-How are you, Colton? -Good, man. How you doing?
Good. We´ve known each other for years and years and years.
-2001, I believe. -2001.
We met in Amsterdam. -That´s right.
-Because we both worked for a comedy theater
called Boom Chicago.
-That´s right, Boom Chicago. -A fantastic place.
A lot of our friends got their start there.
I was there before you. -Yeah.
-You came after me. Did you find --
I found a little bit of culture shock when I moved to Amsterdam.
-Oh, yeah? -How was it for you?
-I found a lot. A lot of culture shock, yeah.
-What was most shocking to you culturally?
-Let´s see.
Well, probably the most shocking part of living in Holland is
they celebrate the holidays a little differently.
-Yeah.
-They start a little earlier. You know?
Like, for them, Christmas kind of starts
around the second week of December.
-Uh-huh.
-Everybody starts putting up their decorations
and having a lot of fun, right?
So, I´m riding into work on a bike,
because of course everybody rides bikes.
-There you go.
-And where we worked, it was still also a neighborhood,
so there´s little kids going to school
same time I´m riding to work.
But on this day in the holidays the kids all have black face on.
-Yeah.
-You know, like black face. -This is a real thing.
-Like, hey -- [ Laughter ]
"I´m a little kid, you know."
And it was weird. -Yeah.
-And then they saw me and they´d go --
[ Speaking foreign language ]
Which means "black Pete."
[ Laughter ]
And they were really happy about it.
-Yeah. They were happy to see black Pete.
-Yeah, see, ´cause the thing is, is that in Holland Santa Claus,
he doesn´t have little elves that help him deliver toys.
He has straight-up slaves. [ Laughter ]
And they portray those slaves by having white Dutch people
put on black face and run around.
And the story goes if you´re a bad kid,
these slaves will throw you in a sack and take you back to Spain.
[ Laughter ]
-It´s a bummer story.
-It´s a bummer story all around, especially for the slaves.
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
And so what did you say to the children
who were saying black Pete to you?
-I didn´t say much.
I fought them. All of them.
[ Laughter ]
All of Holland´s children.
-I remember you did a sketch as a --
-We did. Actually, me and Jordan Peele.
-Jordan Peele from "Key & Peele."
You guys played a couple of aggressive black Petes.
-Yeah.
-And it was a fantastic sketch. And I think that --
-That´s how we fought back. We fought back with a rap song.
-So you met Jordan out there.
-I did. -Jordan Peele.
And then you wrote for "Key & Peele."
And Jordan, who wrote and directed the film, "Get Out" --
a fantastic horror film.
-That´s right. Did you guys see that?
Wow.
-He -- Do you remember?
Because he had that idea for years.
Do you remember the first time he told you about it?
-Oh, yeah. I remember the first time he told it to me.
And, you know, spoiler alert --
has something to do with black people
getting their head cut off. And I was like, "What?
You´re going to make a whole movie about it?"
And he was like, "Yeah, man, I think I´m going do it."
And he did it! -He did it.
-And he nailed it. -He fully nailed it.
-He nailed it.
-So you guys -- So then you went and you wrote for "Key & Peele."
-I did.
-And were there any sketches that sort of --
that you worked on that came out of sort of working with people
you´ve known for a long time?
-Yeah. The best thing about working on a show
like "Key & Peele," we were all just friends.
And so a lot of sketches just came out of kind of hanging out.
You know how that is sort of in the sketch room.
So, one time I showed up to a meeting,
and there was no more chair for me to sit in.
And so I just kind of leaned on this cabinet
that was not very steady.
And I´m not a little guy,
so I probably shouldn´t lean on unsteady cabinets.
Of course everyone´s like,
"Hey, Colton, why don´t you just go grab a chair?"
And I´m like, "Nah, I´m good, I´m good.
I´m gonna stay here."
And they´re like, "Really, we think you should get the chair."
"No, I´m cool, man. I don´t wanna --
I don´t -- I don´t use chairs!"
And of course we made a sketch about that.
So, if you can, check out "Proud Thug."
Just put that in Google, look up,
and you´ll see a sketch about a guy
who refuses to sit in a chair. [ Laughter ]
-That´s fantastic.
That´s how easy comedy writing could be on a good day.
When you´re with your friends on a good day.
-I typed that up and I was gone. Slid down the dinosaur tail.
-You didn´t need a seat. You were in and out.
So you on "Superstore," you play customer service.
-I do. -You do customer service.
Did you ever have a job like that in real life?
-Oh, I did.
You know, I actually -- I worked at a video store.
And what a video store was
is a store where people would go to...
[ Laughter ]
...and they´d rent a video and then they´d take it home.
They´d watch it and then they´d take it back to me
and I would put it on a shelf and somebody else would --
-Now, let´s say there´s a movie I really want to see
and I come in and you don´t have it.
Did you have another one that you could give me?
-I mean, I would have all sorts of recommendations
for other movies,
maybe in a similar genre that you could rent.
-Gotcha.
-Basically I was Netflix... -Yeah.
-...before Netflix. -That´s great.
-That´s what I was, yeah. [ Applause ]
-And did you like your video-store life?
-No. I mean, I liked the free movies that I got to watch,
because again this was before you could just get free movies.
-Right. -So I loved that.
But the thing that connects me and Garrett is
he works in customer service
and both of us do not like customers
and we don´t like service. -Yeah.
So you draw on that in your performance.
-I draw on that strong experience.
-Well, man, it´s great seeing you every week on TV.
And it´s great having you here in person.
-Buddy, thanks for having me. -Always such a delight.