-Me choosing not to be forthright with y'all,
that was a bad choice.
But I can't be wasting time
wishing for a do-over on all that.
'Cause that ain't how choices work.
No, sir. No.
That choice and my Chicago Bull's starter jacket
that I let Janelle Rhodes borrow my sophomore year
'cause she spilled ketchup all over herself
and it looked like she'd been shot,
well, those are two things I ain't ever getting back.
-Welcome back to "Late Night." That was the clip
from the Emmy Award-winning series, "Ted Lasso."
We're here with Jason Sudeikis,
along with co-creators Brendan Hunt and Joe Kelly.
[ Laughter ] Look at that!
Wow. Well-rehearsed, gentlemen.
Well-rehearsed. -Not bad.
-This is very exciting. You are now rolling right out
of season two, which we're getting to see
the finale of this week, into writing season three.
How's it going so far?
-I mean -- -What week are we on, four?
-At least, yeah. -At least four.
I mean, the first two weeks were great because it was the lead-up
to the Emmys, and then we won stuff at the Emmys.
And we really just -- It was a lot of high-fiving.
[ Both laugh ]
And now we have to actually write.
-Took the next day off. That cost us a day.
-Yep. That's true. -So we're figuring it out now.
-Joker -- Right above you, Joker,
is a -- looks like an idea for episode 302.
-Yeah. -Which one --
What do you got there? -"Ted dies"?
-Yeah, "Ted dies." [ Laughter ]
-No wrong answers while you're blue-skying a season.
-Blue sky, baby! -Blue sky -- yeah, exactly.
Yes, and.
Brando, this came as no surprise to me, having known you,
but you made some very splendid sartorial choices at the Emmys.
You were very British early on.
[ Laughter ] This is a guy right out of --
-Did not know there were cameras on, to be fair.
-So, just to be also completely honest,
Jason told me he was gonna dress as Batman so...
-Okay. -I do my Penguin thing.
You know, we're buddies again, but hung me out to dry.
-I said Bruce Wayne. He heard Batman, for the record.
-This is -- What I love about this, Brendan,
is, if you hadn't won, you'd look like such an ass [bleep]
[ Laughter ]
That was like -- When you went and tried it on,
you brought a fake Emmy to see how it'd look.
[ Laughter ]
-It's a long walk back to the parking lot.
-Now, Joe Kelly, this is the Brendan you met, right?
In Amsterdam, back in the day? -That was him.
The pants are a little looser now.
But that's basically him. [ Laughter ]
-So, we did all meet in the early 2000s in Amsterdam,
working for a theater called Boom Chicago,
and the conception of this idea obviously didn't start then,
but, like, some of the seeds were planted, maybe just insofar
as you guys were finding your way into soccer.
-Oh, for sure. Well, I mean, yeah.
Brendan, you know, fell in love with the sport over there.
I mean, safe to say. -Oh, yeah.
Hadn't been into soccer at all.
Then moved to Amsterdam and caught the bug.
-And then I -- I only -- I talked a bunch of people
in the theater to give me 20 guilder
so I could buy a PlayStation to play "Tony Hawk: Pro Skater,"
and then Brendan was like, "Oh, you should get FIFA 2000,
as well," and then we would play that.
And Brendan would basically explain to me the game
as he's playing Arsenal and I was playing Manchester United
and just to sort of break down the players,
and it's exactly the way we ended up doing
the commercial, like, in 2013, like, you know, however many --
dang near 12 years later.
And the way that Beard and Ted would talk,
the way he explains the complications and histories
of the game and how certain players or certain things,
that absolutely started in the greenroom
or the shiny at Boom Chicago. -And then you guys were --
Joe, you guys were sort of sniffing around this idea
for years, right? And sort of had it
in the back pocket, waiting for the right time?
-Well, I mean, first, the NBC promos came up,
and they kind of broached the idea with Jason,
and then it was kind of like, "Oh, we've got this.
Let's go to London, and we can do this."
And kind of freaked everyone out because we refused to hand in
a script or, like, tell them about anything we were doing.
And they're really, really upset.
We found all this out after the fact.
-Yeah, we didn't know.
-They didn't say anything at the time.
Very polite. Very lovely people.
And then, when it was all done,
they're like "That really -- That was great!
Like, we were really freaked out!"
I was like, "Oh, my God. We got this."
We had a great two days in London,
went and saw a Tottenham game. It was great.
-We're literally inside our trailer,
and they're all outside, going, "What's going on in there?
Are they writing it? What's happening?"
We were playing "Catan." For hours.
-Yeah. Three-person "Settlers of Catan,"
which really moves. You know?
[ Laughter ]
That's like -- That's like in paintball.
You know? -We got to see a skill
that I knew you had, Brendan, of hula-hooping
in Coach Beard's big episode.
Obviously, Joe, you were aware that Brendan
had this hula-hooping talent.
Were you worried that he had maybe --
that it had degraded over the years?
Were you pleased that he still had it.
-You're around Brendan, you walk by his office,
he's in there hula-hooping and reading a newspaper.
So, like, he's kept up with it, and I respect it.
-Always warm. His hips are always warm.
He's ready to go. -Did you discover any other
hidden talents amongst your cast
that you guys have exploited so far?
-We -- Billy, who plays the character Colin,
is very skilled and very knowledgeable
at all of Drake's oeuvre.
Like, you could give him like two words,
and he'll know exactly what lyric you're doing,
what song, and then he can just do it, you know,
in rhythm, like, in time, and he can do that any point.
And we learned this all because, last year, during the pandemic,
the three of us and then a bunch of fellas
that play on the game --
or, play on the team on the show,
all played "FIFA" together, played "Pro Clubs."
Before the show was even out, we created AFC Richmond.
We played as our players, and, yeah, it came out in there
that old Billy can -- is like an encyclopedia for Drake,
Drake songs. -He's really helpful.
-He's Drake-opedia. -He's Drake-opedia.
-That worked it's way onto the show,
and it's a very expensive 15-second scene.
[ Laughter ]
-Well, let me tell you, buddy,
what I wouldn't give for your music budget.
[ Laughter ]
-Tell me about it. -If Wally hums a line
of something off camera, we got to shut down for a week.
[ Laughter ]
You obviously -- You met -- I think we've always --
whenever we're together, we talk about the many joys
and some few shortcomings of performing
to the Dutch audiences we used to do.
I've been very happy, season 2, having a Dutch character,
a Dutch player on the team. I thought that was very nice
tip of the cap to our years in Amsterdam.
-Yeah, that was -- Write what you know.
[ Laughter ]
-Our very, very honest friend, Saskia Maas...
-Yes. -That's who he was named after,
who gave us all some hard truths at one time or another.
[ Laughter ]
-Yes. She is both the person that I think
thinks we're all the funniest who has also given us
the most stone-faced looks... [ Laughter ]
...when we tried doing comedy. -Gotta earn it.
You gotta earn -- That's why you know it's real.
-Yep. Guys, so nice to see you.
Congrats. I'm so happy you're working on season three.
And thanks for making time for us today.
-Thanks, man. -Thank you.
-Thank you for having me. -Love you, guys.
The season two finale of "Ted Lasso"
premieres Friday on Apple TV+, and Jason Sudeikis will host
"SNL" with musical guest Brandy Carlisle October 23rd.