-It is so great to see you. -Oh, my gosh.
Thank you for having me. -Welcome to the show. You look fantastic.
It's your first time on our show,
but it feels like we've hung out or we talked or something.
-I know. We went on a date one time.
-[ Laughter ] -Yeah.
-I don't know if you remember it.
-Yeah, of course, I remember that, yeah.
I wanted to say congrats on "White Lotus."
I want to talk about it. You just nailed it.
I mean, it was a home run, buddy.
You were so good on that. But before we get into that,
I wanted to say that we've had many guests on our show
that have done impressions of you.
-Yeah. -Yeah. And great ones.
-Who would have thought?
-If you're up for it,
I would love to show you a few of these impressions.
-Oh, yeah. I think I know --
I know some great ones I've seen on Instagram.
Okay, yeah. Who do you got? -Chloe Fineman was here.
-Oh, my God.
-Here's her Jennifer Coolidge impression.
-Oh, I'm gonna make you a pie, dumbass!
Yeah.
-Is that amazing? -It is. That is amazing.
You know, it's so weird because you don't really know
who you are ever really,
you know, in an objective point, you know, sort of perspective.
But then you see people,
and you're like, "That's who I am?"
And you're like, "Oh, all right."
I'll take it. I mean, she -- I like that.
-But when you get in the zone.
But the first time I think I heard anyone
do an impression of you
is when Ariana Grande was here a few years ago.
And here's Ariana's impression of Jennifer.
-God. You look like the Fourth of July!
I'm taking the dog, dumbass!
[ Laughter ]
-I know. -Come on!
Ariana Grande crushing --
That's a great impression. -I know. Unbelievable.
But, you know, you should know
that it was sort of the beginning
of a lot of cool things that happened for me.
Because -- I don't know.
I sort of, you know -- I was going through a dead zone,
and not much was going on.
And then Ariana did this imitation on your show,
and you encouraged her.
And then this ball got rolling.
I mean, you know, my friend, who's like her age, Teresa,
she was like, "Hey, you know,
you should DM Ariana and just say, you know..."
Because I thought it was such a good imitation.
And I was like, "No! She's got like 260 million followers!"
Those are robots.
The robots answer the DMs,
and we will never, ever get to her or whatever.
And then I did it anyway.
And then this response came back.
And then next thing you know, I was going to her house
getting fit for a wardrobe fitting for "Thank U, Next."
So that was all because of Jimmy Fallon.
-No. -Yes. Yes.
-You were great in "Thank U, Next.
Wait. This is great -- This is amazing to hear this.
So from that Ari thing, it all grew.
And then -- But do you do impressions?
-I do -- You know who I do do is --
I do people that no one knows what they sound like.
Like, I did -- I used to get to the front of a nightclub
where everyone's waiting to go in line,
and then I would be like, you know, "I'm Muffin Hemingway."
Who is, like, one of the Hemingway sisters
that no one knew what she sounded like.
And then and if I had to get into a restaurant
with my friends -- We didn't have any money at that time.
But if we wanted to get a restaurant, I would go --
I would call up the restaurant
as Eileen Ford the modeling agent.
And no one knew what she sounded like.
Not a lot of people.
And I would just be like, "Hi. It's Eileen Ford.
And I've got a bunch of my girls
that would like to come and --
They're all models, of course.
And a bunch of them would love to come over
to your restaurant tonight."
And then -- And then, like, 20 minutes later,
this very motley crew would walk in.
No one looked like a model.
Some were like 4'11". Everyone was like -- And --
But, you know, they couldn't get out of it.
They already had the table.
Then we couldn't go to that restaurant ever again.
-But that's a great impression
of someone that no one's ever heard of.
Let's talk about "White Lotus."
When that script -- Because that was written for you.
That's what I heard.
-Yeah, sort of. Mike had -- You know, yeah, he sort of
observed me on a trip that we went on.
I think he sort of thought maybe I could do that part.
Because he sort of -- You know, he saw how --
-How you can -- -How weird I was, yeah.
-But there's no one else that could have done what you did.
There's no one else. There's not one human being
that could have done what you did on the show.
It was perfect. It was one-of-a-kind.
-Oh, thank you, thank you. -And it was amazing.
-Thank you.
-The delivery, just how quick.
Oh, my gosh. Anyways.
Originally, you go, "I don't know if I feel like doing this."
-I know. You know -- Well, yeah.
I didn't want to -- I didn't want to do it.
Because I know a lot of people
were on their Pelotons over the --
when COVID began and everything.
I don't know. I was -- That was not my journey.
I just sort of -- It was me and my friend Carolyn
in my house in New Orleans.
And we just --
We ate maybe six pizzas a day between the two of us.
And then, you know -- And then this part gets offered.
And I was just like, "Yeah, I'm not. I'm not doing it.
I'm not doing it." You know, I tried to, you know,
figure out these ways to get out of it
with, like, a medical excuse, whatever.
And then, um...
And then Mike sort of caught onto me.
I know he caught on because he sent me a text
in the middle of the night.
I was in New Orleans, he was in L.A.,
and he sent this text.
My little phone dinged. I was just trying to think
of something that sounded believable.
Like, you know, I had partial hip problems,
you know, where I couldn't turn.
I don't know. I came up with all these weird things.
But then Mike just said --
In the text, it just said, "Are you afraid?"
And I was like, "Oh, Jesus, he's onto me."
And then I still thought of trying to get out of it.
But then I was over at my friend's Chase's house one day,
and she goes, "Are you going to Hawaii
to do that job with Mike?"
I said, "No, I'm not. I'm not doing it."
And then she said, "You know what? You're an idiot.
And guess what. You're insane and you're going."
And, you know, just sort of --
A girlfriend sort of talked me off, out of my insanity.
Because, you know, when you're actors,
this big moment can happen sometimes,
and then you just blow it and go,
"Yeah, you know, I'm going to do that next year.
I'm going to go on a trip."
You just blow it somehow. -Yeah.
-And for whatever reason, a good friend --
-Wow. Just said, "Hey, go do it. Snap out of it."
Yeah. And, "You can do this." And you went and did it.
And then --
-Yeah, and then -- Well, yeah. People really liked the --
-They loved it.
-Mike White is brilliant. He wrote a great show.
And then -- Yeah. -Critics love it, fans love it.
Congrats. It's well-deserved, all the nominations.
I know they just announced the next installment
of "White Lotus" is coming on HBO.
-Yeah.
-And they're going to change a lot of the characters.
But I go -- All the fans are like,
"Is Jennifer Coolidge coming back?"
-Well, I don't know.
There's a rumor I'm coming back. I hope --
There's a rumor that "Legally Blonde 3" is happening.
I mean, there's a lot of rumors out there. I hope --
[ Cheers and applause ]
I hope they're all, like -- But I don't know.
-You don't know. Okay.
Knock on wood. I'm not jinxing anything.
But you couldn't have been better in this thing.
And, man, I would watch this every day
for the rest of my life.
I didn't want it to end. It was so great.
I want to show everyone a clip.
Here's the magnificent Jennifer Coolidge in "The White Lotus."
Take a look at this.
-Yeah, he likes the first layer, maybe.
I don't know. But what about the second layer?
And the third layer?
And then every step along the way,
you know, I have to worry about, you know,
is he going to like the next layer?
And I get all afraid. How much do I want to show him?
You know, is he going to be repulsed?
Or is he going to be alarmed?
And at the core of the onion, Belinda,
is just a straight-up alcoholic lunatic.
-That -- That's not true.
-No, it is. It is. And I just want to show my hand.
I don't want to play poker anymore.
I want to skip all the layers and go straight to the crazy
and just like, you know, let the chips fall where they may
and, you know, just show him!
Just show him the core of the onion!
-Yes!
Jennifer Coolidge, everybody!
All episodes of "The White Lotus"
are streaming now on HBO Max.