-John, your character, you're a police officer.
Your name is Gilbert Pewntz.
And that's not the only great name in the show.
But Pewntz was the name that you've long wanted
to find into a television show.
-Yes. I -- I -- In the writers room at "SNL,"
we try to just write stupid names
to make the other writers laugh.
Not you, necessarily. You --
It bothers you, doesn't it? [ Laughter ]
-Oh, yeah, I hate it. [ Laughter ]
-And then you would cut them. -[ Laughs ]
-But I originally wrote this for David Spade,
a character named Cane Pewntz... -Cane.
-...who was teaching the craft of kissing,
and his whole infomercial was just about him
trying to get women to come to his workshop
to practice kissing.
So the name -- Gilbert seemed a little more
friendly for this character, but Pewntz has been something
that I've wanted to get -- put somewhere for a long time.
-You've worked with each other. You've written for each other,
maybe not as explicitly written for each other as you have now,
but you know each other's voices well.
Was there times that you were writing lines
that you would only ever write for Paula,
and, Paula, were there lines that John wrote
that delighted you more than others?
-Yeah. Any -- Writing anything
with Gilbert's character doing the funny --
'Cause John can just do that sort of --
the sort of low-self-esteem-based, like,
misunderstanding and then sort of reiterating
and then trying to make sure he's got the right instructions.
It was such a -- such a funny game with Gilbert
and such a homage to sort of a Barney Fife type thing.
And so anytime I wrote anything
that was coming out of John's mouth,
I could hear it like he was sitting on my shoulder.
-[ Laughs ] -And the same thing with Paula.
Like, it's fun to make her, like, scream.
When she gets startled, have her go, like,
"What in the squirrels?!" [ Laughter ]
But her -- her voice just -- it's right there. Yeah.
-You also -- J.B. Smoove is also in the show,
also a writer with us back in the day,
and a person who is both a joy to write for
and a joy to watch improvise, I would imagine.
-Oh, he's beyond funny.
He's a legend in the pitch meetings at "SNL,"
because it would get to him,
and he would just very leisurely start pitching.
You know, everyone is so nervous,
and they're kind of meeting the host,
and they didn't have anything loaded up about
what's an idea 'cause it's Monday,
and they've only had, like, a day and a half
to think about it.
So they're like, you know, freaking out.
And then it would get to him,
and he'd just have the floor, you know?
He'd just be like, "Yeah, something like --
like a 15-foot grill. You know those grills?"
I was like, "A 15-foot gas grill?"
And he would just keep going, and people would be dying.
I've also always said about J.B. that he's the only person
I've ever seen audition where Lorne put his head down
on the table, he was laughing so hard.
He had to like put -- at a comedy club,
and he had to, like, put his head down
on the table and laugh.
And Hayley Magnus is my niece, and she's like 6-feet tall.
It's just a wonderful group of eccentric characters.
We love it. -And you guys have
taken advantage of the Quibi platform with some --
There's some light nudity, which is, uh...
you know, I am a great appreciator of.
-Yeah. We're not gonna say who's getting naked.
It's either me or John,
but let's just say it's a nice set.
-[ Laughs ]
It's a nice, heaving set that's revealed.
-It could also be both of us, Paula.
[ Laughter ]
-It's both of us. All I know is,
when we did the scene, we end up both possibly being naked,
possibly nipples to the breeze,
and we were crying down into our bosoms, laughing,
because we couldn't believe we were doing this.
And we wrote it, so we couldn't blame anyone
that we were just out in the open air with...
-And this is a thing now more than ever,
which is, I think, a welcome change.
It's taken very seriously when there's nudity on the set.
-Oh, yeah. -And yet you both
were incapable --
Because it was self-inflicted. You wrote it for yourselves.
-Yeah.
-Incapable of taking it seriously.
-No, we had that whole meeting. -Yep.
-Everybody -- we cleared the set of any non-essential people.
I was very -- very serious at first,
and then I take my shirt off to cover Paula.
-[ Laughs ]
And then that's when she starts laughing at me
because she's just looking at my chest, laughing.
And then it was -- -Just 'cause the weight of it --
Can I compliment your chest? Do I, okay, have permission?
-Sure. -He just has a really
good chest, and he's got a nice, you know, hair pattern.
But I -- I don't see it that often, and so I --
I just realized, in a moment --
It was one of those camera moments that just is
the focus pull, where all of a sudden, I'm like,
"Oh, I'm standing out in the cold with, like,
two crew members and a coyote in the back lot of Universal
watching us stand there naked."
-[ Laughs ]
But it's definitely worth -- it's definitely worth it
to ride that -- ride the "Mapleworth" train
to get to that part.
-You do have an incredible cast -- the two of you,
J.B., Hayley, and then a ton of super-fun cameos of friends
that you guys have made over your two decades in comedy.
-Yeah. -Yeah, we got super lucky
with everybody who was able to do it.
It was awesome.
-Just a parade of heavy-hitter --
heavy-hitter people. -Yeah, we had --
-Tina and Andy Samberg and... -Maya Rudolph.
-Maya Rudolph and Fred Armisen. -You know him so well.
He can't -- -Ike Barinholtz and Nicole Byer.
-You've never met any of these people.
You barely can remember their names.
-[ Laughs ]
-That one that's in that one thing.
-[ Laughs ] Um, I am --
-We don't have televisions.
-Oh, you don't. Oh, that's right.
You guys are readers. I'm so excited for the show.
Paula, I should also mention I'm so excited
that season three of "A.P. Bio" is about to start.
Those episodes are fantastic.
That's coming in September on Peacock.
And, John, I genuinely -- We were --
We were busting each other's chops a little
before this started. I'm genuinely excited
to hopefully see you again soon back at work.
-Ah, yes. Me, as well.
-All right, I love you both. -Love you!
Love you. Stay safe. -Thank you. Stay safe.