From The Comic's Comic

Episode #382

Matt McCarthy began his comedy career as the Fordham Ram mascot, but quickly carved out a spot for himself in New York City’s stand-up scene, scoring TV credits with Comedy Central on both Live at Gotham and John Oliver’s New York Stand Up Show. You may recognize him from his previous sketch comedy work on Conan, or from his many TV commercials, including a long-running stint as “the cable guy” one-upped by Verizon Fios, and more recently in national campaigns for Progressive and Planet Fitness. He’s also performed as recurring characters on both Adam Ruins Everything and Corporate. For a couple of years, McCarthy combined his comedy and wrestling fandom to write plot lines for the WWE. But it’s his personal and professional relationship with Pete Holmes that’s paid lasting dividends, from their early DIY videos that got them on TV during the Super Bowl, to a talk show on TBS, and they’re now reunited in 2022 on, How We Roll, the new CBS sitcom based on the real life of professional bowler Tom Smallwood. Matt joined me over Zoom to talk about his life and career, with plenty of funny stories about TV advertising, professional wrestling and carving out a separate niche for himself on TikTok as the ultimate film collector.

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After a briefly funny anecdote about how Marc Maron once introduced Matt McCarthy to others as me — so close, Marc! — we get into the conversation, as I asked Matt about his two biggest relationships, the professional one with Pete Holmes, and his personal one with wife Glennis, and which came first?

Yeah, I think it might be because it was like, one week in July of 2007. I remember saying to our friend Katina (Corrao) because I was like trying to meet somebody.

Put yourself out there.

Yeah. And I remember specifically saying, You know what? Stop trying. I’m just going to sit on the bench until coach puts me in. Like, I don’t even watch sports. I don’t know why I said it like that. And then that afternoon we were walking around somewhere in the East Village, and we ran into Pete. And Pete was saying that he was getting a divorce and was looking for an apartment. And I was like, at that point, I was like, way out in Queens, with a couple of guys that I went to school with. And I was like, if I’m going to be doing comedy seriously, I need to be close to Manhattan because it’s taking way too long to get in town. And so I’m looking to move. So then it was like a day or two later, Katina told me that Glennis had a crush on me. So, if my memory is correct, Pete and I would have already shot Sears DieHard battery commercials. Maybe. I think the timing is right, because I was still working my day job when Glennis and I started dating. And it was when we finally got paid for the battery commercials that I quit my day job and was like, OK, I’ll just try to make ends meet by doing commercials. Which is insane. It shows how little I knew about anything.

But I mean, it worked out tremendously.

No, that’s what’s crazy! It’s like when I started working like I was booking like a commercial a month. And it’s so funny, because then when I was living with Pete, I remember telling him like, Oh, I just booked this other commercial. And him going, ‘You know this is crazy, right?!’

I can picture and hear Pete saying it.

And it was. I remember going to the agency to like, I don’t know say hi or pick up a check or something. This is the only time I’ve met one of the head dudes, like whose last name was part of the name of the company. And I was like, Oh, hey, I’m Matt McCarthy. He goes, ‘Oh, you’re creating quite a commotion around here!’

Thank you, Mr. Ogilvy.

‘Every so often I always hear somebody screaming Matt McCarthy booked another commercial!’

Well, as it turns out, I also moved to New York City in the summer of 2007. And so the first time I remember seeing you, and it’s not just because we share a last name, but I had a vivid memory of the first time I ever saw you. You were holding court on the second floor of Mo Pitkin’s. You had a show there, with a pulpit and you had this big book, and you’re holding court and I was like, ‘What is going on here?’ This guy’s a madman, but he has my last name. I must know more.

That was me! Max. We did that on Wednesdays in Sadie’s Lounge? Was that the name of the little room in Mo Pitkin’s? It might have been.

What was the the premise of Max?

I mean, it was just a stand-up show but I decided I wanted to do some sort of recurring, like just some refillable bit. I just wanted to do something where the structure was the same each week, but I improvised something different each time. So I went to the Strand bookstore, and was I was just looking for a big huge cheap book. And that’s what I said to the guy was like, Do you have any like, huge just like old looking books like that are cheap? And he brought me to some basement or somewhere I’d never been in the bookstore. All it was just all these reference books. And I picked out one for like $1 or two and it was so fucking heavy. I mean, this book was enormous. And then I would go up there onstage at the end of the show with you know, a reading from the book of Max, you know, Chapter 18 Verse 7, and ‘Oh Max walked along the desert road and saw a woman with starving children. And she said, Oh, Max, please help me! My children cannot eat. We cannot afford bread. And then Max said, I have turned your children into bread. Oh! And then the woman ate her children that she was satiated. A reading from the book of Max.’ Just like that type of shit.

But if you were looking at the book itself, it was probably definitions of medical terms or something like that?

It was some sort of accounting book. It was like, figures about like some fiduciary budgets. Like in New York or something. It was numbers. It was just all accounting jargon about some history that was you know, some New York City thing or whatever. I don’t know.

So you were holding court there at Mo Pitkin’s. I distinctly remember at Rififi, I don’t know if it was the first time Oren had done this. But I distinctly remember seeing Oren Brimer showcase a short film he had done there. And then a few months later, you he and Pete were working together and doing like Batman shorts and things like that. How did Front Page Films, how did the three of you coalesce?

That started with me and Pete doing that car battery commercial. Because it was a series. It was supposed to be a campaign. And it was the first job either of us had ever booked. It was the first time either of us had ever been to L.A. They flew us out to L.A. and because we knew each other from stand-up — we were friendly, but that was the first real time we’d ever spent together. And doing those spots … because it was a whole weekend of shit. We were doing on-air commercials. We did radio spots. We did print photographs. I mean, it was insane. And then they did nothing with it. Like it ran. My mother taught once on the Home and Garden Network like 15 years ago, when the Home and Garden Network actually had gardening shows and it wasn’t just, ‘We’re gonna flip this house for a million dollars! Are they gonna buy this? This is the part of the show where we take a sledgehammer to the wall!’

Back when the cable TV networks were more well-defined.

Yes. And we were like, well, we worked really well together. And then that chance meeting of I’m looking for an apartment, I’m looking for apartment. It’s so strange to see the landscape of like how easy it is to produce content now, and to think about in 2007 — because when and we met Oren through just that group of comedians who bounced around in the East Village at the time. And Oren was making videos of his own. I think the first thing I ever worked with Oren on was, Brandy and Sara, Brandy Barber and Sara Jo Allocco had their show The Kissing Booth. And we shot a video for a St. Patrick’s Day thing. So we knew Oren did this type of stuff. And it’s so crazy to think of a time when, not everybody had, you know, a production studio on their phone. Like to know a guy who had a camera and lights and editing equipment on his computer and knew how to use it. It’s like we found a unicorn. So that very quickly, Pete and I’s friendship went from..we used to have a lot of conversations about Wouldn’t this be a funny video? Wouldn’t it be funny if? And then never do it.

Right, because the technological landscape was so different. Just 15 years ago.

Wouldn’t it be funny if there was a show about this? You know, I was just at a used bookstore and I was looking at the film production books, and I’m like, these are not just out of date, but from The Stone Age now. Because looking at one book from 1999, the last chapter had like seven pages about the internet. And it was freaky. Have you ever listened to the speech Jim Carrey gives at the end of The Cable Guy? At the time, that was like, Oh, he’s crazy. Now you listen to that speech, and not just yeah, that just he was right. It was like, oh, there was a time when you couldn’t play video games with somebody in Vietnam? So the first thing we did was one of Pete’s ideas. And it was like, oh, Oren can shoot at all. And then we found, well we like working with him and he’s got a good sensibility and he knows how to cut something together. And then it was like, why don’t we do this all the time. And it was also like, you know, because CollegeHumor was gaining traction, like Funny or Die didn’t even exist yet. It’s so crazy. It’s so crazy. How quickly like, fuck man. What was the other one? SuperDeluxe?

SuperDeluxe was the one Turner Broadcasting funded for a year-and-a-half, two years.

Yeah, that came and went so quickly.

Between 2006-2008.

So there was room to do new exciting things on the Internet. And so we started shooting our own stuff. And then the way the Batman stuff came up was, we had an idea that we were like, Oren knows all the tricks but at a certain point, you’ve got to spend some money to make something look good. So Pete had the idea for the Batman video. The first one. Just goofing on every time Gordon turns around, he turns back and Batman is gone. So it’s like the game is he catches him. What, were you about to sneak off?

Originally posted on CollegeHumor’s website, then posted to YouTube on Nov. 23, 2009. Currently more than 9 million views:

Also just making fun of Batman has a new national pastime, but like in the early aughts, that was not anything that was done. I mean, it’s crazy. It’s crazy how like if you scroll through TikTok, every so often you get some motherfucker wearing a Batman mask doing the voice that Pete did.

Is it actually his voice? Like a lip sync? Because that’s a big thing on TikTok, too.

That happens, too, sometimes. But it’s just like they’re doing, you know, something in the style of: Batman talks like this now.

But not all of your videos were such high-concept or big-budget. I remember an early series you did were just based on a doctor-patient scene.

Right? Anything that we could do on our own on the cheap, you know, we would just shoot it. The Batman thing was, ‘Where the fuck are we going to get a Batman suit?’ Why don’t we pitch it to CollegeHumor? Because they know us and we know them, and if they like the idea, have them pay for it. And we can shoot it at night. Have like a small crew. Have some better lights, have a Batman costume that looks good. But anything like the doctor sketches, I mean, those were shot in just a little writing office that had been handed down through different comedians in Chelsea for like, I don’t even know where it started. But (Nick) Kroll was in there at one point. He was gone before I came in. When I came in that office, and it’s just a place to be during the day, either between auditions or before gigs. Instead of getting on the fucking subway going all the way back to fucking Brooklyn and then getting back on the train and coming all the way back. So when I came in the office, it was me, Pete, (John) Mulaney, Baron (Vaughn). And then Mulaney started working at SNL. At one point, (Anthony) Jeselnik was in that office, too. I feel like (Bobby) Tisdale took my desk when I moved out to L.A. I remember him texting me. Because we moved, like literally the day after Hurricane Sandy hit. So there was no power in the building. And I left a bunch of shit. I remember Tisdale texting me like, hey, there’s a bunch of New York Posts here. Because if there was some ridiculous cover of the New York Post, I would hold on to it.

It could always be good fodder for something.

Well, every day it felt like, you know, Michael Jackson was doing something. He was dangling baby over the railing or he was walking around with the kid with the blanket on its head, like all this shit. And I would just hold on to it. And I remember Tisdale being like, what do you want to do with these? I was like, Oh, you can box them up and ship them to me if you want. I’m a big collector. And he was like, ‘Yeah, I don’t think I’m going to do that.’ If you’re just waiting for me to say you can throw them away, then throw them away. ‘That’s what I was waiting for.’

You know, even even the idea of a shared comedy writing enclave — even that is a marker of the way things used to be. That was before WeWork and all of these co-working establishments.

I noted how when I interviewed Quinta Brunson, we met in a WeWork cubby.

The biggest thing that happened for you guys with Front Page Films, back when Doritos held an annual Super Bowl ad contest asking anyone to make their own ads, you didn’t win, but your Front Page Films entry did air on national TV during the pregame show.

That’s the future Glennis McCarthy sitting next to Pete Holmes, hearing Matt’s pitch for Doritos Beer flavor.

What was crazy is the dudes who won (the contest), actually won the fucking thing. They won like the million dollars, whatever. And it was so funny, too, because they were from Ohio or something, and everybody else was from L.A. They don’t do this anymore. Apparently.

Right. It’s another measure of how much things have changed.

But it used to be a contest: Make your own Super Bowl commercial, Doritos. And this was like the second year they had done it. And say there was like five finalists. We were from New York. The dudes who won were from like Ohio. And then the other three were all from LA. So I remember the dudes from Ohio, that was their angle. We’re the outsiders! Everybody else is from the entertainment industry. And they were the most, if you ever deal with Hollywood bullshit, they were the most Hollywood bullshit. Like corporate-speak of anyone. I will never forget the one dude — there was like a set of brothers — and I remember the one dude was, the way that the gimmick works with the Super Bowl commercials. You know how the next day, USA Today is like the Ad Meter says this is the number one commercial of the Super Bowl. It’s very similar to like the way they do the Nielsen ratings, which is, it’s an estimate, and they’re just guessing. They’re like, well, this is an average group of TV viewers. This is your average American family. So whatever they’re watching probably means this is what everyone’s watching. Which is insane to me. How they used to do the radio ratings. I don’t know if this is how they still do it. But 20 years ago, we got like picked to be, because we were all like 19 or 20, and the way that they did the radio ratings then was they send you a piece of paper and it’s just based on the honor system. Just write down what you listened to at what time. And I was like you gotta be shitting me. And they’re like yeah, and then we’ll send you 50 bucks or whatever. So the way that the Ad Meter works is — this was the way it was explained to me — they give you like a little box with a dial and if you’re enjoying a commercial you turn the dial say it goes from one to 10. If you turn it all the way up to 10, that’s the best. And these outsiders from Ohio are the ones explaining the inner workings of the commercial business to me and how they’re gonna win this contest. I’ll never forget. He goes ‘You know, violence does very well. Slapstick does very well. Crotch shots do very well. I have numbers.’ And the way he said that, and if you watch their ad, it’s like immediately a dude gets hit in the balls, a thing gets smashed. And the budget that they had, this goes for everybody because like the other commercials were gorgeous! We were the ones that made a commercial for nothing. We shot it one morning.

In a conference room.

In the conference room at CollegeHumor. We were just like, Can we shoot something in your conference room? You know, real quick. And the most money we spent was just on the fake label. And that was just a Photoshop and then go to Kinko’s print it out on this fake bag of Doritos. And so then yeah, then we got to the finals and we got to go to the Super Bowl. I don’t remember who played because again, like I said, I’m not a sports guy, but it was the Super Bowl where Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band was the halftime show. So that was awesome.

Right. Because you were there!

Yeah, we went…But yeah, it was funny because, if anybody felt like the outsiders it was us because our commercial looked the crappiest. You know, because everybody else was talking about using a Red. I didn’t know. Like whatever this this crazy expensive like the top of the line digital camera at the time. I just remember hearing everyone say, Yeah, we shoot on a Red. I was like, you know what, ours doesn’t look the best but ours is the funniest. Everyone else’s was kind of, you know, I don’t know. It just… they weren’t funny. And again, that was the other thing. When we went, we were like the first thing I thought was like, holy shit. We get to go to the Super Bowl. They’re gonna put us in a hotel room. Let’s think of videos to make set in a hotel room. I remember specifically, one of the other video submissions, one of the other contestants was like, we’re gonna be drinking in the lobby, or there’s gonna be this party…and we’re like, oh, we’re gonna be shooting in our hotel room. Like we came up with a bunch of sketch ideas to shoot.

You used it as a free new location.

We were like great! Free location! And the hotels are some of my favorite Front Page Film videos we ever did, because that was the most us. Because when we would write things up beforehand, lots of times, you know, it’s like, OK, this is how we’ll shoot it and blah, blah, blah. But for me what was most exciting, what I loved, where I feel like the three of us thrived on was coming up with stuff in the moment. Just like, here’s a hotel room. And it’s like, OK, what’s the premise? All right. Pete’s the bellhop, I’m the the guy staying in the hotel room. What can we do? Something with the minibar. Do something with the shower. Do something with the wake-up call. Do something with, there was a phone next to the toilet. We’re like, Oh my God, you’ve just gifted us another one. Do like a room-service thing. All this stuff. And it was like, coming up with these things in the moment. And then very quickly, I just loved that run and gun. Like we’re just doing it on-the-fly feeling. And Oren’s like, I’ll set the camera up here and I will be over here to shoot Pete’s coverage and then Matt’s coverage and then it was just the improvising together.

Did you have a lot of improv training or background?

I took three levels at UCB. My level 101 was with Jon Daly. Who’s so goddamn funny. But he was dealing with — so I never understood what was going on — there was something going on with his apartment and his apartment building. And it took a lot of his time. And so he had to like miss a bunch of classes. So it wound up being beneficial because I got to have like a bunch of different instructors for that level 101 class. And because, I think Spo taught my 201…

Shannon O’Neill?

Shannon O’Neill. Sorry. And which was a different experience of having one instructor the whole class. And then by level 301. It was like, I forget his name but he was like, I don’t think he does improv anymore. And he was like on fumes at this point. He was so over it. He was so over improv and teaching and the only time he would get excited was when he talked about online poker. And he was like, I actually earned enough on online poker that I could pay all my bills this month. We would show up to class and he would be in the room just like on the windowsill asleep. And he’d be like, alright, two people go up. And I was like, by that point, I was like, I wasted my money on this one.

They also says very late 2000s. Talking about online poker.

Yeah. But I mean, I just wanted to be a better performer. I never had the intention of being on a house team or a Harold team or whatever they’re called. I just wanted to be better. The 201 class was beneficial. But honestly, after the 101, I was just like, oh, I understand how this works. I don’t see what more they can teach me at this point. And then specifically, I remember Owen Burke substituted one week, and I was like, oh, I get it. The way he taught the class made all the sense in the world to me, because like sometimes an improv instructor will let a bad scene keep going, and then discuss afterward about what wasn’t working. Owen would just stop the scene. He would just be get up and say, No. And here’s why. And just learning that stuff about what yes, and really means or if that, then what.

That was the extent of my improv. I was on a practice team and we performed. But I always used it more in stand-up, and particularly in commercials and commercial auditions, because very quickly I realized, they have an idea of what they want. But they are more than willing and encouraging of actors to make it better. Actually it’s funny that we started talking about the Book of Max because, the commercials that work well, I have found, for me, are like that premise where there’s a simple structure, but there’s room to explore inside of it. You know, there’s room to improvise.

That’s probably 1) why Owen Burke would rise to become one of the top execs at both Funny or Die as well as Gary Sanchez, which was the production company that Adam McKay and Will Ferrell had, and 2) then you also started to book more and more national TV ad campaigns: you were the cable guy in the Verizon ads.

What I love about the process of doing on-camera stuff. Commercials, in particular, because you have so you have such a short amount of time to tell the story. With the sitcom, with the multi cam, we kind of don’t know when we’re about to move on. And Pete is very keen on this. Pete’s like me, Pete wants to do it different every time, you know, or like try a different joke or like fuck around in the scene or like improvise or like maybe we can find something else. But you’ve got to do it the way it’s written. And we’re waiting for like, when’s the last take we’re gonna do? I wish we knew when it was going to be the last one, so that we could actually improvise and maybe find something new. Because also with the multi-cam, it’s like, OK, we’re done. We’re moving on, moving on. With a commercial, you’re there all fucking day for the fucking eight hours, and there’s nothing but opportunities to fuck around and try it a different way.

How long did it take to figure out who hand model John-John was in the recent Progressive ads? Because I feel like I know who he is, just from your goofy face and your hands.

You know what’s wild about that? We shot that the day before the NBA shut down in March 2020.

The Progressive thing, it was so funny going on the audition and the callback it was, you know, I remember… people were still doing like the shaking hands with their elbows. Remember that bullshit? And I just did it in the audition, and in the callback of like, you know, once I knew what the voice sounded like, ‘Oh, your wayward pinky is so grotesque!’ I don’t know if the voice I did was French or German. I think the guy was supposed to be French and I was just like, No, I’m going to talk like zis. Just a nondescript, you know, European. Just some whatever that, you know, Ugly American stereotype of, I’m a rich European ‘Sorry, was I driving on the wrong side of the road? Thought zis was Europe. Sorry gramps.’

And then also you were in a Super Bowl this year with Planet Fitness. So the ad hits just keep coming.

I was in an ad for the ad. They wouldn’t even explain what it was. I just knew it was a Planet Fitness commercial. But it was just they were being so secretive.

That’s yeah, that’s how insane the Super Bowl has become for the advertising business. They have teasers. They have ads for the ad.

So I was in the teaser for the Super Bowl commercial. And there was no call sheet. You just got a time. But there was no rundown of everybody that’s in it. Which is the first time that’s ever happened to me. At first I was like, Oh God this is gonna be a fucking nightmare. This is gonna be fly-by-night. They didn’t even send out a call sheet? Came to find out it was because they were being super secret about it because once I got there, later than everyone, because I’m just playing the dude who’s walking his dog and picks up the dog shit. Whereas the other dudes who played the paparazzi had been there a little earlier. And so by the time I showed up, they’re like, oh, Dennis Rodman is here and Lindsay Lohan and William Shatner. And I was like, what? They’re like, yeah, those trailers over there, that’s Lindsay Lohan’s trailer. Like William Shatner’s leaning out of his trailer. This is insane. At one point he got into like, I’m not a car guy, but like, I can tell when something’s expensive. He got into quite an expensive car.

At this point, you’ve been around plenty of famous people — whether it was for TV ads, movie sets, and then, of course, you’ve spent some time with the WWE. In case you missed it…since we just had SXSW back in person, Stephanie McMahon was part of it this year. And there was a tweet where she was praising the brand’s storytelling.

Since you were a writer for them, my first question is, were comedians part of WWE before you? Or were you part of a new innovative effort where the WWE was trying to get more comedy? Because now, obviously, John Cena and so many wrestlers are doing broad mainstream comedy.

I mean, yes, and no. I mean, Patrice wrote at WWE for like a little bit. O’Neal.

Oh! I had no idea.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely he did. I’m pretty sure the way the story goes. He said Stephanie fired him. Stephanie was the one who fired him. And like, she was trying to make a bigger deal out of it. She’s like, OK, well, you’re fired. And he’s like, OK. She’s like, No, you don’t understand. And he’s like, No, you don’t understand. I don’t give a shit.

Patrice did not care about bridges burned.

He’s also like, who cares? Who cares that I’m fired from WWE, you know? But even like my boss, who was the head writer there for many years, Brian Gewirtz, came from the sitcom world. And so, when I got brought in, they were specifically looking for a comedy writer. They were looking for somebody from the TV world, from the comedy community.

Were you required to be a big fan, or have a lot of knowledge about wrestling?

It helps. But no, they were more interested in someone with experience with TV writing. They brought in people writers from the soap opera world with no prior knowledge. Which is fine. In the wrestling fan community and I think the wrestlers too, but you know, by and large wrestlers are fans as well. There’s this perception that the writers are ruining WWE, which is ludicrous because anybody who’s worked on any TV show, knows that the showrunner runs the show, hence the name show runner. And the showrunner of WWE is Vincent Kennedy McMahon. And anything that the writers write is for Vince McMahon to approve or not approve. And my experience was Vince has a very active hand in the creative process. And my experience has also been if wrestling fans could watch the shows that the writers actually wrote and actually pitched to Vince, they would love the WWE writers. But the job itself was getting the job was

They were reaching out to TV writers and this is why I always tell people, be absolutely open and honest about what your interests are. Because this was also 2011. ‘I’m a nerd’ was definitely at its apex. But pro wrestling, there was still a stigma of like, well, you know, it’s fake, right? You know, like all that shit. I never had a problem being open and honest, still, about being a wrestling fan. Of just owning my interests. I love pro wrestling. You know, I love you know, videotapes. I love you know, bad movies. I love laser discs. I love all this stuff. And when you’re open up that stuff, when opportunities come up, people remember. So I remember the first TV writer who sent me the list and they’re like, Oh, they’re looking for comedy writers like wrestling. And then after that, I must have gotten it seven or eight times from people. They’re like, Oh, have you seen this? Because everybody was like, this isn’t for me, but I know the guy who would love to do this. Even just being open and honest about like, I love having a big movie collection. A big video collection. Like people are like, great, I don’t know what to do with these videotapes. I’ll give them to you.

So that said, the job was I was, you know, tasked with a lot of the comedy. And with Vince McMahon, his idea of comedy is you know, somebody getting their foot stuck in a bucket. That’s slapstick.

He has seen the numbers! But you’re commuting to Connecticut for this job?

I was living in New York taking the Metro North to Stamford (WWE HQ).

Did you ever get to travel?

Yes. I was on the home team in Stamford for a few months. And then I got promoted to being on the road. And worked hand in hands, you know, with Vince. Typically, I was with the more humorous wrestlers, like Zack Ryder, who now wrestles under his real name Matt Cardona. Who’s killing it. He’s the type of guy that fucking loves pro wrestling, and there’s nothing that can stop him from finding the best way to present his character. Getting fired was one of the best things that could have happened to him because, he has tapped into his voice, this heel persona he’s doing lately. It’s just beautiful. So I worked with him a lot. Worked with Santino Marella a lot, who was you know, presented as a — his character was like, he was just a goofy guy from Italy. But when you talk to him, that’s not his real accent. I didn’t get starstruck so much, you know, you’re meeting John Cena, or you’re meeting The Rock, or even, like Roddy Piper, or, you know, all these people. I’d be like, wow, I’m really excited to meet you. The only times I was just like, holy shit was when I when I first met The Big Show, because he’s just whole he’s so fucking big. I was just like, holy shit, dude! But the only other time was when I heard Santino talk in his regular voice. I was just like, this doesn’t make sense. Like this is truly, my brain can’t compute seeing this face talking…

It’d be like hearing Emo Philips talk differently.

Right? It was exactly like, I opened for Gilbert Gottfried once at Carolines….it was wild.

So having worked on TV and movie sets before joining the WWE, you had some idea of how the sausage gets made. Did being a wrestling fan and being on the inside did that change how you felt about it?

It only changed me in making me a bigger fan. And a lot of the writers that I work with, that core group of guys are still there, with one or two exceptions, but they’ll often say to me, Matt, you’re the only ex-writer who’s still a fan of pro wrestling. Usually they move on and they’re like fuck this forever. It made me a bigger fan because I understood everything then, particularly with WWE, because anytime anything didn’t make sense or a storyline was dropped or like a joke didn’t land or there was some clunkiness. I was like, Oh, I understand how it works behind the curtain. So now when the things that didn’t make sense to me onscreen make more sense to me now. And it made me appreciate how much more the work that goes into it. It doesn’t mean, when I watch RAW like this past Monday, and I’m just like, the Seth Rollins storyline is the drizzling shits. But I understand why it’s happening because Vince McMahon is Vince McMahon.

It’s like watching Saturday Night Live after you know some writers or you’ve written on the show, and you’re like, oh, yeah, I could see why this sketch made it to air, and why it’s totally bombing, but there was no way Lorne (Michaels) was gonna cut it.

Right. It’s funny, too. When I shot a pilot for some show, some Nickelodeon spin-off channel. I don’t even know if it still exists. Hugh Fink was one of the producers on it. All he wanted to talk to me about was Vince. Because he was like ‘Matt, I wrote at SNL when Dwayne Johnson first hosted,’ and he was like, ‘when he did the Lorne meeting, Vince came in and took over the meeting. And suddenly we were like pitching ideas to Vince, and Vince was the one giving us feedback.’ He’s like, ‘All of us were looking around like no one has ever out-alpha’d Lorne before.’ I was dead laughing. because also, if you watch that episode, it’s not The Rock who says Live From New York, It’s Saturday Night. It’s not one of the cast members. It’s not one of the wrestlers who showed up. It’s Vince. Vince McMahon is the one who says live from New York. I mean, it’s just the greatest.

Yeah, Vince and Lorne are very similar. And I guess it would make sense that Vince would be Lorne on steroids.

Right. It’s Vince, Trump. Like it’s this insecure alpha male thing. I mean, it’s true. It’s been said before, like if Trump were a little bit smarter, a little bit more charismatic, a little smoother with people like he would be Vince, you know. But yeah, but being on the inside and having had a lot of production experience. I know Renee Gautier said this to me, and I was like, you’re absolutely right. There’s so many things that could be done better, production-wise, but WWE refuses to do it because this is the way we do it. But you’re wasting so much fucking time doing it the way you do it. This is not how it’s done in the real world. But Vince is Vince and Vince has to have it his way.

He could do more things pre-tape and and really solidify them.

It could be a better show! It could be a more enjoyable product to watch. But Vince, you know, some people have to be difficult and Vince McMahon is somebody who as smart as he is and as good as he has been at his job. He just gets in his own way. surround himself with people who tell him you know that the Emperor’s New Clothes are gorgeous.

Something you do have complete control over is your TikTok account.

That’s true. I do. There’s no Flairs here. No Bischoffs here. Nobody can tell me what to do.

I follow you on TikTok and I enjoy just the idea that you can show off a completely different side of yourself while still being funny. How did you decide that you wanted to have a TikTok presence that was just about your being a film buff and a film collector?

Because it was the easiest thing to do. It was the least amount of effort. I could just say, ‘Here look at this.’

There’s always an idea. I was saying this to Glennis the other day. I was like, if I get a rundown for a commercial, for any audition. If I read it once and I get it I’m like oh, I know exactly what this is supposed to be. If I can visualize it. I’m like, Oh, I’m gonna book this thing. And nine times out of 10, I do. And with the asking people to name a movie. If I see a name of a movie, and in that moment. I’m, like, Oh, I know exactly what would be a funny thing, or just the way that the person asked the question, then that’s what I want to do.

This was true on Vine and it’s true on TikTok. The amount of effort that you put into this is commendable. But also I’m just like this is all you did all day. If you’re making money off of it, then fine? But I don’t have the fucking energy or desire to like, spend. I just want to do something funny in the moment. Because that’s what TikTok is. It is there and then it’s gone. It’s very much the way…I’m a DeadHead. It was the very much the way Jerry Garcia approached music. That’s why like every Dead show is different. He wants to make art that exists once and then, you know, is gone. It’s very much that sand art that monks do. Or I remember hearing about an artist that she did her art on bananas, because she knew that eventually the banana would rot and it would be gone. I love that idea of, you know, this doesn’t need to be permanent or precious. There’s an excitement about moving forward or finding something different. You know, I think that’s what I like about getting to do scenes differently or like, especially with stand-up. I like the idea of having the act to rely on when I can think of something else to talk about, but like I much more. I enjoy having a dialogue with the audience and not just like a monologue of reciting, these are the jokes and this is the order they go in. So TikTok, I mean there’s permanence to it, because it’s like you post it and it’s there forever, but it’s just like the idea of this is the thing for right now. And then what’s the next thing going to be?

You mentioned Jerry Garcia and the art just exists and then it’s gone. What do you think it says about you that you’ve gone to such great lengths, to collect as much art as possible? So that it does exist still somewhere.

Yeah. And that’s the paradox about the Grateful Dead because almost every show has been documented. But I think what I enjoy is. There’s something about the exploration. There’s always something else. Like I’ve recently really gotten into the director Lynn Ramsay. She’s incredible. And she’s a filmmaker, that you can watch her movies multiple times and find different things, but she’s only got about like six movies. So I have one left that I haven’t watched yet. And I’m just kind of like waiting on it’s just so I have something to look forward to. With a David Lynch, it’s always different every time you watch it, no matter how big or small his body of work is. There’s something to discover. That’s what I love. There’s always something to discover. There’s always a Grateful Dead show I haven’t heard or if I hear it again, it’s different. It’s part of what I love about pro wrestling, because there’s always there’s too much of it. There’s always something to discover….The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, I just love the sheer volume of it, that there’s always something to discover, or just peeking into what the world was like at that time. I love that. And that’s part of what I love about collecting videotapes, especially like, blanks with, either labels or no labels on them because it’s just like what’s on this tape,

Right? The TikToks where you just ask people to pick a number, and then you go through the files and like, you have no idea what’s on this tape. You’re going, I got it in a garage sale somewhere. I have no idea. Somebody’s filming their kid’s school play. And then it shifts into part of Dr. Zhivago. And then…

Yeah, yeah! Dude. I literally found a tape. I should post it. I meant to post it. It’s the label just says Doctor Zhivago. Because I also, I’ll trade tapes with other people, so they can make mixes and stuff. And I’m like, I’ve got a lot of blanks. I’ll send you this many and just make me a copy of whatever you’re making. And it also frees up some room in here. Because I’m going through my comic books now. Because definitely I don’t need this many boxes of comic books. I can say now, what do I want to keep what do I want to sell and what do I want to just leave at the Salvation Army? You deal with it. So this tape, it just said, Doctor Zhivago, and I was like, I’ve got that on DVD. Do I need a crappy copy of it? So I put it in. Just to check. You gotta check. Gotta check. And it is Dr. Zhivago. Taped from like, the Saturday Afternoon Movie, and it’s got that, like…this is take the DVD, throw it in the garbage! This is the way I want to watch it. It’s just so fun to just have the experience. You can’t have that type of experience, you know, flipping around on your Fire stick or your Roku or whatever.

Matt then describes some of the weird VHS mixes he has, and always something new to discover.

Let’s close on a more uplifting note. How We Roll on CBS. You know, this means that 15 years after that summer in the East Village, where you and Pete are both finding your way in an uncertain future, you’re now back working again. And this isn’t the first or second or third time you’ve worked together because of course, on Conan, you were doing sketches and, and Pete was doing warm-up. And then he got his own talk show that aired post-Conan. And you and him and Oren were all working together on that. So how does it feel to once again be reunited with Pete on this even bigger project?

I don’t know what the words are. It’s nice. I’m at a place in my life where, this all came at the right time. Because even, Pete isn’t running this show. It was very much they wanted recommendations of who were some funny people that you are comfortable working with. Because the idea is the show is set in a bowling alley. And they’re like, you know, we can make it like Cheers. But in a bowling alley, like some regulars, you know,

Who is the Norm and Cliff.

Yeah, exactly. And so I got an audition, you know, Pete’s like, oh, you should look at this one guy. We’ve worked together before. But with broadcast TV, network TV, it takes a lot more than just one person being — even the stars of the show. I mean, you think about the story of 30 Rock, you know, that was supposed to be Rachel Dratch starring in that show.

Right. She was even in a lot of the first episode.

It’s Tina’s show, you know, she runs it, writes it, stars in it. And still, no. The network or whoever. Because even when I did the pilot presentation. And for whatever reason, when the audition came in, I didn’t even know Pete was involved until I got the call sheet. You know? Because again, he’s not going to mention anything, because he knows very well like, it doesn’t mean anything. Like OK, we’ll give this guy an audition.

Which I can feel, you know, very grateful for that. Because I still had to get the job myself. And for whatever reason, when the audition came in, and again, this is you know, pandemic. You know, this is in 2021. So, that’s to say, self-taping it at home, which can be uncomfortable but sometimes it can be good, and for whatever reason, when that audition came in, I was like, you know what? There was something in my head that was like, try as hard as you can on this one. Like I ran the lines with Glennis, and it was for a different part, too, and I put on like a suit coat… Because, typically, I’d shoot it once and be like, fuck it, good enough. This is stupid. You know, very full of just, I don’t know. Laziness. But also just like self-condemnation. This one I was like, and Glennis is a great scene partner and she’s a great director. And just like ran the scene back and forth, and taking her input. And I was just like, whether I book this job or not, I am so happy that I did the best. Like all I wanted was to just do a good audition. You know, and I was so like, you know, what? If they don’t take me it’s out of my hands, because I fucking nailed it. I did exactly the best job I could. And that was my attitude going into the pilot. I was like, You know what, this thing’s not going to get picked up. I don’t care. I have one line. I just want to do the best job I can with the line. There are times when I’m not always this guy. But there are times when I can take a line and make it funnier than it is. And this was a time when I was able to do that. And I was just really grateful that you know, I was able to do what I set out to do. Then the thing went to series, this is insane. This doesn’t make sense. And still trying to keep that frame of mind of like, Alright, I just want to be a worker among workers and do this job and do the best I can with it. And it’s been such a great experience.

And then being with Pete again. Is does feel like this full circle moment, because there was a time where I never wanted to see him again. You know, like I had a negative experience working on the talk show. And I didn’t really feel like a part of things. It was confusing. It was just. There were times though, so like when we did the psychiatrist sketches. Or like especially like the ones where we’re going to like the Heaven’s Gate, or like God, when him and I did the parody of True Detective. Those were moments when it was like, I felt connected. With him again. It didn’t feel like we were on TV. It just felt like we were being funny and felt like we were roommates again.

And I don’t know. So then after the talk show wrapped. Crashing was in development. I didn’t know what Crashing was or what it was going to become. But I know that I probably would have been a part of it. But I explicitly said to him, I just don’t want to work with you on anything ever again. I don’t know. But I need to be clear that like I was in a bad place. Like I was in a very, it was heading towards a brick wall of a lot of self-destructive behavior that finally you know, thankfully, I was able to pull myself out of with the help of a lot of amazing people. It’s strange, you know. Being on this show now with him. I’m in such a different place and I feel like he is, too. I can’t speak for anyone else. Even like shooting in a, we’re like vaccinated and stuff, but shooting this thing still in a pandemic. And like we’re not really supposed to be around each other in-between stuff, but like lots of times him and I will just like, I’ll go up to his room and we’ll sit and we’ll talk and like. It’s really just good quality time. It’s not lost on me what a great gift I’ve been given. Plus it’s just fun. Everyone is fun to be around. The rest of the cast is amazing. The great people. the crew is amazing. Put it this way. At the wrap party, literally the first time I’m seeing people, like I’m like wait, are you are you so-and-so? Because I only know people with their masks on. Literally the first time I’ve seen their whole face, you know? And like people who’ve been in business for like 30 years, these crew members are like this is like one of the best experiences we’ve had. Talking to a PA who it’s her first job and she’s like, people keep telling me like don’t get used to this. Not every job is going to be like this. But, it’s a great experience. Hopefully you know. If people like the show, great. If they don’t, I’m very satisfied with the work that I’ve done. I’m just excited to see what’s what’s going to happen.

Well, no matter whether How We Roll lasts only one season or whether it goes for 10 seasons, you still have this experience. That can’t be taken away from you.

It is that thing of like you know, if nobody likes it and gets canceled. I cannot. I’m incapable of feeling disappointed about the experience because it was so fun, and doing this character and figuring out who this character is. And it’s funny, because it’s like we’re like a mid-season deal. So there’s 11 episodes and I got to perform in 10. It truly wasn’t until the last episode that it really clicked in my head of, oh this is who this guy is. This how I do Carl. The rest of time I was just being me or an extension of me or just being funny. But there’s like two scenes I got to be in in the season finale where I’m like, oh, there’s just something. I’m a kid who always made faces in the mirror. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that’s great training for comedic acting. Because I’m just trying to get laughs at school. Right? And I remember being like knowing what the face looked like but also remembering in my head, how it felt making that face so I knew what face I was making. And that’s the way I felt about doing Carl in the season finale. I was like, Oh, I know what, how I feel. I’ve never taken an acting class. I don’t know. It’s so funny being around like really great actors on the show, too. Like, Julie White has won a Tony. And like watching her perform. I’m like I don’t know what I’m doing.

But you were trained by Owen Burke. So you know exactly what you’re doing.

And if I can do that. Then what else can I do?

And in the beauty you know as I’ve covered more television as a journalist I’ve realized you know, the beauty of a lot of sitcoms is they, most of them don’t really find themselves until Season Two.

It’s funny I have been thinking a lot about like, say like Michael Richards on Seinfeld, If you watch those early, like that first season for sure. But like those early episodes, Kramer’s a totally different character. He’s got, you know, five o’clock shadow. He’s wearing a bathrobe. It’s almost like he’s doing like Jim Ignatowski on Taxi.

Maybe he was.

Maybe he was, you know, but it’s funny seeing people find that character. Even like, I’ve been thinking mostly about John Ratzenberger doing Cliff Clavin and how, he wasn’t a part of the cast until season three or four maybe?

Wow, I’m gonna have to go back and watch that again.

Like he’s still like, you know, co-star, end credits you know? But that character going from just the bar know-it-all to then that loser character. But like having that bravado, and then by the end of the series, you’re almost like Cliff, are you OK? He’s almost become this conspiracy nut. So yeah, so like, there’s that. But yeah, a lot of shows, they don’t find it for a little while, but that’s a luxury to be able to have time to find it. Even like Frasier. You think about that character where it started. Like, that was such a dry, almost exposition-riddled character and then it became literally one of the most successful TV characters of all time. You know?

He didn’t just start out who seems the antithesis of Sam Malone.

Right, and then he becomes this. He stole so many mannerisms from Jack Benny, that it just like worked so well for that character. Because that’s what Jack Benny said. If your character is strong enough, you can get laughs without saying anything because the audience knows the character so well. They’re laughing at watching the character think. They can get laughs by just thinking, because you’re like, oh here it comes. That’s incredible to think of. performances like that. And like Frasier regularly the way Kelsey Grammer would do that. He would get lots of laughs just doing takes up just absorbing what some wacky character had said to him or whatever.

Matt, it’s been a luxury to be able to catch up with you and talk for this long. I mean, I wasn’t expecting to have you for a half an hour, let alone an hour and a half. So I appreciate the time. And one McCarthy to another, even if we’re not connected on ancestry.com. It is a thrill to see you on screen, whether it’s for 30 seconds at a time, or for a half-hour at time.

We’ll see how it rolls.

There we go. Print it. Cut.