Natalie's Rap

This episode is brought to you by Airbnb. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb..com Slash host.

AKIva Can I just say something? I've noticed, yeah, ever since you got Covid, put you on front street. The way your hair and face looks to me is when we were younger. Like you look the way that we looked when we lived in L.A. before we got SNL.

That's right.

So, Andy, are you saying that maybe one of Akiva's symptoms is that Covid for him is like a fountain of youth?

I think it's entirely possible.

There's a lot of new variants, we don't know what the side effects are.

Yeah, you don't know what they do, yeah, and that is a great way of phrasing it, too. Cause it's not making light of any of the previous variants that have caused awful, awful harm to the world.

Yeah, this is more. We're moving on while acknowledging that happened, we're also moving on and saying there might be a whole new chapter where it's just a time machine back 20 years.

It's like, what if contagion was a happy movie, you know?

Yeah, that was how it was originally pitched.

There's this virus and it makes everyone look younger and do podcasts.

Now, Andy, since we're talking about how, and again, we're very cognizant of the fact that this is a non-visual medium. But can I make an observation about you, Andy?

Yes, please.

You show up on screen every time we do one of these podcasts. Like you've just emerged from a cave for a year. You look in the screen like you've never seen a computer before. That's right, like you're half man, half ape, and everything is foreign to you, yeah.

That's right.

Your energy is kind of Sandler, uncut gems like frayed at the edges.

Well, I've definitely gotten Sandler many times, but never uncut Gems version. So that means a I'm getting much better at acting, and b older, looking older.

And more manic.

And the goatee?

More manic, a little hairier, a little dicier decision-making.

You know, what's interesting about Uncut Gems is spoiler alert. Other than the fact he dies. At the end, it seems like it's going great. It really is that fine line that, as long as the bookie doesn't kill you, it was a happy ending.

That's how them safties fuck with you. It's in the margins, you know? It could have been a really triumphant ending.

That's what they say. It only takes one unreasonable bookie. That's one of the knocks on gambling.

Yeah, and if the bookies don't get you, the weekend will.

The Lonely Island and Seth Meyers Podcast So hey everybody, welcome to episode six of Seth Meyers and the Lonely Island podcast, where we granularly discuss the digital shorts. And it's been a bit of a layoff. Let's just be honest to our listeners. Three of us are gonna sound a little bit more grizzled, and Akiva's gonna sound way younger because he got the good Covid.

He got that good, good.

That good, good.

AKIVA It is nice that you're feeling better. You had it for a while, right?

Yeah, I had it for about two weeks, I didn't like it at all. I had managed to avoid it this whole time, this whole, like two and a half years.

What was the worst part of it?

The brain fog was legit, but I will say if I knew it was gonna end, if it wasn't scary, it was not unpleasant. It was just like being a little high all the time. I was just a little stupid. I kind of liked it.

Would you say you were a little stupid? Spelled s-t-o-o-p-i-d.

100 Yes, I'm still a little stupid from it, to be perfectly honest.

Would little be l-i-l with an apostrophe.

I think it's like widdle, like W-i-d-d-l-e.

Oh, a widdle, stupid.

So you are a widdle, stupid.

That's adorable.

It's so natural how you guys fall into rap terminology.

Yeah, like widdle.

I wouldn't even call it rap terminology at this point, but it is fun for us to see you cope with it.

What's your favorite rapper? Would you say? It's Widdle Wayne.

I mean, I feel like the whole rap world breaks differently. If instead of Generation of Lils, it was Widdles, definitely.

I would vote for that.

Like less popular.

Yeah, less popular. Yeah, I don't think it takes off in the same way.

Yeah, yeah, I agree with that.

Speaking of rap, we're gonna talk about a seminal moment in celebrity rap history. We're talking March 4th, 2006. The host is Natalie Portman. This is our first real host, being a major part of a digital short in a way that it pops, obviously.

Oh yeah, 100. It's called Natalie's rap.

She has ownership of it. How does it come to pass?

By the way, you just said it's called Natalie's rap, which is true. And I'm looking at the YouTube clip that I pulled up to watch it, and it just definitely says Natalie Rose.

Oh.

Oh so, it's either Natalie's rap or Natalie Raps.

Well, we have the show rundown. I believe it's Natalie's rap.

This podcast is just a way for us to figure out ways to complain about stuff to NBC.

By the way, the rundown says Natalie Rap.

Oh, neither.

Oh yeah, all right.

Natalie Rap sounds more like what it would have been called to me.

Yeah, we definitely would never have put an s. There would never be an s at the end of raps.

Here's a question that no one will care about or find interesting. But us, we would never really name them. They would come to us while editing and be like, What's this? One? called for the rundown.

Correct, there was no need to name it. It doesn't tell you when you're watching SNL live on NBC, there's no name that comes up for the thing. So it was only an internal document. And then the internet made it that all of a sudden you had to actually give things real names.

Right, we're just excusing ourselves a little. That's why it's called like, Natalie rap, Natalie's rap, or Natalie Raps.

Yeah, like, that's not a good name for a song.

Those are good words if you're entering it into a internet search field.

That's true, that's correct, but I will also say, if anything is called blank rap, it's not a good rap generally speaking.

I think that's a good rule of thumb.

Usually means the people in charge of it don't understand what rap music is at all. So just know we chose it for the rundown, not for the word.

You need to know it's a rap song.

Yeah, you have such a lack of confidence in your rap that you want your listeners to know by the title.

Yeah, before Natalie's rap, it was like Flintstones rap.

Yeah, it's like Ronald Reagan rap.

Only genre it works at There was never a flintstone country song.

No, there was a Flintstones rap in the Flintstones Cereal Fruity Pebbles commercial.

Yeah, I think we all enjoy brands rapping.

If you get a good commercial rap, that's when you're cooking with gas. Well, I'm the master rapper. And I'm here to say I love fruity pebbles in a major way.

He loves fruity pebbles in a major way.

Barney.

BaRNEY Barney's pretending to be the master rapper.

Yeah, yeah, correct. yeah, to answer your question. SEth Yeah. Natalie came in, was it on Monday? and was like, Hey, let's do a song, and she wanted to do a rap song, as I recall.

Seth, you're a Star Wars head. Will you set the table, though? Because I think it's important to know the context of her celebrity at that moment to appreciate it. Yes, and the internet has done 15 years or more of these style jokes now since this, but at this point, YouTube's like six months old at the most or something.

Oh yeah.

Tell me about Natalie's celebrity at this moment.

Well, the only thing I'll say about Natalie is Star Wars is a major deal. I don't think that's why any of us are psyched that Natalie Portman is there, right? We kinda know her as a kick-ass actor from other things.

From the professional.

V for vendetta.

She's there to promote V for vendetta.

V for Vendetta, which is very exciting as well, also I think the exciting thing more for you guys than me, because, as we've established, I'm a little bit older. But it is this really fun thing that now starts to happen for your tenure at the show. When people that are sort of your age group come in. And we sort of build a second SNL cast, which is celebrities who are the age of our current cast. That then cross-pollinate with us really well for basically a decade. And I feel like she's one of the first people that comes in. Because she obviously came in and had seen Lazy Sunday and known that. This was something that you guys did that she thought she'd be good at. And I do think it's really important to note this was not a thing that was happening all the time. In a way, I would argue, you guys opened a Pandora's box.

It did a lot of celebs who didn't enjoy the works of Will Kim to the extent that Natalie did. Who said, Hey, look, Natalie's a dramatic actor or a non-rapper who's famous, who did a rap? And everyone loved it? I'm gonna do that now and did.

But also, SNL's always a place where you go in to show what else you can do as an actor and mess with your image as a host.

Yes, and I should note this is a success story. A lot of times, actors come in and wanna show the other thing they do, and it turns out. The reason we haven't seen it yet is it's bad and no one likes it.

Yes, and that's, I think, why. We were very nervous when she was like, I wanna rap, but we were like, Oh, God.

Yeah, we were massive fans of hers. Yeah, but yes, somebody coming and asking to rap, including ourselves, as we pointed out, is usually bad news.

Yeah.

Now, Andy, obviously you're a fan of Natalie. What happens when you hear the news that you're not gonna be the star of this one? Natalie's gonna take the rapping duties?

Well, I mean, it was something we all figured out together. It's not like I was waiting in a box to be told by the overlords what I would be performing. That week. She came into our office and was like, Hey, I like Lazy Sunday, I believe, and she was like, I love rap shit as well, and we were like, really.

And it was a very filthy, if you recall.

Yeah, it was a foul verse.

And we all just started dying, laughing and being like, Oh yeah, that will really work. No one is gonna see this coming, and we just immediately started writing it.

I should note that what's built into the Natalie rap is that moment because it starts with Chris Parnell interviewing her. We're sitting here today with film star Natalie Portman.

Hello.

So Natalie, what's a day in the life of Natalie Portman? Like, Do you really wanna know? Please tell us I don't sleep, mother off that yak and that Durban.

You shut the fuck up and suck my dick.

I'm busting dudes mouths like Gus's mother. That's classic Akiva table setting. Akiva's great at you. Tell him like, this is what I want to happen.

Yeah, that's often how his first knee-jerk joke pitch, me and Andy were like, Yes.

No, it's always what it needs.

And that's from Eazy-E's No More Questions, though. We should say also that is the reason we came up with it is because Eazy-E's song, No More Questions is exactly that format of him being interviewed and then going in and out of the song.

Yep, and she's kind of doing an impression of eazy-e in a very laid back. Yeah, okay.

So, Eazy, tell me, how was your life as a youngster? Rumpelist my style as a juvenile ran with a gang slanged in the meanwhile banking.

Well, and there's direct quotes from it, so it's an homage, let's say not a rip-off. Like the role model line is exactly a quote from the eazy-e song, right?

Yes.

So it's sort of like an homage the way documentary Now is an homage of some of my favorite documentary now currently streaming.

Oh, is it time for plugs?

Look, I was just gonna say.

What you got, Andy?

Palm Springs on Hulu now, Brooklyn, Nine-nine, probably Peacock. I lost track.

So I do wanna say Chris Parnell again, unsung hero, so good in this.

Yeah.

Also, you mentioned Eazy-e. First of all, if you found out Chris Parnell has been 85 years old. The whole time we've known him, you would believe it, and you would also believe that he did. All the white voices in every 80s rap. Yeah, he's the perfect, you know, sort of over-efficient, irritating white man.

Yeah, that's why he's Jerry on Rick and Morty.

Absolutely, oh my gosh, now this song, I thought I had a real familiarity for it. Oh, I should also know I'm in it, you guys.

Is this our first?

Yeah, it is.

She slaps you, right?

She slaps me hard, I say, Damn Natalie, you a crazy chick, and then she says, Yo to my face, Yo shut the fuck up and suck my dick.

That's right.

Now this is very exciting. I got to sing a line, I got to put on headphones like I'm wearing now and sing a rap line. Very excited for me. Well, I, by the way, tried to convince Lauren to call this Seth rap.

Had to be, had to be, that was the whole joke, that was the whole angle.

Because it's not just suck my dick, that's maybe one of the lighter lines in it.

Yeah, her lil Kim lyrics that she spit were filthy, and we were like, Oh, yeah, you got to go way harder than that.

She was a princess in those Star Wars movies, and she had graduated from Harvard, and everybody thought she was perfect.

Got to ruin that somehow.

Yep, it had to go as far as it could go.

And now was she in the room with you guys when you were writing the lyrics? Or did she just sort of give you carte blanche to go as dirty as you wanted?

I think it was carte blanche.

Yeah, I can't remember her actually being there.

I will say this, I remember this one as a particularly hot sesh for Keev, that they were just pouring out of him.

Is that right? I don't remember that.

Yeah, and then we all kind of fine-tuned.

Keev, You're also the filthiest part of. I'm on a boat, too.

I use a lot of bad words, but I'm a pretty clean guy in general.

You saw the joke very clearly, that's all I'll say. Like, you wrote a lot of the lines that ended up in it, and me and Yoram contributed as always. But I remember the way that certain days, certain ones of us, were just more in the zone when we started writing, you know?

Yeah, and you're a filthy fucking person, what the hell?

I just think you get Natalie's voice.

Yeah, that too.

That's right, yeah, I ghost wrote a lot of black swan.

Did you guys know that? I think the fifth line of this rap, we're fresh out of the gates. The audience is just figuring out what's happening. Is I bust in dude's mouth like Gusher's motherfucker?

Yeah, roll up on NBC and smack the shit out of Jeff Zucker.

Nice shout out to Jeff Zucker.

That did not come from me. That feels like an Andy that was me.

That was the Me line, yeah.

I'd say that's one of my favorite lines, though.

There was a nice era at SNL where I feel like the audience also knew who was running the network. You know what I mean, I don't think you could get a Jeff Schell name drop in a current SNL rap song and have it land. I mean, Jeff Zucker was basically asking to be in this song due to the unfortunate rhymes that his name inspires.

Well, to be fair, nothing else rhymes with Gusher.

With Gusher's with motherfucker, nothing else rhymes. that's why they never say motherfucker in raps.

That's why you never hear that in raps.

You never hear the word motherfucker, because nothing rhymes with it, famously.

Now, wait, this is again. The current system that will remain in place forever. Now is no one sees these digital shorts until dress. What was the censors reaction when they first laid eyes on this?

That's a great question.

I don't remember, but I do remember. That's why we added the red bar over her mouth.

Yeah.

It was definitely like, beeping's not enough. We also don't wanna see her mouth mouth the bad words.

And there's a great amount of graphical elements because of that. Yeah, she's constantly getting giant black bars over her mouth, and I will say it works really well.

Yeah, it's like a censor thing.

Yeah, we would realize, often with our censored versions of songs, that actually beeps were sometimes the best because they are the most. Jarringly implying a real horrible cursing.

But wait, Seth, I wanna ask you about Jeff Zucker for a second. Had he been at NBC for a really long time, or was this just an era where executives, for some reason, were famous?

He had been at NBC for a long time, but there was a reason he was more famous than anyone today. I don't quite know.

I mean, it's like, Ted Sarandos, you know who he is? you could name check him in a song.

Yeah, do you guys wanna come up with a rhyme for Sarandos? Anybody? filthiest rhyme for Ted Sarandos?

I guess no.

You guys used to have a musical improv troupe.

It's been a while since we've been doing this.

No, that was not us, that was not us, no.

Yeah, okay, well.

Like, Roll into a sex club, get railed by 10 randos.

Oh yeah, I mean, gave you a little bit of air there, and you really kind of landed it, yeah.

Seth, Since I have you and I don't wanna have to text you, I bailed on the spelling bee too short.

Oh, thank you. yeah, yeah.

This is a good time to get some other business accomplished.

Normally, I text him my result.

This is the New York Times, spelling bee, everyone.

Yeah, I'm not gonna say what the two words were, because then people could know what the date is and be like what they recorded it when.

So now I also think when you go back and watch it, the audience, it takes them a minute to figure out what's going on here, right?

And then they love it.

They definitely love it.

It definitely jumps right in.

But then the second verse, which is again we go back to Parnell talking to her, is, Do you have a message for the kids? Again? Listeners, a lot of this is me gonna be patting these guys on the back. But this, to me, is a classic case of them. Knowing exactly how to heighten into the second verse, I think a lot of people would take three verses to get to kids.

Yeah.

I'm sorry, Natalie.

Are we to believe you condone driving while intoxicated? I never said I was a role model, but what about the kids that look up to you? Do you have a message for them?

All the kids looking up to me can suck my.

Drink till I'm sick.

I do remember making sure the child left the room and not doing that line in front of the kid.

Yeah, we were respectful, not respectful to our audience, but to the kid that shot the part.

Yeah, not to the millions of kids who watch SNL either.

No, no, none of those kids, those kids were not spared.

We did note in the rundown it played second to last, so it was 1255, probably when it aired.

Steps were taken.

Yeah, oh, it was right before the second song, so it was probably 1245..

Who's the musical guest?

Fall out boy.

Hey, fall out, boy. Yeah. Do you remember what happened?

Oh, what happened?

When they heard this song, they fell out.

Boy.

Wow.

You guys blew the momentum. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, if I'd been able to deliver that right off.

Say it again, say it again. We won't cut any of this. I just want you to say it again.

Do you guys remember what happened when they heard Natalie rap?

They fell out.

Oh man.

You stole it? Sorry, I wasn't totally paying attention.

I would have maybe said, Guys, remember what happened when Fall Out Boys saw Natalie's rap?

What?

They fell out, boy.

Something like that, oh boy, oh, you would have kept the boy alive.

Yeah, that's better.

Was it fall out, boys?

No singular.

Fall out boy.

Okay.

It was just one of them. You have to guess who it is.

Falls out boy, you know, your Pearl's jam and your falls out boy.

All right, so now we get to a really nice thing where some gentlemen, I think, Jorma, you're in this shot, right?

Yeah, I'm a part of the gentleman that she wants to have sex with, I believe.

Dudes, you know, I'm talking to you, we love you, Natalie.

I wanna you too.

It's a boy thing, it's a girl.

Romantic.

She says, Very romantic, I wanna fuck.

We basically got a bunch of dorks from the SNL crew.

I noticed it was a real find. The Dorks, Brian Tucker was in there, John McDonald was in there.

I stepped in last minute.

JoRma Yeah, they were like, we're one Dork short, so we gotta make an exception. I mean, Jorma's a super cool dude, but I guess in a pinch he could be.

Yeah, there was a dork shortage.

It was a stretch, but I managed.

By the way, the one thing there never was at SNL was a dork shortage.

It was the Great Dork shortage of 2006.

Oh right, all those dorks got snowed in.

That line is also a I don't know what you wanna call it parody of NWA's song Gangster, Gangster. No r's when they write it. But I don't feel comfortable saying the word gangster.

With an A at the end, I think that's good, I think that's for the best, yeah.

Yeah, I think that's for the best. P is for Portman, P is for do you remember what the second p is for? Guys? For meow? Yeah, that was a nice instead of a beep.

Well, there's a lot you may not know about me.

Really, such as when I was in Harvard, I smoked weed every day, I cheated every test and started all the Yay. I got a deaf posse. You got a bunch of dudes, I'll sit right there on your face.

I'll take your shit.

See, now I feel like all the kids looking up to me can suck my dick. And the Harvard verse are keef.

The Harvard verse is definitely, but that's also a reference, too, right?

Yeah, you got a deaf posse and you got a bunch of dudes.

A bunch of dudes, yeah.

Sir mix-a-lot.

Cuss Boy, I got a deaf posse, you got a bunch of dudes, you're broke, cold, crying about the Rockman blues.

Most people just know, Baby got back, but we were watching my Posse's on Broadway on the box long before it came out.

We're the real deal, guys.

It's true.

My posse's on Broadway is still the jam.

It's still a very good song.

Who wrote this line? Do you guys remember I sit right down on your face and take a shit?

Isn't it? I sit right dead on your face.

I sit right down on your face and take a shit.

It just gets real bald right at the end.

Yeah.

I don't remember who, but that sounds like something I would say.

Yeah, I would have guessed Yorma or Andy on take a shit.

Yeah, it was one of us.

Yeah, it was one of us.

I would guess that Andy wrote it, but he was quoting Yorm from real life.

It's ironic because that's what my kid says to me all the time.

I'm always observing life and then using it in my work.

Yeah, Andy always says everything is copy, man, that's kind of a Nora Ephron Slash Andy Samberg thing really applies here. I think, yeah.

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Oh, dear.

Dressed like a Viking? Yeah, total nonsense. I was talking to a good friend who's gonna keep getting name dropped in this podcast. Mike Shoemaker, who said he saw that and was in love. He thought the fact that you wore a Viking costume late in the song for no reason was what endeared him to you.

I gotta say, I'm with you, Seth, like, I'm still sort of embarrassed about that choice.

But I'm never gonna run from the fact that I was wrong. A lot about your early work, and this is one. I will say. I've made peace with the Viking. But how does it happen?

I feel like the Viking was. The thought process was something to the effect of, like, well, it's gotta be totally different than lazy Sunday. Like, honestly, it might be that stupid, you know? And maybe also because I was singing, and I knew I wasn't a good singer, that it was like a character.

I think it was that I think you were nervous about singing in the beginning.

Like, but if it's this weird Viking guy, then we're just like, shit, who knows what his deal is?

It's that it wasn't you, it was to protect it a little. Also, the first version we wrote was just all about Odin.

Oh yeah, did you really?

No, there was nothing about Odin that would have made it make sort of sense.

I love that. You're like, No, that would have been stupid. What are you talking about? You dressed like a Viking?

No, no, I think it was. We wanted it to be a character and I thought that would be a fun look, basically.

It's not a bad look.

You just say, as for the drug use, I can vouch for that, so maybe you're a drug addict.

So here's the interesting thing about the Vikingverse one. I remember you were so deep in character. ANDy Oh, yeah.

Full day Lewis.

I remember seeing you and I said, Cool Viking costume, and you learned a little bit of ancient Norse.

I did, yeah.

Yeah, he just kept talking about Asgard and Odin and stuff.

Yeah, way ahead of the curve.

And this is before Thor was a hot movie, so nobody knew this stuff.

No, he just knew a lot of Norse mythology.

Guys, this is for Thor, this is for Thor. Wait, you called before Thor for Thor.

Yeah, it's for Thor for before the fourth Thor movie.

This is for for Thor 4..

So, keep in mind, this is for Thor 4.

Yeah, right, yeah, this is for 4th 4..

Nope, you said it wrong.

4th, 4th, 4th, 4's raps.

For Thor 4 seth, it's not rocket science, Jeez.

Now what I like about the Viking is he actually does some callbacks to the first verse of the song. Which is when Natalie said, I'm going to put my foot down your throat till you shit in my shoe. Yeah, and also that she would like you to pay for my dry cleaning, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, well, it's happened to him before.

It's happened to him, it's experiential, yeah.

And it should be noted, the reason you pay for her dry cleaning is when my shit gets in your shoe.

Well, it's his fault, technically.

She's also done that, and I guess you're getting her shoes dry cleaned. I'm going to let that go. I feel obviously you're a Viking from a different era.

They're like nice cloth or suede boots or something. You got to take those to the dry cleaner, right?

In Viking times, shoes are basically just fabric.

Exactly, you dry clean that.

But then this is the most Andy line, I don't know if Andy wrote it, but it's the most Andy line of. As for the drug use, well, I can vouch for that, like I can vouch for that. Appearing this late in a song, that is the filthiest line after the filthiest line, after the filthiest line. And then there's just this anodyne nonsense.

I'll say this that easily could have been any of the three of us in my mind. That is just a lonely island type joke.

Yes.

Such softball jones.

Can I read it from Genius?

Oh man, the costume didn't fool them at all, they immediately knew.

Well, they knew it was you.

Right, yeah, they were like, that's not a Viking character, that's Andy dressed like a Viking.

I like the fact that since we worked forward from Eazy-E, if we worked backwards, that at some point Eazy-E suggested. Should we have someone come in late and vouch for me?

Yeah, I said, I do a lot of drinking eight ball, but there's no proof.

Like, shouldn't we have a second source on this rap song? and then someone said, E, you don't have to say rap song?

The Viking was essentially like a footnote, right? Yeah, it's like a singing footnote.

You would think that would maybe be the Coup de Grace, the final cherry, but there really was one last, very lonely island. Flourish. You guys love Chris Parnell and you gave him a beautiful jam at the end. Okey, doke Natalie, one final question.

If you could steal a smooch from any guy in Hollywood, who would it be?

No more questions.

Do you guys know before? I guess, Do you know who wrote it?

I'm going to guess Keeve, I want to guess Keeve, too, that's generous.

Interesting, Keeve was maybe my last but steal a smooch and then she hits Parnell with a chair.

And I believe No more questions is literally how the eazy-e one called No more questions ends, right? Yeah.

Yes, and eazy-e one more before we end this session. What's your ruling? No more questions.

One of the weirder things to me about this video was that they asked us to then put it onto the V for Vendetta blu-ray DVD extras. And it is on there. Yeah, it's pretty random, it doesn't have anything to do with no V for Vendetta.

And V for Vendetta is a film adaptation of a famous Alan Moore graphic novel. Alan Moore famously hates every adaptation of his work. He doesn't believe any of them should have been anything but comic books. He feels like a lot of times they've been misunderstood the messages he's been trying to get across. And yet I heard him in an interview say his favorite thing about V for Vendetta is this rap song was on the extras.

You had me, I thought what you were going to say was a real thing.

I was so ready to be educated.

I was like, Oh, shit, here comes a real thing.

He was like, Oh, I thought they were going to say they zagged.

God damn it.

Hey, can we take a quick trip to Seth's corner?

Yeah, please, please.

Seth's corner, you're all invited.

Seth's corner, It's happening right now, take it away, Seth.

Fucking Seth's corner, fuck that guy.

Fuck that guy.

A real collaborating week for me and Keev's now bride Liz. And this is going to happen a lot. I know a lot of our listeners are going to get some funny business. I went to college with Keev's wife and then we worked together at a comedy theater in Amsterdam, and then we were at SNL.

Yeah, by a long time, you knew her first.

Was there ever tension? Come on, we're shock jocks.

Oh, hello for a shock jock. I thought this was Seth corner. This is not shock jock time. This is Seth's corner. you keep your shock jocks out of my corner.

First sketch out of the monologue, too. You guys were always in that sweet spot.

A top heavy Meyers show really breaks my heart. Because I feel like the sketches that come first should be the ones that are remembered more. And yet, here we are talking about the second to last sketch in the show. 15 years later, yeah, taking this to Lorne.

No, I feel bad.

I remember there being one, but I forget what the joke is.

No, I get it. And I should note I think it already aired in a different show. This is a re-air of a commercial parody it was in the Lance Armstrong show. So can I just read you the beginning of smoke alarm?

Smoke When you're sleeping, there's no way to know what's in the air in your home, around your children.

So, the two questions you need to ask yourself are, Do you value the safety of your family? and do you love the 80s?

Light on the smoke detector goes on Electric Avenue by Eddie van Halen.

That's a good concept.

Now I pulled the original script and it breaks my heart because then it cuts to Fred and Parnell, and Parnell is sort of a best of the 80s C.D. Pitchman. And Fred is Officer Peter Vanelli of the New York City Fire Department. But in the original script, it's me and Fred. So that means I wrote a script for a commercial parody and, somewhere along the lines, a sketch I wrote.

You got taken out.

And replaced with Chris Parnell. Sad truth, for the better, so I can't argue about it. No, no, no.

What do you think the reasoning given to you was that he didn't have enough in the show? Or did it have to shoot at 6 a.m and you were required somewhere else for update?

I don't know this might be something that just out of the pain that I was feeling at the time, that I've closed off that trauma. But I do think it might have been Higgins or someone saying, this is a really perfect Parnell part, and it really is, so I hold no ill will.

Oh yeah, the music, the rights, the music clearance.

It's all about the song.

You can't clear Electric Avenue, I mean, you could clear it, but they wouldn't pay for it.

Right, so, ultimately, if you're ever looking for an old SNL sketch that has pre-existing music and you can't find it. It's not been taken down because of some, you know, nefarious reason. It's just expensive and nobody wants to pay that money.

We are going to come up against this problem a few times on this podcast.

Yeah, we are. Should we write, like a sort of placeholder song that we play when you guys run into some music clearance issues? Sure, OK, great, you guys do that.

No problem, we'll get working on that.

Hey, one of my favorite sketches of all time was Cut after Dress. Do you remember the collector's sketch? Where Natalie worked in? A sort of, like, a comic book shop that had a lot of collectible toys? And Fred and Horatio came in as toy collectors and only spoke Spanish. Take care, hey guys, you're speaking Spanish.

No, no, I'm sorry, I don't.

¿Todo el español.

No, no, I don't speak Spanish, but hold on, hey Carmen, Can you come out here for a sec? Give me a hand? Hey, you speak Spanish, right?

Hola, ¿que tal? ¿Necesitan ayuda?

Ay, bueno, eso es mejor.

Muy bueno, muy bueno.

¿De donde son? Somos colectores de Costa Rica. Como tico.

De la Costa, Muy bien.

They're toy collectors from Costa Rica. Oh, cool.

You guys came a long way, huh?

¿Con que lo puedo ayudar? Ah, deja ver aquí, ah, para ver, dame un Batman con Joker, ¿oK?

Dame, un leatherface del Texas chainsaw massacre.

Ok, pero ah, un Tom McFarlane Spawn.

OK, pero Tom McFarlane Spawn tiene mucho cual quieres, Ah, dame el payaso de Spawn, he wants the clown from Spawn, Ok, ok?

¿Que mas?

Para mi, ese Freddy Krueger? Nightmare on Elm Street?

All right.

They were just ordering every boxed toy collectible in Spanish, and Natalie spoke Spanish. And so the whole sketch was Fred saying, like, Eh, uno, Tom McFarlane spawn?

Oh God, yeah, had to get that McFarlane spawn.

Tom McFarlane Spawn.

Man.

You know, those Beatles, the Yellow Submarine Beatles collectibles?

Yes, yeah.

I believe a joke was they wanted all three of those, but not Ringo.

Oh man, no ringo, no ringo.

And then she rang them up and they stacked up everything they named. They actually had a real one. They'd gone to, like a comic book store and bought everything, and then they stacked them up and Natalie then read them all back.

Right?

The whole sketch was just them saying it and then her reading it back. And I will say a thing I also remember is Sudeikis was working the register and was doing this thing where he was really dancing. It was like one of those old push-button registers, and he was making a real meal. A lot of clacks.

Yeah.

And then it came out to, like, $1,500.

No tenemos dinero.

¿¿Qué no tenemos nada?

Perdona, querida.

What's up, they don't have any money, no es que nunca tenemos dinero.

They never have any money.

They were very embarrassed and just shrugged, They were very apologetic that they didn't have any money. I should note that Natalie when she was on my show, I mentioned that sketch and she also did not have any memory of it, which is a really funny thing.

That's surprising, because if you're just hosting, that should be a pretty memorable week.

Yeah, but I think the ones that get cut you might not remember.

Because you have to forget them. I'm speaking as a one-time host.

Now, Andy, you and I are both in the one-timers club.

Also, you only rehearsed it like three times, so that makes sense.

One-timers club, Yeah.

You get the jacket.

You get a little hanky.

Okay.

Can we give a shout-out to my brother for making the beat for Natalie's rap, right?

Didn't my brother make the beat for that?

Yeah, asa taccone.

Yeah, asa taccone.

Of Electric Guest, that was one of his beats.

I love that beat, it's tight.

People used to say tight back in the day.

I should note, Can I go back? I think we're still legally in Seth's corner, so I'm allowed to do this.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Sorry to interrupt, then.

No, no, I just want to say that. Dratch plays an old woman in The Fire Alarm, and Gloria by Laura Branigan plays while smoke fills the bedroom, and Dratch gives a real perfect Dratch. Read, where she pops her head up and says, I love this.

We could talk a teeny bit if we are permitted to leave Seth's corner.

Yes, the exit door to Seth's corner is now open.

I just remember when this came out, that now we knew YouTube existed. Lazy Sunday had been on there and taken off, and this was the second big thing that had some traction that came out. And we immediately went to YouTube to see if somebody had put it there. It was still well before NBC would put something there, or that even we would think about it.

We were upset at the time that we were being asked to make things that were viral and then quarantine them.

They weren't even quarantining yet because NBC.

Yeah, you're right, they just took them down.

I guess they were quarantining it to NBC reruns.

For future Hulu use.

Yes, that was the discussion of like, we are beholden to the people who have paid for their syndication rights.

Right, it was like in breach of like deals with the affiliates and stuff.

Syndication deal, yeah.

How quickly was Hulu in the works for them? I mean, it must have been immediately, like, as soon as YouTube was happening, they were like, How can we do our own version of this?

I think it was more just NBC.

There was a long time where they were telling us, Oh, yeah, and promote NBC.

They're like.

Ah, I think I'm going to tell people.

To watch it on YouTube.

Now, this also not only opens the door for celebrities rapping for the next two decades. But you're going to have more people showing up who want to do a digital short now. This is now part of your future. Yes, of making these. And we'll keep a running power ranking. But obviously right now, Natalie, and she might hold the spot for a long time, is the top host in a digital short.

I mean, this was our first really successful one after lazy Sunday, right? That's how I remember it.