-Our first guest tonight
is an Academy Award-nominated writer
and Emmy-nominated actor who you know from movies
like "The Big Sick" and shows like "Silicon Valley."
He stars in the highly anticipated
Marvel movie "Eternals," which is in theaters tomorrow.
Let's take a look.
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Please welcome back to the show our friend Kumail Nanjiani.
[ Cheers and applause ]
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Welcome! It's so good to see you in person!
-Oh, my God! How exciting!
-Human beings. -Bunch of people!
-Human beings. -It's a bunch of people!
-We were talking backstage that one of the problems --
and there's not many -- but one of the problems --
-Most of the stuff has been fixed.
-From what? -You said problems.
Most problems in the world have been fixed.
-Yeah, we have very few left. -Very little.
Good luck with your show, buddy.
You're not gonna have much to talk about.
-I know! Once -- [ Laughter ]
You know, you actually -- You and your wife,
who I saw, your lovely wife, Emily, backstage.
You guys, early on in the pandemic,
you actually tried to help people fix their problems
by being honest about yours. You did a podcast.
-Yeah, we did a podcast. It was called
"Staying In with Emily and Kumail."
It was sort of when the quarantine first happened.
And she's a therapist, and I've got a lot of problems,
so that was -- [ Laughter ]
That was the dynamic. -Yeah, it's a good dynamic.
-Yeah, I was like, "This is how I'm feeling,"
and she's like, "What about this, this, this?"
And we really thought -- We were like, "We'll do this
for a couple months, wrap up the pandemic..."
[ Laughter ] "...be out in the world."
Nice, tight eight episodes, you know?
[ Laughter ] And a couple months, like --
We did it for like four or five months,
and then it was like, "We're out of advice.
Good luck, everyone. We are turtling up."
[ Laughter ]
"Time to really take care of what's going on in here."
[ Laughter ]
You know. Yeah, but it was good.
It was good to, like, have that --
You know, sometimes it's -- You realize you're not having
deep conversations with the person
you're in love with all the time.
So It's good to be like, "This is how I'm feeling.
How are you feeling?" -It's interesting.
-Like, I do feel like it must -- it would be therapeutic
even if it was just, like, "Let's do a podcast
just for you and I that we can listen to later,"
but I feel like a married couple forcing themselves
to do a podcast is a good way to listen.
-I think the best way to have a conversation with a person now
is just to put two mics in front of them and not even record.
-Yeah. -I feel like I'm so much more,
like, personal on podcasts than I am just talking to people
I'm actually friends with.
Like, you take this out of here, and I'm gonna shut down.
-Absolutely. [ Laughter ]
And then, if it ever gets awkward,
you can just do, like, a sponsor plug.
-Yeah, exactly. [ Both laugh ]
"MeUndies -- They're so comfortable.
Get them." Unless -- do you have a rival
underwear thing that sponsors you?
-We don't. We've been dying to get an underwear sponsor.
-Today, buddy. We're just dead-end city.
-Well, you just got one today, buddy.
[ Laughter ]
-We were saying one of the tricks of doing press
for a movie like this is, you know, not because people
are doing a bad job but they ask you a lot of the same questions.
So I wanted to try to ask you about something in your life
right now that I feel like maybe no one has asked you about.
There is a Cricket World Cup happening right now.
-There is. -And Pakistan had a huge win.
-Oh, we're kicking ass. [ Scattered cheers ]
-There we go. I feel like that might have been
more applause for you than the actual --
-Well, I want to ask. Is Pakistan in the house?
-Yeah! -Yes! There it is!
-There we go. -Love it.
Yeah, we are undefeated. We're winning --
-Is it a hard sell to try to get Americans
interested or into cricket? -Well, I feel like --
You know, people ask me to explain cricket --
have asked me to explain cricket to them.
First thing you have to do is, you have to forget baseball.
-Right. -Like, you really have to.
What happens is, whenever I start explaining
cricket to them, and I start using terms like "googly"...
-Yeah. -..."silly mid on,"
"silly mid off" -- these are real terms.
-Yeah. -They just, like,
start making fun of me. -Sure.
-So whenever anybody asks me to explain cricket,
I know about 45 seconds from now,
I'm just gonna get dunked on. -Right.
-It's just a setup to make fun of me.
-[ Laughs ] -Do you know cricket at all?
-I had an Australian roommate, so I watched some cricket,
and I thought you had to drink a fair amount
to care enough to stay. [ Laughter ]
-I mean, those games used to last five days.
-It's not dumber than baseball, it should be noted.
You just grow up with baseball, so you --
-You're not gonna goad me into saying anything negative
about baseball in America. -Okay. That's very wise.
-I'm just starting to make it. [ Laughter ]
-Very, very, very wise. -Yeah.
Baseball -- what a sport. [ Laughter ]
-Now -- Oh, man, baseball -- that is --
Now that's a game. -So believable.
-I can do compliments without really saying anything positive
about baseball -Yeah. It was --
-You sold it very well. -Baseball!
Ooh, baby, that's a day! [ Laughter ]
-You should do ads for baseball during your podcast.
-Yeah. "Baseball -- uh, play it."
[ Laughter ]
"Baseball -- what do you think of the number 9?
There's gonna be two innings of those numbers.
Have fun." -Oof.
Got a little over your skis --
You got over your skis on that one.
[ Laughter ] -We can edit it.
-No, no, no. We're gonna leave that all in.
In fact, we're gonna make it longer.
We're gonna slow it down when you say it.
-You just lost the MeUndies sponsor.
-Hey, so the "Eternals," this is maybe a lesser-known
part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
-You mean more people know Spider-Man than Eternals.
-I didn't want to say it to you,
but I do believe that to be true.
-I disagree. [ Laughter ]
-Now, I think one of the first times we met --
this is a true story -- was in the basement
of a comic-book store. -Yeah, so I used to do --
that Emily used to produce -- my friend Jonah Ray and I --
hosted in the back of a comic-book store,
called Meltdown Comics.
We hosted a stand-up comedy show.
For six years, we did three seasons on Comedy Central.
It was super fun. So I've been, like,
a comic-book fan, nerd fan since I was a kid,
but all the way through. Like, I never stopped.
You're a big comic-book fan. -I am, yeah.
-Yeah. Did you know Eternals?
-I didn't. I have to admit that I didn't.
I grew up more of a DC guy than a Marvels guy --
Marvel guy -- excuse me. -Yeah, you don't even know
the name of the company. -Marvels.
-Marvels? It's like "Carvel," right?
-It's like "Carvel." Yeah, we have a --
we have our own whale character. [ Laughter ]
I can't think of it. -Fudgie the Whale, right?
-Marvel must have some-- Like, they have King Shark,
DC does. We have to have some sort of
fish-based superhero. -Yeah, that's true.
-Do you edit the show? I think you might.
[ Laughter ] Just this one.
-We've always said, "No matter what..."
and I appreciate that you're really testing us,
but we're not going to. -Kumail's fish ref
that went nowhere. We're just gonna show all of it.
-Kumail, we saw a little on the clip, but I have to say,
you know, I think one of the most exciting things is
you get to cast in a superhero movie,
but then the first time you get to see yourself in uniform,
I mean, you look outside standing.
[ Cheers and applause ] -Yeah.
Look at that.
Pretty great. -Pretty great.
-Yeah, it looks good. You know, you put it on
for the first time, and you stand up a little straighter
or you feel cool. But I put it on --
And, you know, it's a bunch of pieces.
Even though it is pretty comfortable,
it's a bunch of pieces. People have to help you.
You can't just get into it. -Right.
-There's a crime. Get your team --
Get your wardrobe team to show up.
It's gonna take us 10 to 12 minutes.
-So, right. If they call you and say,
"Hey, there's a crime," like, what are you telling them?
45 minutes, minimum? -I mean, depends.
How's Uber doing, right? -Right.
Uber's been really slow. My guy can't fly.
Once he gets there, he can shoot stuff from his hands,
but you got to take him to the location.
[ Laughter ]
-So, he's -- [ Laughing ]
Yeah. So, he's --
You put the costume on, you feel pretty great.
But, you know, it's a bunch of pieces,
and so you can't really go to the bathroom once you put it on.
So, in the morning, I would put it on,
and if I was wearing it all day, I would, like, not have water,
not have coffee, like, be careful, right?
And then, a couple of weeks, I've been shooting
in the costume, and I was -- my buddy Brian Tyree Henry,
who's in the movie, who's absolutely amazing in the movie,
he was drinking coffee in his suit, and I was like,
"How do you -- How do you deal with the bathroom piece?"
And he said, "There's a zipper." And that's when I found out
I'd been putting the pants on backwards.
[ Laughter and applause ]
It's my first time being a superhero.
-It's your first superhero movie.
Classic first-time mistake. -I just got here.
-Your -- You wrote about your family
in the wonderful film "The Big Sick,"
and I'm wondering, has your family seen this film, yet?
-They just saw it Monday night at a screening in New York.
-And I think we've talked in the past, your parents feel
pretty free to give you feedback, yes?
-They do. And it's been --
It's changed, because there was --
there was clear feedback, very honest.
And then I kind of had a talk with them.
I was like, "You know, it's okay if you don't like something.
Just tell me you like it. That's all I want from you."
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
-And then sometimes they will be like, "We are now performing
the action you have requested of us."
[ Laughter ] "It was good."
Which I do appreciate. -Yes.
-I do want that honesty,
just not from my parents all the time.
-But then, they really, really love this movie.
Like, I didn't have to prompt them or anything.
I finished the movie -- You know, we finished it,
and I was just sitting there, and my mom reached over,
and she was like, "That was really good!"
She was like, "I don't like these movies,
but that one was really good!" [ Laughter ]
-That's when it's very nice that your parents
are terrible actors, that you can tell the difference.
-I could tell the difference, yeah.
They were very genuine. Like, my dad, you know --
I knew my dad was going to love it.
Like, he's sort of all-in on MCU, but my mom isn't as much,
and she really, really loved it.
I could hear her laughing the whole time.
They just had a great time. It was really exciting.
-It is fantastic, and I'm so happy
to have you here in person. Congrats on the film.
-It's so good to be here. My God.
-You guys, that's Kumail Nanjiani.
"Eternals" is in theaters tomorrow.
We'll be right back with Jonathan Majors.