Grief moves us in mysterious ways.
Tina Fey recalled a bizarre moment at a recent standup show near Dallas when two audience members behaved somewhat inappropriately during one of the most somber moments in her set.
“I was telling a sort of serious story about losing my mom in the last year,” Fey said in an interview on Late Night With Seth Meyers. “And I looked down, and a couple in the front row started making out. I was like, ‘Okay, Dallas!'”
Host Seth Meyers attempted to explain the couple’s unusual behavior. “Do you think maybe one of them had recently lost a parent, and the other one was like, ‘I’m gonna take their mind off it?'” he suggested. “‘I’m just gonna start hardcore mackin’ with them ’cause I love ’em.'”
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Tina Fey and her mother, Jeanne Fey, in New York in 2008
“Maybe,” Fey responded. “Just mack down. When you see someone sad, you have to mack down on them.”
Meyers joked, “Yes, almost every kiss cam at basketball games is because one of them has recently lost someone.”
Fey is currently in the midst of her Restless Leg Tour alongside friend and frequent collaborator Amy Poehler. The 30 Rock actress told Meyers that she wasn’t sure how her comedic sensibilities would land in red-leaning states in the wake of widespread conservative political victories in the 2024 election.
“A lot has gotten amazing in our country in the last year, so it was like, ‘Oh, let’s see how we’re gonna go out and do our topical jokes and see how it plays,'” Fey said. “And it was great. I feel like people were really thirsty to have a reason to come out and laugh and hear jokes.”
The comedian noted that only a handful of audience members have expressed any dissatisfaction with her material. “We do a Weekend Update section of the show, and so I was like, ‘Okay, let’s see how these jokes fly in Texas,'” Fey said. “I was ready. But mostly, it was like, everyone’s so happy, and then out of 5,000 people, you can find one or two Leslie Bibb in White Lotus. Like a couple husbands’ shoulders go up a little.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Fey and Meyers reflected on the Saturday Night Live 50th anniversary show, where the Date Night star wrote a one-line cameo for the show’s longtime dresser, Donna Richards.
“This was all I cared about,” Fey said of Richards’ joke. “I knew that the audience was basically everyone who ever hosted, so I was like, ‘This is Donna’s moment. Everyone in this room loves her.’ You’re so dependent on her when you host. She pulls your pants off, she puts your clothes on. I’ve seen her physically carry Sir Ian McKellen.”
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Tina Fey and Seth Meyers on ‘Late Night With Seth Meyers’
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Fey explained the wardrober’s brief segment. “We did a bit with her, we asked her, ‘Donna, who’s your favorite host ever?’ And the joke was that she, too quickly, was like, ‘Jason Momoa,'” she recalled. “And I made her rehearse with me so much, because I was like, ‘Donna, you gotta nail the timing. Not too big.’ And we rehearsed every time I walked by her for like three days. We practiced in the hallway, and she crushed!”
Meyers agreed. “She crushed it!” he said. “Her timing was impeccable, and [it] turns out she has a fan of the joke!”
The host then showed several pictures of Richards posing with Momoa, seemingly taken after her SNL50 sketch.
Watch the full conversation between Fey and Meyers above.
Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly
