Jesse Klein (3:32)
One of my happiest memories as a kid around 9 years old was of staying up late to watch Saturday Night Live on this old black and white TV that I had actually found in the trash area of my building and had convinced my parents to let me keep in my room mainly so that I could stay up and watch Saturday Night Live. And there was just something so magical and exciting to me about when that show would start and that theme music would play over that, like, cool New Yorky montage of the cast. And it just made me feel really hip and alive, like I was part of, like, a cool club and not like a nerdy girl who was watching a black and white TV that I found in the garbage. So one of the highlights from when I was 10 years old and full disclosure, there are no other highlights from when I was 10 years old because I was 10. But one of the highlights was that my best friend's dad took us to 30 Rock to see a taping of SNL. And I remember that before the show started, I had to go to the bathroom. And to get there, I walked down the hallway of Studio 8H and it was lined with photos of, like, Gilda Radner and Bill Murray. And I was just like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. This they were here. I'm here. Oh my God. And when I got to the bathroom, I took like 15 paper towels and I put them into my pocket to bring them home and put into this little wooden box I had where I kept all of my mementos. The only other it had a unicorn on it. It was beautiful. I think the only other memento in the box at the time was, like, an acorn I had picked up on a trip to Woodstock. But anyway, on that visit to snl, the host was Tom Hanks, and the musical guest was Aerosmith. So it was awesome. And just when the night couldn't get any more perfect afterwards, my friend's dad took us to an incredible dinner at Hard Rock Cafe, the coolest restaurant in the world. And I remember so clearly, it was the first velvet rope I ever walked past. And as I was walking past it, I was like, I feel famous. I feel like Justine Bateman must feel all the time. So the most famous woman in the world at the time to me. So cut to 2009. I am a grown up and I have achieved, largely because of the influence of snl, I have achieved my dream of becoming a professional TV comedy writer. And I'm a stand up comedian. I've been working in LA for three years and I'm finally moving back to New York, mainly because LA is like sunny and perfect and I hate it and I can't live there anymore. But anyway, I'm back in New York and I need a job and my agent sort of calls me out of the blue and he's like, you know, SNL is actually looking for new writers right now. Do you want to submit some sketches? And I was like, oh, my God, yes, of course I do. I just have to find them on my computer. And by find them on my computer, I meant I had to run to Starbucks and panic and write some sketches. And it's really hard to write anything comedy at Starbucks because there's no one around to tell you if your commercial parody idea for a jockstrap for dogs is funny or not. And if you're wondering, did you really submit a sketch that was a commercial parody for a jockstrap for dogs? The answer is yes. Yes, I did. And I was like, all right, well, I'm not going to get this job. But then a couple of days later, my agent calls me again and he's like, snl liked your packet. You need to meet with Lorne Michaels. So I'm not going to gossip about Lorne, but I'll just give you a representative tidbit from the interview I had with him, which is, you know, I'm a little nervous, but I go into his office and it's one of those situations. I don't know if you've ever been in an interview like this, but. But there's a very large leather couch and then also a large leather chair, and I never know where to sit in that situation. So I just decide I'm going to be sort of endearing and honest and I'm like, so where do you want me to sit? And he's like, well, why don't you sit on the couch and I'll sit on the chair? And I'm like, okay. And then we have, like, a minute of small talk. And after a minute, he goes, you know, actually, I want to sit on the couch. And I look to see if he's joking, and he's not. We got up and we switched, and I was like, this is weird. And then 15 minutes later, I left. And I was like, not only am I not getting that job, I almost feel like I've been fired from the job. I don't know how that would work. But then a few days later, I am home, and I am lying on my couch watching Animal Planet, as is my want. And I get another call from my agent, and he's like, yeah, so you got the job. SNL wants you, and you're gonna start. Thanks. Wait till you hear the rest of the story. So. So anyway, I flip out, and I call my best friend John, and he comes over and we order pizza, and I put on Jay Z's Empire State of Mind, and I put it on repeat because that's what people do when they're happy now. And I'm having, you know, one of those, like, very sort of that special moment in life. I'm having that window in between when you get a cool job and you can tell everyone about it, but right before you've started the job and you realize what the job is going to entail. And I was not prepared for what working at SNL entailed. So I'll just give you, like, a little brief picture of how, like, the week works. Basically, it starts on Tuesday, and the writers stay up all night to write the whole show. Literally all night. Like, you get there at noon and you go home at 9am Wednesday morning, like, at best. And maybe you'll go home and you'll sleep for a couple of hours, but then you have to come back to prepare for Wednesday afternoon's table read, which is this epic marathon affair in which Lauren and the whole cast and all the writers and everyone who works at the show squishes into the writer's room and they read every single sketch that's been submitted. There's about 40, and it takes about four hours. And afterwards, Lauren goes off with the supervising writers, and it takes them a few hours. They decide what's going to go in that week's show based on what got the most laughs. And they have this sort of weird tradition where even though there's email now, the way they Let you know what's going to be in the show is they sort of do it high school playstyle, where the writer assistant comes out with one piece of paper and everyone has to crowd around to see what's been circled. And when I would ask people, like, why do we do it this way? People would be like, it's just tradition. As if SNL is like an Afghani village untouched by time, you know? So, anyway, my first Tuesday night, my first writer's night, I'm excited, but a little nervous, but because I'm remembering that I am not a night person. I am a morning person. I go to bed at, like, 10:30pm every night, but I'm like, all right, I'm just gonna. I'm gonna power through. And I'm powering through. And then at about 10:35, I'm like, I'm so sleepy. But my work was not anywhere close to done because the host for that week was Blake Lively, the lead girl from Gossip Girl. And I have to say that in addition to having, like, the biggest boobs on the skinniest body I've ever seen in my life, she seemed super cool and funny and really nice. And I was gonna. I was writing this sketch where I decided she would play, like, a wacky volunteer at an animal adoption center. I don't know why, but I thought that would work. So I was just really, like, anal about making it perfect. And I stick up all night tweaking it, and the hours are dragging on and on. So in a nutshell, my first table read at Saturday Night Live. It bombs so bad. The sketch bombs so bad in front of a room of people who I think are the funniest people in the world. And I'm assuming that probably there's a few of you here who have never bombed in front of the writers room at snl. So just to give you a sense of what it's like, imagine that you're having sex with somebody that you really like, but they're not making any noise, no matter what you do to their body with your body. And then imagine that there's also a room of people watching it happen, and they're not making any noise either. It's terrifying. And it's so terrifying that I'm like, this will not stand. I'm determined that next week I'm gonna get something at least onto the dress rehearsal show. So a little background on that. Every Saturday, SNL actually does two shows, and the first show is in front of a studio audience, but it doesn't air and any sketch that doesn't do well will not make it to the TV show. So I'm like, I'm gonna at least get that far. And the host my second week is Taylor Lautner, who's sort of the teen heartthrob werewolf from the Twilight movies, which I have not seen. One, because I am 35 years old, and two, because if I want to see, like, pale people being angsty, I'll go home for Shabbat dinner and just, like, stare at my parents or, like, look in the mirror. I don't need to spend money. But he seems really nice, and he's really young, so I'm like, I'll write something. Or he plays someone really young. So I write a sketch where he'll play Bristol Palin's X Levi Johnston. And all he's gonna have to do is wear, like, a puffy vest and, like, mumble like an idiot. And Taylor Lautner nails this, and it gets laughs. And it goes to dress rehearsal. And I'm like, oh, this is a victory. Or so I think, until I realize what dress rehearsal means, which is lorne basically sits. Mr. Lorne Michaels sits under the audience bleachers during dress, and he watches the show on a monitor. And when your sketch starts, you slide into a chair next to Lauren and you watch your sketch with him. So my sketch starts, and then I watch Lauren watch my sketch bomb really bad. And I'm assuming there's a few of you who've never watched your sketch bomb in front of Lauren. So just to give you a sense of what it's like, imagine that you're having sex with Lorne Michaels and he's not making any noise, and I'm like, oh, my God, that's really unpleasant image. So this becomes my life, right? Like, week after week, I am struggling to come up with material that I think will work on the show. And it doesn't always go terribly, but I can never get it to go great. And I sort of start to spiral, because my whole identity, personally and professionally up to this point in my life, is that I am funny. I can be funny. And it's just like, all of a sudden, I can't crack the code on this show. And before every table read, I am, like, gripped with fear. And before every dress rehearsal, my stomach is in knots. I am walking around sort of lost and confused, but in, like, a foggy. Like, sort of like, in a Keanu Reeves way. And it just feels like there's a part of me that has become broken, and without it I'm becoming unhinged, you know, like, first of all, I'm never seeing my friends anymore just because of the hours. And on the rare occasions when I see them, they say things to me like, you don't look very good. Or like, jesse, don't cry in this restaurant. We want to come back here. I'm also not sleeping because there's no time to sleep. And on the occasions when I might sleep, I'm too anxious. And I'm just thinking about next week's guests and what I should write for them. And I'll be lying there like, okay, Jennifer Lopez is going to be on next week. What should I write for Jennifer Lopez? And in the midst of all the stress, I'm trying to, like, experience any kind of pleasure. I don't have pleasure anymore. All I can do is go to the anthropology store downstairs at 30 Rock and spend too much money on some twee bullshit items. Like, I remember I spent $280 on, like, a sweater with, like, a kangaroo pocket on it or some crap. Or sometimes girls know what I'm talking about. Or sometimes I'll get home really late and I'll take an Ambien and I'll start to hallucinate just enough to send, like, a vague sext to this, like, guy I used to date in la. And they're always like, hey, are you up? Do you think I'm good? And right when I was doing this, the Tiger woods scandal broke. And I remember one of his mistresses talked about the fact that they Ambien sexted. And everyone at my job was like, ew, that's so gross. And I was like, yeah, ew, that's so gross. I'm doing what Tiger woods does. And I knew I was hitting rock bottom when the anxiety started to affect me physically. And I started to feel like I was having heart palpitations. And because I'm a neurotic hypochondriac, I was like, I'm dying. So I went to my doctor. I have a really good doctor. So he was immediately able to diagnose me with being an idiot. And he's like, you just need to relax. And I was like, okay, well, then give me some Klonopin. And he was like, no, you should do this without drugs. And I was like, why? Are you a bad doctor? So around this time, a really good friend of mine, the one who told me not to cry in restaurants, sends me a link to this series of lectures by this British Buddhist monk named Ajahn Brahm. And she's like, listen to this. It will make you feel better. And I was skeptical because generally the only self help I will accept is from a very close girlfriend of mine named Oprah Winfrey. But I'm desperate, so I'm like, okay. And I immediately fall in love with Ajahn Brahm. And basically, he has given a weekly talk for like, 15 years about every aspect of human experience in the world. And they're alphabetized on the website. Go look. So, like, if your name is Mandy, you can look under M. And there will probably be a lecture entitled, like, mandy, here's what you should do. It's really helpful. So I start listening to these lectures, like, in bed. Like, literally. I take my laptop and I put it by my pillow so his voice is in my ear. And one night I listened to a lecture he did about death and dying. And the theme was acceptance. And it was accepting that life and death go together and are part of the same continuum. And I realized, even though I'm not physically dying, maybe I can integrate this sort of idea into the fact that my comedy is dying. And I realized if I'm going to succeed at snl, I have to make peace with bombing. Sort of. You have to do that in life, is make peace with bombing. But especially on that show. And I stop writing things from a place of fear, and what should I do? And I just sort of start to write things that I think are funny. And then I'm like, whatever. And I hand it in and things sort of start to get better. One of the last shows of the season, Tina Fey was the host. And I love Tina Fey, and I really wanted to get something on when she was on. And I remembered on Tuesday night that I'd written this sketch when I was submitting to get the job, and I was like, maybe Tina would be good for this. And I hand it in and we do it at Table read. And it doesn't kill, but it doesn't bomb. And it turns out Tina wants to try it. And it's a commercial parody. Not jock strap for dogs. It's a commercial parody, which means we're going to shoot it Friday and edit all day Saturday. And I remember sliding in next to Lauren right before dress. And I was nervous that people weren't necessarily going to get it because it was a weird idea. And it was like a parody of Duncan Hines commercials and the way they show lonely women substituting chocolate for sex. And so it was for a product called Brownie Husband. And the idea was that it was Like a husband. It was a brownie shaped like a husband, and you could sort of fuck it and eat it at the same time. I was nervous. But then as soon as they started to roll it, people started to laugh. And, like, they're really laughing, like, rolling hard laughter. And Lauren is laughing. And if you want to know what it's like to make Lauren laugh, picture yourself having sex with Lauren and he's laughing. And then when it airs, it's kind of a hit, and it becomes like, a trending topic on Twitter, like, people want a brownie husband. And anyway, it was the first moment in the whole SNL experience when I was like, oh, this is what I thought it would be like when I was a kid. So the season ends, and the other SNL tradition is that they don't tell you until the end of the summer if you're hired back for fall, so you have, like, months to stew. But I found myself worrying less about whether they would not want me back than I was worrying about, oh, my God, what if they do want me back? Because I was worried about going to a place that had made me feel so crazy. But on the other hand, nothing felt crazier than the idea of leaving this job that everyone, every comedy person wants that I wanted since I was 10. And I started to think about what I would miss, and I thought, oh, I'll miss that approval. I'll miss the approval of the audience laughing and Lauren laughing. But then I remember that, ironically, the sketch that got me that approval was one that I wrote at a shitty Starbucks by myself before I thought I was worthy of even getting the job. And when I did get the job, I didn't have the glamorous experience that I imagined I would have when I was 10. And I was watching that show on a black and white tv. But I actually had a much more important experience, because what I learned was to be brave. SNL taught me that you can't be afraid to just put something out into the world that's yours and to do something that you believe in, and that's totally different. And so when SNL finally called my agent and they said they wanted me back, I respectfully said no. And that fall, I took my laptop back to Starbucks and I just started to write something new. Thanks.
