-Hi, Spivey. -Hi! Oh, my God.
This is so exciting. -This is so exciting.
It is such a trip to have you back in the building.
We met in this building. -We did.
-We started the same year, 2001, on "Saturday Night Live."
-Yes, right. Right after 9/11. -We're in the same class.
Right after 9/11. -We're in the same class, yeah.
-And I feel like people who come together at "SNL"
are always sort of intensely close.
But I think the fact that we started days before 9/11,
made us even closer.
It was a tricky time to work in comedy.
And I was saying about this earlier.
You're one of my favorite people to be around
in terms of when you have to write
because you are a brilliant writer who is very honest
about how hard it is and how much you hate it.
-Oh, it's horrible. -Yeah.
[ Laughter ] -It's a horrible nightmare.
-Yeah. -It's like a hard turd.
[ Laughter ] Every time you sit down
to write something,
it's like living a nightmare over and over.
[ Laughter ]
And, by the way, I'm so grateful to be doing it.
I don't mean to sound like -- -Yeah.
-'Cause I think we were saying there's some writers who,
they're very confident. They walk down the halls.
You're like, "What do you got tonight?"
And they're like, "I got a couple of really good ideas."
Whereas every time I asked you, you'd be like,
"Y'all, I got nothin'." -I got nothin'!
[ Laughter ]
That's horrible.
-I do want to prove how much -- how little that was true.
These are some of the franchises you wrote.
There she is.
-Poehler as Kaitlin. -Kaitlin.
Personal favorite of mine.
There's "Bronx Beat." -Oh, "Bronx Beat."
-Yeah. -The world is gonna blow up.
[ Cheers and applause ]
"Donatella." -Oh, God.
[ Laughter ] Look at Horatio.
-Horatio as Elton John. -Elton John.
-I can't believe he didn't get to play Elton John
in that movie they made. -Why didn't he?
-Come on. -I thought the same thing.
-And then of course you --
-Oh, my God, "Oprah's favorite things."
The studio blew up. -The studio blew up.
-And then you wrote a less popular, I think,
in the annals of "SNL." -It delighted like four people.
-For Billy Bob Thornton,
which I think was our fourth or fifth show,
and it was called "Fenced-in area."
-"Fenced-in area." -And there I am.
On the same night that I gave Blake Shelton [bleep]
for having a mullet. [ Laughter ]
There I am. [ Applause ]
-I want you to have this hair in real life.
-I'm so attracted to you in this.
-Thank you. [ Laughter ]
-With this look.
-This is a very specific kind of sketch that you wrote.
You're from North Carolina. -Yeah.
-You are enamored by this world.
You wrote on "King of the Hill." -Yes.
-Explain real quick the premise behind "Fenced-in area"
because it is as small an idea --
-It's a whiff of a concept. [ Laughter ]
It barely clung to the paper as I was writing.
Billy Bob fenced in an area in his backyard
that was about as big as this little stage-a-roo thing.
And then he had big dreams about what he was gonna do with it.
Like, meaning, "I might put a pool in there."
[ Laughter ]
I might buy some rottweilers, put them in there.
And then so it was ruining his life.
So then Seth was his little brother who showed up to say,
"Please come inside and stop drinking beer
and staring at your fenced-in area."
[ Laughter ]
And he had this beautiful mullet
and he was saying, "Let's go key Jeff Turner's four-wheeler."
[ Laughter ]
-And this is a true story.
When Billy Bob Thornton was on this show a couple years ago,
I had not seen him -- 16 years I had not seen him.
And I walked into his dressing room.
And he went, "Fenced-in area."
[ Laughter ]
So it landed with him.
-Yes. Well, I love him. Oh, my God.
-"Bless the Harts" is similar to this world.
Yes? -Yes.
-And is this inspired by
where you came from and the people you knew?
-Oh, God, yeah. Yeah. It's all about my hometown.
Everything I write secretly takes place in the South,
which you know that.
Even if it's not the South, in my mind it's the South
and it also might be in the '80s, the 1980s.
[ Laughter ]
But yeah.
In the vein of my Southern obsession,
"Bless the Harts" is this Billy Bob character.
It's my hometown and it's people I grew up with.
And it's sort of like a "King of the Hill"
that takes place in North Carolina
with female leads, let's say.
-Yeah, 'cause you have --
Some of the voices of people heard in the clip --
Kristen Wiig, Maya Rudolph,
the incredibly talented Jillian Bell.
-Mm-hmm. -Ike Barinholtz.
-Yep.
-And it must be so fun to know that you have these people
whose voices over the years, you've come to learn so well.
-Oh, my gosh. Yeah. It's a delight writing for them
'cause it's just like family. It's like our twin language.
Anyone from the Groundlings or "SNL" or whatever,
you do speak the same comedic language.
It is like -- it feels -- it's like orgasmic writing for that.
[ Laughter ]
Yeah, it's just been -- I'm the luckiest girl in the world.