- Say hello to John Hamm!
(audience cheers)
(upbeat music)
- [John] Hey!
- You look fabulous.
I'm just gonna lead with that.
- Fired up.
- Wait, you have like a...
You should have a like glasses deal.
- Ah, I don't know, maybe-
- [Kelly] I'm just saying.
- Maybe my deal is just wearing glasses.
- I'm just saying why you should look in it,
it could be a lucrative business, it's a nice look.
So Elisabeth Moss, as you saw
we know she beat you like every time, right?
- I don't know about every time.
I think what she said was she beat me once
and then I refused to play again.
But yeah, it was the championship.
She won the championship and then the championship was over.
And then, you know, there was never another championship.
What a shame. (audience laughing)
- That is so sad.
No, what was the game of choice again?
- Well, she played speed,
but we played a lot of games at the Mad...
In the Mad Man base camp, there was dominoes,
there was a lot of cards, there was heads up.
- Do you do Mexican train dominoes?
I love those.
- We have played, we didn't play that there
but we did played regular old dominoes.
It was, there were a lot of games
'cause there was a lot of...
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- We spent a lot of time there.
- [Kelly] Yeah. - Yeah, I worked...
I was always there 'cause I'm in every scene.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- So I would sort of run the game quotient.
And then if there was one that I wasn't particularly good at
we shuffled that one into the back of the-
(Kelly and audience laughing)
In the back of the line.
- We see who you are. - Yes.
- So wait, did you...
You also love poker, right?
Do you do poker nights?
- I play poker. - [Kelly] Okay.
- I've been in a, actually a game
of poker that's been running every week
since before I started "Mad Man", which would've been-
- [Kelly] What? - back in the early 2000s.
But no it's yeah.
I love playing poker, it's fun.
It's more fun to just get your friends together
and sit around a table and talk.
- [Kelly] 100%. - Yeah.
- And it's just kind of the vessel
for that whole mingling scenario.
- Absolutely - Oh, okay, I love it.
Wait, did you always know that you wanted to be an actor?
Like from early on?
I know a lot of people kind of say that.
- Kind of.
I was chosen at a very early age.
- [Kelly] Oh. - In first grade
by my first grade teacher, Shirley Kassouy.
- I love that you still know her name.
- If anybody wants to double check my facts.
(audience laughing)
To play Winnie the Pooh,
in our first grade production of Winnie the Pooh.
So, and I think Miss Kassouy picked me
because I had no fear of speaking very loudly
in front of people. - Yeah.
- So yeah. I wouldn't say-
- [Kelly] Which isn't normal for most kids.
- It set me down the path, you know
of dressing up in animated costumes, but no, I think it's...
I've never had a problem with standing up and talking loud.
- Do you, Okay. - And looking like an idiot.
- To go even deeper.
- With a pillow strapped to my stomach.
- Did you get a pot of honey?
(audience laughing) - I sure did.
(Kelly laughs)
- No, to go even deeper, do you feel...
Feel free to not answer this,
but I feel like sometimes I'm more comfortable on stage.
- [John] For sure.
- Yeah. - It's fun.
- I feel like I'm more comfortable.
Like, I don't know if that's like trauma
in there somewhere, I don't know what that is.
- A hundred percent, by the way.
- Yeah.
- No, it can be fun.
I mean, some people it's the most terrifying thing
in the world and for some people
it's the opposite and I think you and I probably like that.
- Yeah, I am.
Yeah, I feel very comfortable. - [John] It's a Blast!
- Almost more comfortable
than having to play myself sometimes
at a party or something with other celebrities
which people think you're all supposed to be friends.
It's like what?
Anyway, but I love you.
You wanna be friends? - Yes, totally.
(Kelly laughs)
- So before the break we were talking about you acting
in school, but I hear that you actually went back
to your high school and you taught acting.
- I did, I actually went back to my old high school
in St. Louis, Missouri, John Buroughs School
in St Louis, Missouri.
I'm sure some of you may know somebody who went there.
There's usually like one in every crowd.
- [Kelly] Hmm.
- In 2004, after I graduated college,
I had a theater degree and no prospects.
So I was like, well, what can I do?
I know, I'll talk to my old acting teacher
and maybe he'll gimme a job, teaching at my old high school.
And I did that and it was really fun.
I was 24 years old.
I had no idea what I was doing.
- Teaching is hard.
- It is incredibly hard.
And not only is it hard, it is a long day.
- Yeah.
- And when you're used to being a bartender
and a waiter and your day starts at like 5:30, 6PM,
that eight o'clock wake up is a little bit of a rough
- Yeah.
- Transition.
So that was my introduction to that.
I spent a whole year there, they liked what I did.
I had some really great students.
Ellie Kemper was one of my students.
- [Kelly] Oh wow!
- I had a couple other pretty phenomenal kids
in my classes.
- Small world.
- But, they said do you wanna come back?
You wanna keep doing this?
And I was like, well, I'm 24 years old.
I'm pretty long in the tooth for an actor.
(audience laughing)
- [Kelly] Which is crazy.
- Which is crazy, but I- - Try being a woman. (laughs)
- Exactly.
But I thought, if I don't do it now
I probably won't do it. - [Kelly] Yeah.
- And so I was like, I would love to do this
but I have to try, at least try.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- So, I packed up my car,
which was a 1986 Toyota Corolla.
- [Kelly] Nice.
- And I got all the money that I had, which was $150.
And I headed west.
- I Love...
Not as similar story I was never teacher,
but I just mean like, I think you have those big dreams
and a lot of people do
but it's a brave thing to just drive across country
head out west.
I'm from Texas, and I did the same.
I was a cocktail waitress.
So we all, we all were waiters at some point.
- Exactly, tip your waiters.
- Yeah, yeah.
But I love it to be so bold
and move out there for a dream.
But how long, like...
'Cause you were persistent,
you persevered like you...
It was from that teaching class
to when you actually hit, like got a job.
- From that acting class to when I actually hit,
was a period of about probably five years.
- Really? - [John] Yeah.
- That's a lot.
- [John] Waiting tables and-
- [Kelly] That's hard - Bartending and everything.
Yeah, well, I mean, but it was fun.
I mean, it's fun to be in a new city, making new friends,
learning the lay of the land, learning, going to...
When I came to LA like the Beck
and the Silverlake music scene was all happening,
I lived over there and it was really fun.
And you could go see those shows for five bucks
and all my friends were comedians,
and you could go see shows at Largo for $3.
And if you waited in line, it was free.
So there was all that.
There was fun stuff to do.
You just had to kind of lean into it, but-
- You were me though.
Where is the free one?
- Yeah, where's the free show exactly?
- [Kelly] That was me - Which line is free?
- [Kelly] When I cocktail down here.
- So wait, speaking of shows, you must love music.
I heard that you were actually at Prince's last concert.
- Oh, I was.
- [Kelly] How did? That's amazing.
(audience applauding)
I never got to see him live.
- Yeah, oh wow.
There's yeah, that was it.
It was him and a piano and a microphone.
The tour was called "Prince: Piano and a Microphone.
And he- - [Kelly] Very literal.
- He played for about 90 to a hundred minutes nonstop
and it was like, he would start songs and then like
look out the crowd and be like, mhm
you guys aren't ready for that one yet.
And the crowd would go like crazy.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- It was in Atlanta, Georgia at the Fox theater
which is this old beautiful.
- Yeah. - You probably played there.
- Yeah, I love it.
- Vaudeville theater, right in Midtown there.
And it was like church.
It was- - [Kelly] Spiritual.
- People turned up and it was really fun.
It had been...
I had gotten tickets.
I was shooting "Baby Driver."
You don't have to applaud for that.
But it is a good movie.
( Kelly and John laugh)
(audience applauds)
- [Kelly] Oh my God.
- I'm only putting this in context,
but we were shooting "Baby Driver"
and I saw that he was coming
and I knew that he was coming on this particular tour.
He was playing by himself
and I thought, I'm gonna, I got tickets.
And he canceled.
- Oh.
- He got sick and he canceled.
And I was like, oh no, but he rescheduled.
And he rescheduled for the end of our shoot
and I still had those days off.
So I was like, okay, my tickets are still good.
We're gonna get to go.
And it was his last show
and I still have my little ticket stub.
- Oh my gosh, that's incredible.
- And it was the best show I've ever seen, it was great.