-Before "Glee" -- That's how I know you,
from "Glee," yeah.
-It's okay. It's okay.
[ Cheers and applause ]
-You were so great on that, but before that,
you were known because you did this, like,
Harry Potter musical. -Yeah, that's right.
It was called "A Very Potter Musical,"
if you know that? -Yeah, you guys seen it?
[ Cheers and applause ] -It's a YouTube thing.
-It's got, like, 30 million hits on YouTube.
It's just the biggest thing ever.
How did that come about? How do you --
How was your accent?
-Oh, I actually didn't do an accent for that,
although I probably should have.
It's like my one party trick
I like to pull out with my British friends,
is the British accent.
But it's definitely not something I did in that show.
But I should mention that accent
has gotten me into trouble before in life.
I guess we have time. This is a late night show.
I did -- When I was like 16 --
You know, you're a connoisseur of many voices,
and you like doing caricatures just for fun with your friends.
Actors do this. It's a horrible disease.
And growing up with my actor friends,
we would just try doing English accents.
And one time we were just having a go at it,
and I was at one of my favorite band's concert, Phantom Planet,
who I was a devout fan of as a kid.
-Yeah!
-And I had tickets to the balcony.
I was like, "No, man. I want to be on the floor."
And so we were talking in an English accent
and whoever the lady was who was at the sort of, like --
had the proverbial, like, gate
of getting into the floor or not...
We were just talking in this British accent,
and she's like, "Oh, my God, are you guys from London?"
-[ British accent ] "Yeah, love.
Yeah, th-that's right. Yeah, yeah, we are."
[ Normal voice] And this turned
into this whole back story of, like, you know,
[ British accent ] "We're only here for, like, a night,
and I've come all this way,
And it would be brilliant if you could just let us go --
Go into the floor and just, you know --
just 'cause, like, it's a holiday."
So, you know -- -[ Laughs ]
[ Normal voice] So she let us in
based on the idea that we were English
And that we were leaving the next day.
So, of course -- -That is a fantastic
British accent, by the way. -It's okay.
This comes back to bite me in the ass,
because the next day, I'm at a record shop,
and I hear, "Darren?"
And I turn around, and I see this woman,
and I'm supposed to be gone, and so I --
-That's the girl from the...? -Same girl.
And I could have done the right thing and been like,
"Oh, I totally played you," but I decided to go,
[ British accent] "Oh, hi. Are you all right? You good?"
[ Normal voice ] And so it ends up that this girl
lived near my house in San Francisco.
And I had to sustain this absurd lie
for like four years.
[ Laughter ]
Like a total idiot, and I committed to it,
'cause I'd already gone too far down the rabbit hole.
-Of course, yeah! -So cut to four years later,
after many times her running into me,
and being like "Darren?"
and me being in front of other people, going,
"Nope, wrong person.
Definitely, I don't know who you're taking about,"
I finally found her on a bus, and I, like --
I stayed on the bus. I got off at her stop,
like totally out of my way just to stop her
and be like, "Look, I'm an ass hat.
I have been totally giving you this fake accent."
And she's like, "I'm not even mad.
That's just the dumbest thing...
[ Laughter ]
-...I've ever heard." -That is the best.
So that was the British accent. -So, don't lie.
That goes to show.
That's a great story. [ Cheers and applause ]
-Don't do that. I don't recommend it.
It's a bad thing to do. [ Applause ]
I've got to talk about
"The Assassination of Gianni Versace" --
-It's a mouthful. -"American Crime Story."
-Yeah, you are fantastic in this, man!
-Thanks, dude. -Congratulations, man.
-Thank you. [ Cheers and applause ]
-The reviews, the buzz -- Everybody's talking about it.
'Cause I've watched you -- And I love Ryan Murphy.
And I think he's a genius.
You know, he did "The People v. O.J."
-O.J. Simpson, yeah. "Glee," as well.
-Yeah, "Glee," as well.
And I watch you, I go, "I don't know if I'm gonna
buy Darren as this murderer."
Like, a crazy...
Dude, you were so frightening.
-Thank you. Thank you. I think that's a compliment.
People are like, "Oh, man! You give me nightmares."
And I go, right on. -Thank you.
-All right, cool. That's sort of the goal.
-How do you get into it? W-What do you have to do?
-I mean, I think, like anything, when you're playing anybody,
You're not just --
You're not playing the most horrible
or most incredible thing anybody has ever done in their life.
If I was to play you in anything,
which would never happen, but it's not like,
what's it like to get in the mind of a late night show host.
It's like, no, what's it like to get in the mind
of just a human being with very human desires
and needs and disappointments and triumphs.
So, for somebody like him -- You know, he was a very --
There were parts of him
that were very likeable and very relatable.
And so you kind of latch on to those things
and let everything else sort of play out.
But, no, he did some horrible, deplorable things.
I'm not saying he was... -Oh, no.
-...a wonderful man throughout his whole life.
but, you know, you latch on to the human element
and that's kind of what tells the story.
-You can see it's layered. It's just crazy.
I'm just watching it, going, "I couldn't..."
-It's all downhill after this. I don't know if I can --
-No! Come on! Are you kidding me?
It's just the beginning, buddy. -[ Chuckles ]