Jessi Klein - Tired, from New York

 

One of my happiest memories as a kid, around nine 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. There was just something so magical and exciting to me about when that show would start and that theme music would play over that cool New Yorky montage of the cast. It just made me feel really hip and alive, like I was part of a cool club, and not a nerdy girl who was watching a black-and-white TV that I found in the garbage. [chuckles]

 

So, one of the highlights from when I was 10 years old, and full disclosure, there are no other highlights from when I was [chuckles] 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. 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 Gilda Radner and Bill Murray, and I was just like, “Oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God they were here, I'm here. Oh, my God.”

 

When I got to the bathroom, I took 15 paper towels and put them into my pocket to bring home and put into this little wooden box I had, where I kept all of my mementos. [audience laughter] It had a unicorn on it. It was beautiful. I think the only other memento in the box at the time was 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. 

 

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. I remember so clearly, it was the first velvet rope I ever walked past. As I was walking past it, I was like, I feel famous. [audience laughter] I feel like Justine Bateman must feel all the time. [audience laughter] So, [chuckles] the most famous woman in the world to me at the time.

 

So, cut to 2009. I am a grown-up. 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 sunny and perfect and I hate it and I can’t live there anymore. [audience laughter] But anyway, I’m back in New York and I need a job. My agent 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.” By find them on my computer, I meant I had to run to Starbucks and panic and write some [chuckles] sketches. 

 

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. 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 [chuckles] 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 there's a very large leather couch and then also a large [chuckles] leather chair and I never know where to sit in that situation, so I just decide I'm going to be 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 a minute of small talk. And after a minute, he goes, “You know, actually, I want to sit on the couch.” [audience laughter] I look to see if he's joking, and he's not. We got up and we switched, [audience laughter] and I was like, “This is weird.” And then, 15 minutes later, I left. I was like, not only am I not getting that job, I almost feel like I've been fired from the job. [audience laughter] 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. [chuckles] I get another call from my agent. And he's like, “Yeah, so, you got the job. SNL wants you, and you're going to start-- [audience applause] 

 

Thanks. Wait till you hear the rest of the story. [audience laughter] So, anyway, I flip out and I call my best friend, John, and he comes over and we order pizza. I put on Jay-Z’s Empire State of Mind [audience laughter] and I put it on repeat, because that’s what people do when they’re happy now. [audience laughter] 

 

I’m having one of those, 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. I was not prepared for what working at SNL entailed. So, I’ll just give you a little brief picture of how 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 09:00 AM Wednesday morning, like, at best. 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 Lorne, and the whole cast, and all the writers and everyone who works at the show squishes into the writers’ room and they read every single sketch that’s been submitted. There’s about 40, and it takes about four hours. 

 

And afterwards, [chuckles] Lorne 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. They have this 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 do it high school play style, where the writer assistant comes out with one piece of paper, and everyone has to crowd around [audience laughter] to see what’s been circled. 

 

When I would ask people, “Why do we do it this way?” people would be like, “It’s just tradition.” My first Tuesday night, my first writer’s night, I’m excited but a little nervous, because I’m remembering that I am not a night person. I am a morning person. I go to bed at 10:30 PM every night. But I’m like, “All right, I’m just going to power through.” I’m powering through, and then at about 10:35, I’m like, I’m so sleepy. [audience laughter] But my work was not anywhere close to done, because the host for that week was Blake Lively, the lead girl from Gossip Girl. She seemed super cool and funny and really nice. 

 

I was writing this sketch where I decided she would play a wacky volunteer at an animal adoption center. I don't know why, but I thought that would work. So, I was just really anal about making it perfect. I stay 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. I'm assuming that probably there's a few of you here [chuckles] who have never bombed in front of the writers' room [chuckles] at SNL. So, just to give you a sense of what it's like. [audience laughter] 

 

Imagine that you're having sex with somebody that you really like, but they're not making any noise, [chuckles] no matter what you do to their body with your body. [audience laughter] And then, imagine that there's also a room of people watching it happen, [audience laughter] and they're not making any noise either. [audience laughter] It's terrifying. And it's so terrifying that I'm like, “This will not stand.” I'm determined that next week I'm going to 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 going to at least get that far.” [chuckles] The host my second week is Taylor Lautner, who's the teen heartthrob werewolf from the Twilight movies, which I have not seen. One, because I am 35 years old, [audience laughter] and two, because if I want to see pale people being angsty, I'll go home for Shabbat dinner [audience laughter] and just stare at my parents or 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 ex, Levi Johnston. All he's going to have to do is wear a puffy vest and mumble like an idiot. Taylor Lautner nails this. [chuckles] 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. When your sketch starts, you slide into a chair next to Lorne and you watch your sketch with him. 

 

So, my sketch starts, and then I watch Lorne watch my sketch bomb really bad. [audience laughter] I'm assuming there's a few of you who've never watched your sketch bomb in front of Lorne. So, just to give you a sense of what it's like. [audience laughter] Imagine that you're having sex with Lorne Michaels, [audience laughter] and he's not making any noise. So, this becomes my life, right? Week after week, I am struggling to come up with material that I think will work on the show. It doesn't always go terribly, but I can never get it to go great. I 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. It's just like, all of a sudden, I can't crack the code on this show. 

 

Before every table read, I am gripped with fear. Before every dress rehearsal, my stomach is in knots. I am walking around lost and confused, but in a foggy way, in a Keanu Reeves way. [audience laughter] It just feels like there's a part of me that has become broken. And without it, I'm becoming unhinged, you know? 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, "Jessi, don't cry in this restaurant. We want to come back here." [audience laughter] 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 guest 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 experience any kind of pleasure. I don't have pleasure anymore. All I can do is go to the Anthropologie store downstairs at 30 Rock and spend too much money. I remember I spent $280 on a sweater with a kangaroo pocket on it. [chuckles] Girls know what I'm talking about. 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. 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. [audience laughter] 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?" [audience laughter] 

 

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 he's like, "Listen to this. It will make you feel better." I was skeptical, because generally the only self-help I will accept is from a very close girlfriend of mine named Oprah Winfrey. [audience laughter] But I'm desperate, so I'm like, “Okay.” I immediately fall in love with Ajahn Brahm. Basically, he has given a weekly talk for 15 years about every aspect of human experience in the world. They're alphabetized on the website, go look.

 

So, if your name is Mandy, you can look under M and there will probably be a lecture entitled, "Mandy, here's what you should do." [audience laughter] It's really helpful. So, I start listening to these lectures in bed. 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. It was accepting that life and death go together and are part of the same continuum. 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. [chuckles] I realized if I'm going to succeed at SNL, I have to make peace with bombing. 

 

You have to do that in life, is make peace with bombing. But especially on that show. I stop writing things from a place of fear and what should I do, and I just start to write things that I think are funny and then I'm like, “Whatever,” and I hand it in. And things start to get better. One of the last shows of the season, Tina Fey was the host. I love Tina Fey, and I really wanted to get something on when she was on. 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.” I hand it in, and we do it at table read. It doesn't kill, but it doesn't bomb. And it turns out Tina wants to try it.

 

It's a commercial parody. Not jockstrap for dogs. [audience laughter] It's a commercial parody, which means we're going to shoot it for Friday and edit all day Saturday. I remember sliding in next to Lorne right before dress. I was nervous that people weren't necessarily going to get it, because it was a weird idea and it was 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. [audience laughter] And the idea was that it was like a brownie shaped like a husband and you could sort of fuck it and eat it at the same time. [audience laughter] I was nervous. But then, as soon as they started to roll it, people started to laugh.

 

They were really laughing, rolling hard laughter. Lorne is laughing. If you want to know what it's like [audience laughter] to make Lorne laugh, picture yourself having sex with Lorne and he's laughing. [audience laughter] And then, when it airs, it's a hit and it becomes a trending topic on Twitter. People want a Brownie Husband. 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. 

 

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 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 every comedy person wants, that I wanted since I was 10. 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 Lorne 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.

 

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.