John Mulaney Announces Olivia Munn Pregnancy Seth Meyers Interview Transcript

Seth Meyers: (00:02)
We’re thrilled to have our first guest here with us tonight. He’s an Emmy winning comedian and writer you know from his work on Saturday Night Live, Oh, Hello on Broadway, and Netflix’s John Mulaney and the Sack Lunch Bunch. Please welcome back to the show, our very good friend, John Mulaney.

You’re back.

John Mulaney: (00:30)
Hello.

You were here. You were in studio a while back.

I’m told that I was, yeah.

You had a year.

Yeah. It’s nice to see you.

It’s great to see you as well.

How are you?

It’s good. We’ve talked a fair amount, but I haven’t seen you for a good long time.

No. It’s been awhile. I packed a lot into this… Is it September now?

It is a September. Yeah.

Okay. So since last September, I went to rehab in September. Okay? I got out in October. I moved out of my home from my ex-wife. I host Saturday Night Live on Halloween.

Yeah.

I relapse on drugs after the show. Not directly after. I just mean not after, well after good nights. Well after.

You have always said to me the Halloween show of SNL is sacrosanct.

You cannot be under the influence of anything on that. You have to be stone cold sober.

Okay. So you’re coming out of that.

I hosted that. I did relapse back onto drugs after that. And then, I’m told I took a job here and I remember doing… You asked me to do Royal Watch: News of the Real Life Crown and how’s that segment going?

It’s on hold.

Oh, okay. Yeah.

Peacock is interested.

Oh, I’m sure. Sure. What isn’t Peacock interested in? And let’s see, then I continued using drugs. You and some other friends staged an intervention as you recall. I went to rehab again this time for two months. I got out in February. I lived in sober living for another month and a half. The insurrection was on January 6th, but I had nothing to do with that. That was actually, I was away when that happened.

You can’t be laid at your doorstep.

No. And it wouldn’t have happened on my watch. There was never an insurrection before I went to rehab and have they done it since I got out?

Not one.

They wouldn’t dare. Baby J’s back on the streets. Then in the spring I went to Los Angeles and met and started to date a wonderful woman named Olivia.

Who I know well. She lovely woman.

You know Olivia Munn very well. I met her actually for the first time in life at your wedding to Alexi, your wife.

Yeah.

Yeah. So it’s nice something good came out of the wedding. That’s just a clean, good joke all around. That’s a fun joke all around.

It’s a fun joke for her.

Yes. It’s a great joke for her. And you’ll have fun with it at home tonight. And she got to date me right out of recovery, which is what they call a reverse catch. And no, but I’m sorry. But it is a very, very lucky thing to have met this woman and to have like… You’ve dealt with me… You knew me before I was on a lot of drugs. You knew me while I was on drugs. You did not know me immediately after stopping drugs. So been a challenging time.

Would you say that is the hardest version of John Mulaney to be?

That to be? They’re all uncomfortable to be, but no. Yeah. It’s like newborn Bambi legs. You know how when Bambi’s born, Bambi’s like, “Hey, I used to be on cocaine.”

I thought Thumper was on cocaine.

Thumper, They never tested Thumper. Thumper was on Adderall. But I got into this relationship. That’s been really beautiful. And with someone incredible, who has like dealt with the non-coked up Bambi version of me and that’s been very incredible. And she’s kind of held my hand through that hell and we’re having a baby together.

That’s really exciting.

Thanks.

Congratulations to both of you.

I was nervous when I was about to say the news. That’s why I looked down and then I looked up.

Yeah, yeah. No, like it wasn’t that you like forgot it or anything.

No, no.

It’s really thrilling.

I’m going to be a dad.

Yeah. It’s going to be amazing. Congratulations.

Thank you. Thank you. We’re both really, really happy.

It is so much. You really crammed so much into a year.

I did. I did. Especially for someone that used to have many years of not much interesting.

Yeah. I mean, when we met, you were a young, very successful comedian. You were a wonderful writer, but you were a square. And of all the people I knew in those early years of your time at SNL, you would be the one I would least predict to have a year-

I was the one always running around telling people to be sober during Halloween. Yeah.

You were like the Halloween-

This is a special show. Yeah.

And so I remember once even we were in Chicago and we went out to like… We writers would go and like go watch-

Oh, yeah, we’d go see. Yeah.

And we went out to a nightclub and you were at the nightclub and you were like, I’m going to leave. It’s too loud. And I’m sorry.

Yeah. I remember that.

And when I watched that fellow walkout, I never would’ve thought that you would have had this year.

Yeah. You weren’t like that’s tabloid fodder right there, that guy. Can I ask you a question?

Yeah.

You have kids.

I do.

What do you say when you meet them? Because I don’t want to be too formal. Like, hi, I’m John… But to be too casual.

This is going to be hard for you and they will not know your work. And so, that is going to be a really tricky way to start it off.

That is…

Yeah.

So they’ll know me as a writer?

Look, if she does her job as a mother they’ll know your credits, they just won’t have seen the work.

Right, right, right.

But that’s an exciting thing that you get to do it all for them for the first time.

You mean-

You’ll be there when they hear horse in a hospital. You know what I mean?

Yeah. And we’re saying they because it’s triplets. It’s not really. But if it was triplets, could we name the ugliest one Seth?

We’ll be right back with more from John Mulaney.

Welcome back to Late Night. We’re here with John Mulaney. You mentioned the intervention. How was it for you?

How it was for me, my intervention, was when I opened the door, I knew right away it was an intervention, which means that’s how bad of a drug problem I had. That when I opened a door and saw people, I went this is probably an intervention about my drug problem.

Yeah.

Actually, you know the gambit that I was going to dinner with a friend from college, at their apartment. And so, you were the first person I saw as I walked through the doorway where I knew this was an intervention. So I’m like going to dinner with a friend from college, going to dinner with friend from college, going to dinner with a friend of college. What’s Seth Meyers doing here?

You also knew… You obviously know what an intervention is. You’re a smart guy. And it was my memory of it was how quickly you tried to tell all of us… Like you were like don’t. I get it. It’s an intervention. I get it. We’re good. I agree.

I remember walking in and going, “Okay. Okay.” And then I did… God, I needed to be the smartest person in the room, even at the intervention. So I remember saying to all of you before you all read your letter, I have a drug problem and I need help. Just to scoop you.

Yeah. So we all had to go through and cross out-

Everyone had to cross out-

… where we tell you had a drug problem.

I’ve got no intro now.

Or now we had to say, we have like as you previously mentioned.

You know, it’s like John says you have a drug problem.

There was a wonderful professional there, a professional interventionist. And she was doing what a professional does. And you were very much like, “Am I allowed to jump in?”

Yeah.

Like you very much wanted to let her know that you were ready to get past.

Yeah. You’re doing a kind version of how I came off I think. I recall a few times going I know what an intervention. And the worst part was, and I do regret this, that two things I kept doing. I kept insisting I was sober at the intervention. Remember when I looked at everyone and I went, “I’m sober now. I’m sober right now.” I wasn’t.

Yeah.

I was on… I remember when I kept going to the bathroom, that was for drugs. But then the other thing that still sticks, do you remember when I insisted on getting the credit for days I hadn’t used drugs?

Yeah.

Yeah. That was a really weird hill to die on in the middle of an intervention to be like, I want you all to acknowledge that Monday and Tuesday, I didn’t do any drugs. And everyone was like, okay, we acknowledge that. What was it like on your end? Because I got to be high during it. So was it an awkward affair?

Yeah. It was awful.

Yeah, was it?

Mostly because, again, you do those things because you’re really worried about your friend. So it starts from there also. Again, I don’t want to make it about… Or I don’t want to take the focus away from the drug part, but you were very late. We’ve talked about on the show about how you want people to be honest about the fact that you are not a punctual person. And you were hours late.

I was two hours late.

Yeah.

For what I thought was dinner.

Right.

Which is not a priority to someone on cocaine.

And I do want to stress though that like had it been a dinner and not an intervention, people also would have been upset.

It would have been equally bad. And do you know the thing that made me the most late? I went to get a haircut at 7:00 PM. Dinner was scheduled for 7:00.

Yeah.

I went at 7:00 PM to get a haircut at Saturday night, live in the Emmy award-winning hair department because I don’t know why, but I wanted a haircut and I was very coked up. And I took my badge from when I worked here and I went to the eighth floor of 30 Rockefeller Center and I walked in and I said, “Can I have a haircut?” And Betty’s like, “Oh, John, you’re not hosting this week.” And I said, “Can I have a haircut?” And you know, when a junkie comes into your office and asked for a haircut and you’re like, it’d be faster to cut the hair. So I got a haircut here at SNL. And then I was like, okay, got to go to dinner.

Well, the other thing was that sounds like a lie someone on drugs would tell a friend who wasn’t in show business because your college friend was not in show business.

No.

And we’re all at her apartment.

Yes. You’re all at her apartment.

And she’s on the phone. And she came in and said, “He’s getting a haircut at Saturday Night Live. And then all of us who worked at Saturday Night Live were like he’s not getting a fucking hair cut, but you were. Because then I called Saturday Night Live and said, “Hey.”

What’d you call, the switchboard?

I called the switchboard.

You called the page tests.

I called. And I asked someone, “Could you go check for me? Is John getting a haircut at Saturday Night Live?” And then someone came back and said, “He is currently getting his hair cut at Saturday Night Live.” And I was like, I can’t believe it. That son of a gun really went after all this. And it was just nice to know that with everything you were going through and your substance issues, you still went and found that free haircut.

I did. Yeah. I still got a free hair cut in the midst of it. And it was as if I knew… Like I look back and I’m like, wow, I was going to rehab for two months that night. And I had no idea, but some part of me was like you never know when you’re going to need a hair cut.

That’s true. You probably were the most clean cut looking-

I was the best looking guy at the intervention. I’ll tell you that much.

Yeah.

I came in cocaine skinny with a brand new haircut. And you looked like Jerry Garcia.

Yeah. I’ve been sitting in an apartment with strangers for eight hours waiting for my friend to show up.

Yeah. Waiting to be tense and not do any bits.

Oh, yeah. We didn’t get to do any bits. Were you disappointed that you were the only one who was allowed to… Or did you love it? Because you were the one who was being funny and the rest of us, we were not allowed to be funny.

I didn’t know you weren’t allowed to be funny.

Right.

Let me say this about it. I walk into the intervention and I’m so mad. I didn’t want an intervention. I wanted to continue… At that moment in time, I wanted to continue using drugs. Sitting here tonight, I’m so grateful to you and to everyone there for saving my life. Okay. That night I was not grateful. And yet as mad as I was, I looked around at the group and I was like, this is a good group. It was like a we are the world of alternative comedians over the age of 40. And I mean, like so many funny people and then no one did bits the entire time.

Yes. I think you know the gravity of the situation when Fred Armisen is not doing a bit.

Fred was serious. Do you know how off-putting that is?

Yeah.

Fred was like, “Hey John, I’m really worried about what you’re going…” I was like, “Stop. I’ll go.”

Also, most of Fred’s bits start with-

With I’m not doing a bit. Yeah. Hey, this is serious. I’m not doing a bit, but he really was-

This time he really wasn’t doing a bit. I want to talk about some more stuff. Will you stick around?

Yeah, of course.

More from Mulaney when we come back. Welcome back. We’re here with John Mulaney. So you appeared on this show as a guest, right after you hosted SNL.

Yes.

Then you started working here and you did a segment called Royal Watch.

Yes, News of the Real Life Crown.

In both of these segments, you wore sunglasses and a jacket that Julian Casablancas-

Yes, Julian Casablancas of the Strokes had given me a big trench coat, a cape of sorts.

And so, you weren’t on the show and after Royal Watch Real Life Stories.

Royal Watch: News of the Real Life Crown.

Right. A lot of people were like, whoa, something’s wrong with John Mulaney. And you and I, and I should note that as somebody who is spending a lot of time with you, I look back and I’m like incredible ignorance to what you were going through. I mean, I knew you had gone to rehab and come out, but I did not… Anyway, what happened was a lot of people are like I think something’s wrong with John Mulaney. And you and I were like, nothing’s wrong with you? And then it turns out something was wrong with you. And when you look at the photos, those people…

I’m in a tough spot here because it’s like the boy who cried wolf, the boy who cried Royal Watch: News of the Real Life Crown. I was not under the influence while delivering my Royal Watch: News of the Real Life Crown report.

Yes.

I had been under the influence the day before and the day after I probably was under the influence. But while on the show trying to update the audience on the Royal Watch at your insistence, I was more sober than not. However, a lot of people were then saying, something’s wrong with John Mulaney. And I was sitting at home going indeed, something is.

Yeah. Well, the real problem of it, not knowing of course, moving forward what would happen is it was a perfect photo for when you then went back to rehab.

Yeah, very rarely does someone make a public appearance looking like that moments before being institutionalized. And so, yeah, everyone going, “John Mulaney checks into rehab for alcohol and cocaine abuse.” And then the photo is of me in those sunglasses.

Maybe this one. This is a guy who’s about to show.

That’s a guy moments and his friend just laughing in ignorance. Friend just kicking back.

Nothing’s wrong with this guy.

Nothing’s wrong with this guy.

Oh this one. Look, I think I look a little concerned here, maybe there for the first time. Thinking, wait a second.

Also, anytime I’m wildly gesticulating into the audience.

Right. And I think just in case everybody wants to get the timeline down, we did not have an audience.

No, you did not. No, that’s an excellent point.

So this is you… That’s basically you gesturing to Wally.

That’s me playing to the crowd that isn’t there.

Well, you couldn’t see.

No, I couldn’t see. But I mean, how crazy I must have been to suggest that Harry and Meghan were desperate for publicity back in November when that totally came true later.

Oh, he’s doing it again.

Right, crowd?

He’s doing it again. Look, I’m always very happy to be your friend and I’m very happy to be in your presence. And this year, I was lucky to spend a lot of time with you. And it was a real roller coaster, but I’m very happier on the other side of it. I am so happy for you and Olivia. This is very exciting news. I love you very much.

It’s the best.

And I’m glad you’re doing well.

I love you, Seth. You guys saved me from drugs, and Olivia and this baby have helped save me from myself and this early journey out of recovery. And yeah, I don’t have a joke for that. I’m really grateful to you, buddy. Thank you.

I’m grateful to you.

I love you.

I love you. Thank you for being here. That’s John Mulaney and we will be right back with Regina Hall.

John Mulaney Announces Olivia Munn Pregnancy Seth Meyers Interview Transcript

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