- Hi, this is Mariah from the Hollywood Reporter
and this is Meet Your Nominee.
I have Emmy nominee, two time this year Emmy nominee,
Jane Lynch with me.
- Hello everybody.
- Hi Jane, how are you?
- I'm good.
- So, you're nominated for Outstanding Guest Actress
in a Comedy Series.
- Yes.
- For the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.
And Outstanding Host for a Reality Competition Program.
- Indeed.
- For Hollywood Game Night.
- Yeah, I'm thrilled.
- Okay.
- What job did I like better?
- (laughing) Yeah.
- Well Kiva's here so I will say Hollywood Game Night.
(laughing)
- This is your 10th nomination for primetime Emmy.
You have three wins.
Does it ever get pedestrian for you?
- No, not at all.
No, it's a thrill every time.
You know what always happens,
either on my birthday, because my birthday's July 14th,
or the day before or the day after.
Because I've had some nominations where I didn't
get the Emmy, but I've had almost every birthday
the last five or six years,
I know I sound like I'm bragging.
(laughing)
I've had a double gift.
- That's amazing.
- Yeah.
- And it is a wonderful birthday gift.
- Isn't it? It's just the best, it's just the best.
- But even better if a month and a half later
you get a gold present.
- Indeed, right.
Yeah, it's very nice.
But truly though, and I don't need to be forcefully
humble here because lord knows I'm not at all.
The nomination aspect of it is the most exciting.
- Yeah.
- It's that someone or a group of someones
thought what you had done this past season
was worthy of note and mention and that... The rest of it,
if you win, that's a lovely icing on the cake.
- Yeah.
- And you've hosted some award shows.
- I have.
- Can you give any advice or do you have any predictions
about what's going to be the difficult part of
Michael and Collin's night?
- Oh, they're co-hosting, huh?
- Yeah. - Oh, it's gonna be great.
No, they're not gonna have any problem at all.
They're gonna enjoy each other.
They have a relationship and it's gonna be fun for us.
They're gonna sail through this and nail it.
- And who would you like to dance with at the after party?
- I'm not a dancer, I won't be dancing.
Kiva, I'll dance with Akiva.
At the governor's ball, we'll dance like we're at prom.
(hums slow song)
- Is there anybody that you'd like to be seated next to
for any reason? - No.
No.
I love the one I'm with. (laughing)
Love the one you're with.
- Absolutely, well let's talk a little bit about
the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.
- Let's, yes. What a joy that was.
- Your character Sophie Lenon, so great.
Such an interesting character.
Such a foil to Midge's blooming feminism.
What was it like to play a character that was basically
representing the challenges that women faced?
- (laughs) The past?
Well, you know, Sophie Lenon did what she thought
she had to do in order to survive in the business.
You know how when people have their,
"I had to do this" "I was forced into it"
you know, "I thought I would be the next Lana Turner".
But no, I had to become this fat, loud mouth queen's
housewife and that was the only way I could make it
in this business, I couldn't make it as just a woman
with my own point of view.
I had to adopt this kind of crazy, eccentric character.
So, she's bitter about that, obviously.
You know how when you believe something,
that you were victimized in some way,
that you want everybody to confirm it.
So, if Midge goes on to become a big comedy star
without making any of the sacrifices I made
or any of the compromises that I made,
then that just threatens her whole being.
- Hmm, yeah, that's interesting.
Your character, is it based on any real life comedians?
Because some have compared her to Phillis Dillard.
- Yeah, I did not know that but you know,
as I was working on it I realized that indeed,
I was doing kind of a Phillis Dillard.
The loud and after all of her jokes (mimics loud laugh)
laughing at her own jokes and making fun of herself.
Kind of rushing in to show she's in on the joke as well.
That she knows she's not gorgeous
and she knows she's a loudmouth, so what.
- Do you think there's any universe in maybe the future
of the Marvelous Mrs.Maisel,
where Sophie and Midge could be friends.
- I think there is a way for Sophie and Midge to be friends
but it's going to call for Sophie kind of facing
some hard truths and humbling herself.
Because you saw in that scene where Midge came
to visit me in my beautiful mansion
and I'm kind of this erudite, smug, self-satisfied
person in real life and I give her my fur at the end.
I think she wants to be regaled as her elder
and she wants that respect.
So, Sophie would have to humble herself
and kind of let go of a lot of crap
in order to be friends with Midge,
because Midge won't have it.
- (laughs) What is it like working with
Amy Sherman Palladino?
We had her on the Round Tables and she was hilarious.
- Yeah, that's how I felt too.
She didn't direct this episode,
but she was the first person I met.
We shoot in New York and I went up to her office
and she's hilarious.
She is so much fun, she was showing me some dress
that she was going to wear to a party
and she said, "Is this too young for me,
am I too old to wear this?"
I was like, no way girl! You can wear that little dress.
She's really cute and just every ounce of her is hilarious.
- What do you think it was about this performance
that really touched all of the Emmy voters.
- Oh gosh, I don't know, I'm just so grateful for it.
You know, I don't know.
(laughing)
I couldn't say that without humble bragging.
- Yeah, that's true.
- "Well, I think it was my blah blah blah."
You tell me, why do you think?
- I mean, it was amazing.
You always do a great job of playing a difficult character.
You're never one-note, very complex.
- Well, thank you. I appreciate that. (laughing)
- Yeah, let's talk about Hollywood Game Night.
- Let's.
- A couple people in my office really wanted to know
who has been some of the most
rabidly competitive celebrities?
- Rabidly competitive would be Evette Nichole Brown,
who we have like every other episode
because we love her so much and she's so smart.
I wouldn't say she's rabid, she's real cool.
She's cool as a cucumber, where as Anthony Anderson
was rabid.
(laughing)
You know who was really sweet and competitive
and he did two episodes for us, was Neo.
He was great, in fact,
we put him in a pin with a bunch of kittens.
He's a kitten lover.
So, he's a great guy.
Gosh, competitive.
Chrissy Mets from 'This is Us'.
- Ohh.
- Extremely competitive and the triplets were on the show,
they played together.
Yeah, she could barely contain herself the whole time.
She would shame them if they got it wrong,
celebrate when everybody got it right.
- What was one of the shocking moments of last season?
One of the most shocking moments.
- So, we did this red-nose day episode with Chelsea Handler,
Sarah Silverman, Jack Black, we're talking alpha comedians.
- Yeah.
- So, you've got eight of these alpha comedians
and it was like herding cats
and it was mayhem 99.9% of the time.
No one listened to me, they barely listened to each other,
but it was one of the funniest episodes we ever did.
- Did anyone surprise you with a nefarious strategy?
- Eva Longoria.
(laughing)
We stopped her in her tracks, and it didn't work.
They were a really good team too
and I'm kind of to blame for the reason her team didn't win.
I screwed something up and they lost points
but hey, that's life.
We put a stop to her cheating immediately.
- Through all of the seasons of Hollywood Game Night,
has anything evolved that's been surprising to you?
What has been the evolution of the game.
- Well, you know, it started out really fun,
and it's still really fun.
I think it's the chemistry of it or the foundation of it
or the structure of it, we've kept it the same
because it works.
The wonderful thing is that our game creators,
they come up with 12 to 15 new games every season
and I don't know how they do it.
We don't get to all of them
because we like to use some of the ones that we love
like the old games and the old favorites.
We throw in new games, two or three new games every episode
so, that continues to tickle me.
Just the games they come up with.
- Do you have a favorite game?
- Let's see, right now just because
I'm such an attention whore, I love Songs Sung Wrong
because I get to sing.
- Ah.
- I sing pop songs, I'll sing like 16-32 bars of it
and the last line I sing incorrectly
and they have to sing it correctly.
You would not believe how hard it is
once you have the wrong lyric in your head
to come up with the right one. It's not as easy as it looks.
- Yeah, yeah, I believe that.
- Yeah, it's tough.
- Well Jane Lynch, thank you so much for being here.
- Oh, my pleasure.
- We're gonna see you on Emmy night.
- Yes you are!
- And good luck! - Well, thank you so much.
- Thank you.