please. Yes, please. Thank you. Thank you for your time. Thank you so much. Take care. Well, that was so much fun. I'm going to get my mom on Zoom to tell her all about a list conversation. Hi, mom. Hi, love. How you doing? Hi. I like your vote, Penn. That's very good. Thank you. Big news this year. Vote. Yeah. Vote. Thank you very much. Yep. Vote by me. Very nice. So I talked to Catherine O'Hara today, who is a wonder. And I know. I admire her so much. I don't know how to say it. I just respect and admire her so much. Although, mommy, I have to tell you something. I think I offended her to start out. I told her, you know, she's a devout Catholic. And she comes from a large Catholic family and the church has a lot of meeting for her. And I told her the Catholic priest joke that David Cedarris wrote about in his New Yorker piece. Do you have any jokes you remember, mom? Yeah. I was just, we were talking last night about the first joke that you ever heard, you know. Yeah. It's not very fun. I mean, it's hysterical, but it's not funny, really. Well, what is it? It's what daddy told his grandfather was a minister. Uh-huh. And he was 80th birthday. His mother drove them across country to Oklahoma. And daddy tombs about four at that time. He says, I've got a joke. His grandfather loved jokes. So he said, oh, we'll tell it. So he says, why did the ocean roar? Well, you would too, if you had crabs on your bottom. Well, I mean, that's the oldest joke in the world. But every kid knows it as their first joke. I mean, I think at least daddy did. And I remember thinking that it was just hysterical that joke. Oh, really when you were young? When I was young, yeah. I don't mean now. Well, let me ask you something. Can you define a kind of thing that makes you laugh? Uh, it's funny that you say define because almost if you can define it, you're not going to laugh at it. Right. So the funnyness comes from number of surprise, but also the turn, the twist that you didn't expect. Yes. So, so that is, can I define it? No, but I sure know when it happens. Yeah, sure know when it happens. I mean, I remember when we were little, you and I used to howl. Well, chances are I was howling and you were laughing because I was howling. But we would watch, I think it was soupy sales or was it Captain King grew with the ping-pong balls? Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Yes. But he would do a thing and ping-pong balls would fall on him unexpectedly. And three year old me thought that was the, I mean, it was essentially like a, a Jack in the box or something. Yeah. Yeah. Now, well, good joke is so important. Yeah. But who can remember them? Well, I'm asking you, can you remember a single joke? Hold on a second. Uh, close. But no cigar now. No, I can't, can't. No, sorry. No, I know some funny jokes. You do? I wish you could remember them. There was one time I was telling a joke at somebody's 80th birthday party. Yeah. And I got up to tell it. It's about the, the guy that's, he's in a refrigerator and the refrigerator ends up hanging over in a balcony. It's very complicated. But I got through all of the complications and then I remember the end. So I started to laugh so hard and I couldn't, I couldn't even think or laughing so hard. And everybody was howling and nobody ever got the point. And he said to me, always, what was the joke? I said, I have no idea. But I got it and it was so funny. And if I could, oh, it's a wash. They would have laughed. So Julia, I know jokes that are so funny that it could be a project, but you're gigantic. But they're going to be silent for now. What I wish I could know the refrigerator one with the man and the refrigerator hanging over a balcony. Oh, no, it's about, you know, the guy is the sort of in bed with the wife, not his wife, right? And so then why he jumps into the refrigerator. And then somehow the the move is coming. They take the room. I know it's very complicated. Well, it sounds like a smash hit, mom. She'd take that on the road. No, in the telling is all makes sense. Yes. Well, evidently, evidently, that's the case. The telling, the telling is the key. The telling is the key. Amen. Amen. Amen. All right, mom, well, listen, I'm really happy with this conversation. What is it? And I'm so dying to hear your interview. What interview? Which one? You're with Catherine? With Catherine. Oh, I forgot we were on the, we were on it on it. Or the podcast. What is it to do with Catherine? Okay. Mommy. Yeah. So long, farewell. I'll see you next time I see you. I'll see you. I'll see you soon. Okay. Love you. Love you. Bye. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's more Wiser than me with Lemonade Premium on Apple. You can listen to every episode of season three, ad free. Subscribers also get access to exclusive bonus interview excerpts from each episode. Subscribe now by clicking on the Wiser than me podcast logo in the Apple Podcast app and then hitting the subscribe button. Make sure you're following Wiser than me on social media. We're on Instagram and TikTok at Wiser than me and we're on Facebook at Wiser than me podcast. Wiser than me is a production of Lemonade Media created and hosted by me, Julia Louis Drifus. This show is produced by Chrissy Pease, Jamila Zara Williams, Alex McCohen and O'Hallopes. Brad Hall is a consulting producer. Rachel Neill is VP of New Content and our SPP of Weekly Content and Production is Steve Nelson. Executive producers are Paula Kaplan, Stephanie Woodles-Wax, Jessica Cordova-Cramer and me. The show is mixed by Johnny Vince Evans with Engineering Help from James Sparber and our music was written by Henry Hall. You can also find on Spotify or wherever you listen to your music. Special thanks to Wil Shlegel and of course my mother Judith Bowles. Follow Wiser than me wherever you get your podcasts and if there's a wise old lady in your life, listen up.