There's nothing on TV quite like Adult Swim's The Eric Andre Show. When it all comes together,
it's a messy and hilarious package of free-form zaniness. It takes a lot of work to put such
a unique and original program together, which means there's no shortage of wild behind-the-scenes
stories.
A television show makes it to the air after its creators and producers follow a very specific
process: A writer comes up with a script or outline, convinces an agent it's a bankable
concept, and then the agent pitches it to a network or production company. If all goes
well, executives will ask for a script and then use it as the basis for an introductory,
or "pilot" episode. If they like that, more episodes get ordered. This is not how The
Eric Andre Show made it to Adult Swim. Andre told Spin:
"I knew it was too crazy and visual and too much like an absurdist stream-of-consciousness
show to really sell on paper."
So, instead of writing a script and essentially begging someone to pay for him to make a pilot
out of it, he skipped some steps and made a proof-of-concept episode on his own and
on the cheap. He explained:
"We rented out this little semi-abandoned, semi-illegal bodega in the middle of Brooklyn.
We just cleaned it up a little bit, threw up curtains."
After compiling the footage, Andre further cut costs by learning the editing program
Final Cut and cutting together the pilot himself. The project took about a year, and after multiple
networks, quote, "thought it sucked," he found an ally in Adult Swim.
The Eric Andre Show is one of the more original shows to hit TV in recent years, but it didn't
emerge in a vacuum. Eric Andre's influences include sketch comedy, Adult Swim pioneers,
and '70s television. He tells to The Huffington Post:
"It's basically like Space Ghost as a live-action show."
Space Ghost Coast to Coast was a 1994 to 2008 talk show in which animated, reimagined superhero
Space Ghost interviewed confused celebrities from his galactic lair. Andre says his show
also contains DNA from The Tom Green Show, Sacha Baron Cohen's reality-blurring Da Ali
G Show, and the syndicated, purposely cheap-looking 1970s talk show parody Fernwood 2 Night. Other
shows from which Andre found inspiration include Jackass and Chappelle's Show, for its quick
sketch format.
The Eric Andre Show may be a deconstructed talk show, but it's a talk show nonetheless.
Host Eric Andre knew he wanted a sidekick, the way Johnny Carson could play off Ed McMahon
or Conan O'Brien with Andy Richter. He told The Huffington Post:
"I knew I was so crazy, I needed somebody just as out there comedically, but opposite
in energy to be the voice of reason."
So, he turned to someone who ran in the same New York stand-up comedy circles: Hannibal
Buress, who had yet to achieve household name status from a growing resume that included
stints as a Saturday Night Live writer and a Broad City cast member. Andre felt that
Buress, who exudes a calm, mellow persona, was perfect.
"My seat feels like it's alive or something. Yeah, we got snakes. ...with human traits."
Andre also appreciates and is keenly aware of how his show is one of the few on TV with
two African-American leads. He told The Fader:
"I want to prove to America that black people are the most diverse, creative group of people
and we can express any way we want. We're both very different and we both also somehow
connect on a certain level, and we both kind of have our own unique point of view and it's
fun to show people new and unique black perspectives."
"I did not get the job at Fruit Loops. My body is
now your communion. Please, eat from me."
As a cable programming block that airs only at night, Adult Swim isn't bound by the same
constraints as other television enterprises. Its programming tends to be more edgy, envelope-pushing,
or straight-up weird, as evidenced by hits like Rick and Morty, Tim and Eric Awesome
Show, Great Job!, and The Eric Andre Show.
But while its stable of talent has lots of freedom to follow their warped creative visions,
Adult Swim is still a television network that can survive only as long as it doesn't alienate
advertisers or push away too many viewers. The network's Standard and Practices department
placed just a few limitations on Andre. He explained the arrangement to Spin that certain
kinds of self-harm:
"[...] and drug use and making fun of specific gods are like the three S&P issues that come
up."
Under the heading of religious mockery, Andre says he was allowed to curse the heavens and
challenge the almighty to strike him with lightning, but if he added the word "Jesus"
to the bit, it would get axed.
"Have you seen my dog? Uh-huh. Describe him to me! Describe him to me! AAAAH!"
The Eric Andre Show also incorporates public, guerrilla-style comedy caught on tape, where
planning isn't really a possibility and things can go very wrong very quickly. Andre explained
in his interview with The Huffington Post:
"All the bits where I thought I was definitely going to get assaulted, I didn't, and then
the bit that I thought would be the least violent was the most."
That event would be the time he, quote, "got beat up at a Mensa convention." Andre tried
to crash a meeting of the organization for the super-intelligent while wearing a suit
of armor, all the while claiming to have an IQ of 400. After being thoroughly manhandled
and forced out of the building by a pushy Mensa member, Andre voluntarily fled before
security guards arrived.
The natural reaction to Andre's antics isn't always violence, derision, and hostility.
On one occasion, random strangers felt sorry for him. Andre related one such story on Speakeasy:
"I did a bit where I dressed up like a cop and we went up to Harlem and I handcuffed
myself around a light post and dropped my pants before anybody showed up. And I was
going, 'Ah, could somebody help me?'. And all these people gathered, and they're like,
'How did you get in that situation?' I'm like, It's a long story, just please help me out.'"
Andre fondly recalled how, quote, "the community came together" to help him get un-cuffed and
his pants back on.
If anyone ever thought the pranks pulled on an unknowing and unwitting public throughout
the run of The Eric Andre Show were less than authentic, this story about Andre facing legal
consequences, and experiencing the temporary loss of his personal freedom, should dispel
that notion.
While filming a bit for the first season of the show, Andre, quote, "crashed a town hall
meeting while the mayor was speaking," he explained to The Fader.
"Vote for me for class president and I'll put beer in the water fountains and cameras
in the girls' locker rooms! Whoo! Go Bobcats!"
As it was an official town meeting in the town of Rancho Cucamonga, California, the
place was full of law enforcement personnel, who acted quickly. He further related to The
Fader:
"They escorted me out and I was like, 'Don't tase me, bro!' I also told a cop my name was
John Coltrane."
They believed him, apparently having never heard of the famous jazz musician whose name
Andre nicked. Nevertheless, the sheriffs eventually took Andre to the local jail, where he had
to spend some time, explaining:
"Just for the night. But I had to go to court and get a lawyer. Very expensive."
Concurrent with starring on the early seasons on The Eric Andre Show, Eric Andre moonlighted
with a supporting role on the dark ABC sitcom Don't Trust the B in Apt. 23.
While definitely one of the edgier shows on a broadcast network's schedule, it was still
a sitcom airing in primetime on a channel owned by Walt Disney. According to an Andre
interview with The Huffington Post, some executives at ABC were, at best, tentative about his
bizarre Adult Swim series, and, quote, "not thrilled" at worst.
When he tried to include Don't Trust the B in Apt. 23 on press releases for The Eric
Andre Show, the network intervened. As he explained it:
"And then like 14 people from ABC flew in on helicopters, were like, 'Don't mention
us in the Adult Swim show!'"
The extreme nature of The Eric Andre Show means pain and injury is a possibility, if
not a probability, for its host. One of the series' signature bits finds Andre jumping
through walls and destroying his desk at the top of every episode.
"You just gonna let that happen? Hm? You just gonna let that happen? That's, that's his
desk. I stand here."
While the chance of serious bodily damage there is limited because the production makes
the furniture thin and easily breakable, Andre has still gotten himself seriously hurt, during
both in-studio bits and in out-in-the-world filmed stunts.
He aggravated a pre-existing injury when he tried to lift co-host Hannibal Buress's chair.
He explained the injury to Spin:
"It was way heavier than I anticipated and I tore my back in half. I had to, like, marine
crawl back to the video monitors and take a 20-minute break."
"Ohhhh my God."
His most painful scrape long-term knee damage came as the result of a bit where he hid in
a garbage can so as to hop out and scare people who walked by. He said:
"I'm in physical therapy for it. My knees are both out of the track."
Most notably, however, was the mysterious injury Andre sustained to one of his buttocks,
which Andre explained matter-of-factly:
"I took a hole out of my butt cheek. I don't remember when or how it happened, but I just
went home and it looked like someone had held a cigarette against my butt cheek and just
kept going [...]."
The talk show elements of The Eric Andre Show only resemble something like The Tonight Show
on the surface. There's a desk and chairs, a suited host, a sidekick, and famous guests,
but this program doesn't exist to fawn over celebrities and let them promote their latest
projects; The Eric Andre Show sets out to make its guests deeply unsettled.
"I'm really having a tough time interviewing people. It's very hard for me. Yeah."
Andre told Splitsider:
"It's fun seeing guests out of their comfort zones. We just figured out different ways
to psychologically torture the guests."
Among the things that different celebrities endured without knowing about it ahead of
time: water slowly dripping on them, mild electric shock, and rotten clams placed under
their seats. When Clueless star Stacey Dash guested, a swarm of rats came out to kiss
her feet.
"There's more than one. There's many. No we got a ton. We got a real problem on our hands."
Seemingly knowing what they might face when booking an appearance on The Eric Andre Show,
most celebrities just roll with it. Others, however, have bailed. After Andre drew a historically
offensive symbol on his forehead and pretended to eat regurgitated food, The Hills star Lauren
Conrad walked right off the set. Rapper T.I. cut off his stint on the program
when Andre produced a prosthetic male organ and brought a half undressed man out onstage.
"Don't you touch me, man! BLAAAAAARGH!!!"
The vast majority of TV shows air one season per year in successive years, churning out
a batch of episodes every fall. The Eric Andre Show doesn't work on such a mainstream or
tight timeframe, and it never has.
According to Hannibal Buress, the show's pilot came together in 2008 and 2009, while Adult
Swim didn't announce it had picked up the show and placed it on its schedule until May
2012, debuting it on air that same month. Fans had to wait nearly a year and a half
for season two, which didn't arrive until October 2013.
Season three dutifully followed about a year later, toward the end of 2014, but then another
extremely long wait ensued for season four, finally reaching the airwaves in the summer
of 2016. True to form, The Eric Andre Show also made fans wait for a fifth season. In
October 2019, Entertainment Weekly broke the news that Andre, Buress, and their disintegrating
set will come back to television sometime in 2020. But when, exactly? Per the Adult
Swim Twitter account, it will be, quote, "late" in the year.
Check out one of our newest videos right here! Plus, even more Looper videos about your favorite
TV shows are coming soon. Subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit the bell so you don't
miss a single one.