You can actually learn something from Drunk History, whether it's something interesting
about a forgotten war hero or how you shouldn't mix tequila with wine.
This is the untold truth of the long-running, hard-drinking comedy series.
Drunk History was co-created by Jeremy Konner and Derek Waters, who was also the de facto
host of the show, frequently seen drinking a tequila shot with a narrator or donning
a fancy wig for a reenactment.
According to The New York Times, the whole thing stemmed from a conversation Waters had
in 2007 with actor Jake Johnson.
Waters and Johnson were — duh — drunk, and Johnson was passionately trying to explain
to Waters how Otis Redding passed away.
"It's probably got about two minutes of content, this story.
Took me 45 minutes to tell it.
I thought, I just blew this kid's mind."
How hilarious and awesome it would be, thought Waters, to tape drunk people telling a rambling
story about a historical event and then get actors to reenact the drunk-person story.
Waters had the idea for months but didn't do anything about it because he didn't think
it would work.
Plus, he didn't have any clout.
Fortunately, one of his best friends happened to be Juno and Arrested Development star Michael
Cera, who kept encouraging him to figure out a way to do it.
He also promised to be in the show if Waters ever managed to make it.
Clout granted.
In its first incarnation, Drunk History was a completely different animal.
Waters' first pitch was for a reality show.
According to IndieWire, the concept was that Waters would rent a bus and drive across the
country, popping into bars and parties in major cities, where drunk locals would tell
him unfiltered tales of local history.
While the show's concept changed into something a bit more manageable, this original concept
was retained in the early seasons of the show as a framing device.
Waters says he was also offered the chance to do Drunk History as a bunch of sketches
that would be edited together into a feature film.
While a company throwing money at you to make your movie seems pretty awesome, Waters actually
turned it down, because he knew the concept of a drunk person describing a historical
event acted out by people in period garb is something that would only work in small doses.
Further down the line in the production process, the History Channel showed interest in putting
Drunk History on the air ... but wondered if the word "Drunk" had to be in the title,
or if the narrators had to be drunk.
So, it'd just be...
'History?'
That kind of kills everything special about the show.
"...Storytelling."
While a brain on booze isn't the most reliable conduit for information, the cast and staff
of Drunk History ensured that the show's narration segments -- and by extension, the reenactments
-- came out accurate, albeit in a swervy, tipsy sort of way.
In order to come up with good material, the producers had a group of history doctoral
students from UCLA compile hundreds of potential Drunk History stories before each season began
taping.
That list was then pared down, and each story was matched up to the comedians who signed
up to narrate, based on their historical interests.
Waters told The Wrap in 2018:
"Most of the people who do it have some sort of idea of the story prior — or the world
that it's gonna be discussing."
To guarantee that the guest stars appeared to be experts on their topic, they were encouraged
to cram like it was a high-school history test.
Waters explained:
"We send them a research packet so that they have one to two weeks of studying it over
and over again."
The packets usually consisted of a three-page summary of the historical figure or event,
links to documentaries, and book recommendations for a deeper dive.
When taping actually happened, Waters just let the narrators ramble on – stopping them
only if they got a date, name, or some other fact wrong.
"What year are we in?
I don't know.
Yes you do."
With such a hot property on his hands, Derek Waters was naturally beset by requests from
agents of big-time Hollywood big shots who wanted their chance to cut loose on Drunk
History.
And he was happy to have them on, provided they were easy to work with.
Fortunately, there were certain fail-safes that weeded out a lot of potential human buzzkills.
The fact that the reenactments took all day or more was a major turn-off for busy actors,
as was the fact that the show operated on such a shoestring production budget that it
could only afford to pay $600 for a day of on-screen work.
Nevertheless, some stars were still down, like Oscar-winner Octavia Spencer, who guest-starred
as Harriet Tubman.
Waters would later single her out as being a delight to work with.
In addition to being solicited by celebrities and their agents, on occasion, Drunk History
producers would approach stars with offers and roles in mind.
One major actor who declined the chance to star in a historical reenactment: Adam Sandler,
who didn't want to play Davy Crockett in a segment about the Battle of the Alamo.
Waters took on the role himself, telling Entertainment Weekly:
"I really wanted to be Davy Crockett, and I'm glad Adam Sandler said no."
"You are a gentleman.
But with just the right amount of a bastard."
Drunk History was both extremely accurate and deeply entertaining, which would probably
make it an effective educational aid in history classes — were it not for all the unbridled
drinking and bleeped profanity.
Still, its value came from an earnest and honest place.
Waters explained:
"I wanted to be a teacher.
I just never thought I'd be a teacher like this."
Apparently, this uncommon teaching path has actually made a positive impact.
Waters explained that his show seems to be a valuable teaching tool at the college level,
saying,
"People have told me that their professors show a clip.
The thing that gets me is some people say, 'I had a test, and I didn't know this until
I saw Drunk History.
I passed.
I knew this question that was on my test because of Drunk History.'"
For the actors to get their lip-syncing of the drunk narrators' tales just so, the sets
of the historical reenactment segments were outfitted with gigantic speakers that bellowed
out the drunk narrations, a few lines at a time, on a loop.
But when the actors nailed it, it was all worth it.
"This is about to be, like I'm not even about to bulls--t you, this is about to be some
bulls--t, like this is about to be like a real stealth operation, you motherf----s have
never seen no s--t like this before."
The real technical problems come when shooting the drunk portions.
Oddly enough, drunk people combined with expensive filmmaking equipment added up to potential
disaster.
Who knew?
Co-creator Jeremy Konner told Complex that problems with audio were almost a given and
that the drunker the comedians got, the less they seemed to care about keeping the expensive
microphones safe.
Another problem: The narrators sometimes got so hammered that they wound up laying facedown
on the ground or on a couch, and they would try to tell their stories that way.
Unfortunately, microphones can't pick up audio when it's drunkenly mumbled into a couch cushion
or throw rug, meaning the production crew always had to be ready to help get things
back on track.
Derek Waters liked his narrators good and hammered for real — the show was called
Drunk History, not Sort of Tipsy History, after all.
This explains why, according to him, every single one of the narrators puked at some
point during their taping.
Waters even worked up a little drinking routine.
He encouraged the comedians to have a drink before the crew arrived, to get them warmed
up and loose.
But not too many — Waters has said he's had to reschedule when he's shown up at a
narrator's house to find that they were already five or six sheets to the wind.
Then, to loosen them up further, and to get them comfortable with losing all their inhibitions
on national TV, Waters would share a drink with the narrator.
The drinking continued throughout the shoot, so narrators got pretty plowed.
"Some celebrateds?
What's the word I'm looking for? Some..."
"Mark."
"Ahbahbahbahbah. Hold on."
What specific alcohols worked best?
Over the span of the show, Waters told Cheddar News, he learned that beer makes people talk
too much about themselves, wine makes them sleepy, and bourbon, quote, "makes you do
what I like on the show, which is make you think you're the smartest person."
According to Business Insider, a taping of the average narration segment for Drunk History
could last around six hours.
Multiple takes were required, from which the best was selected later on.
On Drunk History, this was usually the one where the narrator is the drunkest ... but
not necessarily one where the comedian is trying to be funny.
Waters said it's because people naturally try to be funny when they're drunk.
But even professionals forget how to craft a joke when the world's spinning all around
them.
"Mark.
Mark."
Uh huh."
The production crew also took plenty of measures to make sure everybody was safe while filming.
"Yeah, we have a medic and security on set.
It's a poison.
You shouldn't drink alcohol."
Drunk History filmed actual drunk people being drunk, but some got far more drunk than the
rest.
Co-creator Jeremy Konner told Complex in 2015 that two narrators stood out: Comedian Duncan
Trussell somehow managed to tell the story of Thomas Edison's destruction of rival Nikola
Tesla from the floor of his bathroom.
The other was Natasha Leggero, who drank a bottle of white wine and followed it with
some tequila shots, and then tried to film from a bathtub filled with moisturizer.
However entertaining that might have been to see, the thread of history was surely lost.
The comic ended up calling the production the next day after she'd sobered up, unable
to remember if they'd finished taping her episode or not.
Turned out, they hadn't, so they had to reschedule.
Drunk History aired its sixth-season finale on Comedy Central in August 2019, and a few
weeks later, the network ordered a seventh season as part of a major production and development
deal with Derek Waters.
"Cheers to being perfect.
Yes."
About a year later, in August 2020, per Variety, the cable outlet decided it didn't want more
Drunk History after all and cancelled the renewal, effectively ending the show.
Ratings-wise, the show remained a decent performer up until the end of its life on Comedy Central,
and at the time of its cancellation, it had just been nominated for multiple Emmy Awards,
including Outstanding Variety Sketch Series.
What truly killed the show was that it was a victim of an evolving approach to programming
on te part of the network.
After coronavirus-related shutdowns led to temporary production delays on live-action
shows, Comedy Central cancelled or moved nearly all of its non-animated scripted shows, scrapping
Drunk History in the process.
When Comedy Central suddenly canceled Drunk History in the summer of 2020, production
on the show's seventh season had been halted for months due to international shutdowns.
Unfortunately, that put an end to co-creator and host Derek Waters' plans to pay tribute
to the person from his Baltimore childhood who made him a history buff, and whose teaching
style had a strong influence on Drunk History.
Waters told Gold Derby:
"Why I love history, is my high school teacher, Mr. Stange.
He would be able to somehow relate the historical figure that we're learning about or the moment
in history and then turn it into why the Orioles suck right now."
Waters had an episode in the works where drunk narrators discuss their favorite and most
personally impactful teachers, and it would have ended with Waters and Mr. Stange, quote,
"getting drunk and teaching the story of the Whiskey Rebellion with Alexander Hamilton."
Unfortunately, it never came to pass.
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