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Today on the premiere episode of our new season, Julia sits down with 78-year-old comedy icon and Saturday Night Live original cast member, Jane Curtin. They reminisce about the 50th anniversary celebration of SNL and the enduring friendships Jane formed with the women of that first cast. Jane shares the story of meeting her husband of 50 years, Patrick Lynch, their hands-on parenting, and navigating grief after his recent passing. Plus, Julia’s 91-year-old mom, Judy, shares the moment she learned Julia was cast on Saturday Night Live.

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Transcript

SPEAKERS

Jane Curtin, Julia Louis-Dreyfus

[00:00:00] JULIA: On October 11th, 1975, I was 14. I was worried about boys, my weight and my face, and my awful hair and my stupid name. I was embarrassed by my neighborhood, by my sisters, by all of my parents. Nobody understood me and I felt this more intensely than anybody else in the whole world. What I’m saying is I was a teenager.

[00:00:28] October 11th, 1975 was a Saturday, and at 1130 that night, I turned on the tv. And guess what came on? The messy, chaotic, imperfectly perfect debut of Saturday Night Live. John Belushi, Jane Curtin, Dan Aykroyd, Gilda Radner, Lorraine Newman, Garrett Morris, and Chevy Chase. How do I describe the effect the show had on me?

[00:00:53] Like a curtain lifting, like a bomb going off? Yeah, but it was more, [00:01:00] I had found my people. It might seem obvious in retrospect, knowing what I’ve pursued in my career since then, including being on that very show a few years later. But I am telling you this, I knew it that night. It was just like. Bang a revelation.

[00:01:16] The first sketch was Belushi and Michael o’ Donahue, and at the end of it, Chevy came out in a headset saying, live from New York. It’s Saturday night. And then Billy Preston saying nothing from nothing, leaves nothing, which is. The most sublime song ever. And then later it was Janice, Ian, my God, Janice, Ian.

[00:01:37] She sang straight through the TV to me and only me. I learned the truth at 17, that life was meant for beauty queens and high school girls with clear skin smiles, who married young and then retired. Oh, please gimme a break. The best teenage angst song ever. And I honestly, I was the angst, [00:02:00] longing, most longing teen and that song, and Jane Curtin and Gilda Radner and Lorraine Newman, funny women, I yearned to be with him.

[00:02:10] The whole thing was like a life changing earthquake. Actually, it didn’t change my life. I don’t think that art is like that. Art doesn’t change your life. When it’s good, it reflects your life. It shines a light on your life that is so bright that you go out and you change it yourself. Not to get too pretentious or anything, but whatever.

[00:02:33] It’s my show and Shakespeare says it best. He says this, the purpose of playing. Of acting of art, he says is to hold as toward the mirror, up to nature. Our good and our bad art compels us to see it all. We could use a little of that kind of art right now. Couldn’t we Plays songs? Art and TV that doesn’t preach at us, doesn’t [00:03:00] shout a point of view or a set of instructions, but holds up the mirror so that we can see clearly who we are, where we are going, who we are hurting, what we are destroying, what we are becoming, and then chart our own course of change.

[00:03:17] That’s what happened when I was 14 and I watched the debut of Saturday Night Live. It held up a giant. Mirror for me and I could see myself in that world. I could see the possibilities ahead. I couldn’t see the challenges at all, and my journey was certainly not a straight line. But you know, it worked out pretty good and that’s why I couldn’t possibly be happier that the first guest of the new season of Wiser than Me.

[00:03:44] It’s Jane Curin.

[00:03:54] I’m Julia Louis Dreyfus, and this is Wiser than me, the podcast where I get schooled by women [00:04:00] who are wiser than me.

[00:04:18] Saturday Night Live was the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs. Every original cast member deserves our everlasting comedy gratitude. And on today’s show, I intend to properly thank one of those great originals, the legendary Unimpeachably, hilariously singular, Jane Curtin.

[00:04:42] To me, Jane was the rock solid center of that show, the glue. Sure she could be just as wild as anybody in the cast. She was a cone head after all. But she could also kill as a straight woman, which is much harder than it looks. And don’t forget, she had the chops to [00:05:00] take over the weekend, update desk after Chevy Chase left and make it her own.

[00:05:05] After she left the show, Jane went on to sitcom Sainthood first on Kate and Ally, where she won two Emmys and then on Third Rock from The Sun, and she held both of those great shows together too. She starred on Broadway and in huge movies and she’s still cruising, having just pulled off a scene, stealing turn on the residents on Netflix.

[00:05:25] Jane’s career is a kind of masterclass in longevity in wit, and refusing to play by anyone else’s rules. While others chased chaos, she perfected timing, intelligence, and precision. And at the same time, she’s always a little subversive, you know, a little sneaky. A little knowing she can take comedic and dramatic material alike and just kill, and you never see her sweat behind the scenes of that success, her late husband of 50 years, Patrick Lynch, her anchor and a great dad who kept the home [00:06:00] steady so she could work.

[00:06:02] Jane has served as a US Committee, national Ambassador for unicef. She’s a mother, a wife, a grandma. She’s so much wiser than me. I am very thrilled to say hi, and thank you to Jane Curtin. Hi, and thank you Jane Curtin. 

[00:06:19] JANE: Thanks so much, Julia. I enjoyed every minute of it. Thanks. I’m gonna feed my dog now.

[00:06:25] JULIA: Bye-bye. 

[00:06:26] JANE: Bye. Wow, 

[00:06:27] JULIA: bye. It was great to have you on the program. Oh, Jane. Jane, okay. I’m gonna start with the questions we always ask at the top of these conversations. Are you comfortable if I ask your real age? 

[00:06:40] JANE: Absolutely. I’m 78 I believe. Or am I 79? 

[00:06:45] JULIA: I don’t know. What year were you born? 

[00:06:46] JANE: 47. 1947. Seventy eight, seventy nine.

[00:06:50] JULIA: When’s your birthday? 

[00:06:51] JANE: September 6th. 

[00:06:53] JULIA: Yeah. So you are 78. 

[00:06:55] JANE: 78, okay. 

[00:06:57] JULIA: How old do you feel? 

[00:06:58] JANE: Probably 48. 

[00:06:59] JULIA: [00:07:00] Uhhuh. 

[00:07:01] JANE: Not quite 50. 

[00:07:02] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:07:03] JANE: But getting there, 

[00:07:04] JULIA: yeah. 

[00:07:05] JANE: I feel really good. 

[00:07:06] JULIA: What is it about forties that makes you feel like that? I’m so curious ’cause I think I know what you mean, but 

[00:07:13] JANE: forties, you’re still, you don’t have the onus of the.

[00:07:17] Age, you know? 

[00:07:18] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:07:19] JANE: Forties is nothing, 

[00:07:20] JULIA: right? 

[00:07:21] JANE: 50 is like, oh my God. 

[00:07:23] JULIA: Right? 

[00:07:24] JANE: I’m 50. But you don’t have that heaviness when you’re in your forties, so you go on with your life without thinking. What was that? What was that? You know, my hands don’t move. It’s, you don’t think about those things because you just keep doing.

[00:07:40] JULIA: Yeah. Right. 

[00:07:41] JANE: But when you’re 50, you start thinking, oh shit, now everything’s going to fall apart. It doesn’t. But you think it’s going to 

[00:07:50] JULIA: Because it could. 

[00:07:51] JANE: It could, but chances are it won’t. 

[00:07:55] JULIA: Also, I think when you’re in your forties, do you agree with this that you sort of feel there’s a kind of [00:08:00] immortality that’s kind of a holdover from your youth that you still hang onto in your forties to a certain extent?

[00:08:05] You know what I mean? 

[00:08:06] JANE: I, I know exactly what you mean. But it is not a conscious immortality. It is. No. Yes, yes. Right? ’cause you have been doing so much consistently for so long that you can’t imagine that that’s going to end. 

[00:08:19] JULIA: I know. Isn’t that funny? 

[00:08:21] JANE: Because the more you do or the more time you have, the more you do.

[00:08:26] I find, you know, it’s like having a big purse. You just keep filling it. Sorry. That’s a perfect, because we’re used to it, we’re used to that kind of, of of thing that you, uh, your days are full and you keep moving ahead and think about the future 

[00:08:44] JULIA: Uhhuh. So what’s the best part about being your age? This age of 78 or 79 or whatever the fuck.

[00:08:52] It’s, 

[00:08:52] JANE: you just don’t give a shit. You just don’t care. 

[00:08:55] JULIA: You really don’t. 

[00:08:56] JANE: No, you can’t. 

[00:08:57] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:08:58] JANE: You can’t [00:09:00] right now life is really too short, so you can’t, 

[00:09:02] JULIA: but like, what’s an example of something you just really don’t give a shit about that maybe, uh, 30 years ago you did give a shit about, if you can think of an example.

[00:09:13] JANE: My career probably. I think, you know, I, I like to work. 

[00:09:19] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:09:19] JANE: Um, and uh, if something happens, it’s great. 

[00:09:22] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:09:23] JANE: But I’m not going to worry about it. 

[00:09:25] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:09:26] JANE: I would just, you know, I’d like to keep working so that I can get healthcare. 

[00:09:30] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:09:30] JANE: That would be lovely. Um, but I was concerned about the right things to do.

[00:09:37] Even though I didn’t really care what the right things to do were, I wanted to do the things that were right for me at that time. Um, but I just don’t think about any of that stuff anymore. About where you fit. 

[00:09:51] JULIA: Mm-hmm. You feel more settled? 

[00:09:54] JANE: Well, yeah. You have to. ’cause you are. 

[00:09:56] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:09:57] JANE: You know, you’re like that old glass.

[00:09:59] [00:10:00] Everything sort of settles around your feet. 

[00:10:02] JULIA: Old glass. What does that mean? I don’t get it. 

[00:10:05] JANE: Oh, so you didn’t grow up in New England? These old houses built in the 16 hundreds have glass panes and glass over time. Just goes, gravity, pulls it down and down and down. Oh, that wavy 

[00:10:19] JULIA: old 

[00:10:20] JANE: glass, the wavy old glass and everything hap, everything ends up down at the bottom.

[00:10:25] So you have to be settled at this age. 

[00:10:27] JULIA: Okay. But that is incredible. That’s such an incredible metaphor because by the way, don’t we love the look of that old glass? 

[00:10:34] JANE: Yeah. It’s a great New England tradition to see the old glass. 

[00:10:40] JULIA: Okay, so we met at the 50th anniversary of SNL and. I had such strong feelings that night, and I’m gonna reiterate to you because I don’t believe we’d ever met before.

[00:10:53] JANE: I don’t think so. Yeah. 

[00:10:55] JULIA: And. I was very moved to meet you because [00:11:00] I feel indebted to you for your career and your, um, sort of representation and your bravery on that show was a huge part of my evolution. And when the show first premiered in 1975, I was there. As its audience at home in Washington DC watching it.

[00:11:24] And I felt seen and I was, I was telling my husband, Brad, I watched it. I’ve been sort of doing a bit of a deep dive and Janice Ian was on. That show, 

[00:11:37] JANE: right? Yeah. 

[00:11:38] JULIA: And I was 13 or 14 years old and that song and these people IE you and the rest of the cast sort of being irreverent in a way that nobody else was being on television right then, I felt like, wow.

[00:11:52] This is my life. These are my people. I’ve gotta get to these people. And you in particular, you were [00:12:00] and are someone that I admired from afar. Afar, and still do. So I just wanted to say thank you to you for that because it opened up a world of possibilities to me in my mind. 

[00:12:12] JANE: How fortunate for you that you could find your tribe?

[00:12:16] At the age of 13. 

[00:12:18] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:12:18] JANE: How fortunate. 

[00:12:21] JULIA: I know. I 

[00:12:21] JANE: mean, that is amazing to me. 

[00:12:23] JULIA: Well, I, yes, it was great luck that that show came on then, you know? 

[00:12:28] JANE: Yeah, 

[00:12:29] JULIA: it really is. It really is when you think about it, and I think lots of people have that experience with the arts in one way or another. It speaks to the power of art and performance.

[00:12:43] And, um, 

[00:12:44] JANE: and connection. 

[00:12:45] JULIA: And connection. That’s exactly right. 

[00:12:48] JANE: Yeah, 

[00:12:48] JULIA: that is exactly right. You know, I was on the show for three years. 

[00:12:52] JANE: Yeah. 

[00:12:53] JULIA: SNL and of course you were on it for five years and we both, um, at, at [00:13:00] completely different times with different leadership. Uh, we, ’cause Lauren wasn’t there when I was on and, uh, that was, oh, you 

[00:13:07] JANE: were in the gene era.

[00:13:09] JULIA: No, I was in the Dick Ebersol era. 

[00:13:10] JANE: Oh my God. Okay. Yeah. Okay. 

[00:13:13] JULIA: Yeah. But the schedule, it was the same dog eat, dog schedule, uh, sort of drug fueled, uh, schedule. And I wanna know, how did you, what was your tonic, how did you get through those five years, sanely? Because I think you did. 

[00:13:32] JANE: I had just gotten married in May the year before or that year.

[00:13:35] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:13:36] JANE: And, um. I joined the show and I wanted to participate and be a part of it, but it was all too late for me thinking. I no, I, no, I’m gonna go home. I, I, I have to walk my dog. I, you know, I’m gonna make dinner. I, I had a life and I find that a lot of the [00:14:00] preparation that they transferred everything to nighttime.

[00:14:04] Was because people didn’t have a place to go. 

[00:14:07] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:14:08] JANE: They didn’t have an anchor, they didn’t have any support outside of that building. 

[00:14:15] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:14:16] JANE: And it, it just, it made me sad, um, because they were all basically looking for what I had so that they could have that support and do their job at the same time.

[00:14:31] JULIA: But did you find, you found a real comradery, I think with Gilda and Lorraine? 

[00:14:38] JANE: Oh, yes. 

[00:14:39] JULIA: Yes. 

[00:14:39] JANE: Oh my God, yes. Mm-hmm. We were very tight and, um, very protective of each other and, and, uh, supportive of each other. 

[00:14:50] JULIA: You spoke about how Gilda would come and hang out at your house and watch you be married. 

[00:14:57] JANE: Yeah. 

[00:14:58] JULIA: Can you talk about your [00:15:00] dynamic with her?

[00:15:00] And I love the fact that you said, yeah, just come over and watch us be married and that you were so open to that. That’s so wonderful and speaks to a lovely relationship you had with her. 

[00:15:10] JANE: Well, yeah. I mean, we, we were girls. 

[00:15:13] JULIA: Oh yeah. 

[00:15:14] JANE: We were, we were girls. 

[00:15:16] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:15:16] JANE: And um. Uh, girls are, are processed to behave a certain way and to want certain things.

[00:15:24] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:15:25] JANE: But culture, culture, really acquiring those things has been made into a game. You have to play a game in order to do this, and you have to play a game in order to do that. And there was nothing real and honest about the way that women were taught how to ’cause that was back in, into the, um, the glamor dos and the, uh, all of that vogue stuff that you take the quiz on, how you can get a boyfriend, all of that crap.

[00:15:54] JULIA: Oh, Uhhuh. 

[00:15:55] JANE: And you become almost inured to it. It, uh. You have to [00:16:00] behave a certain way in order to get the gold that you want. And for us, for Patrick and me, there were no games. We didn’t know how to play games. There was no snark, there was nothing this, nothing that, it was just people And, and, uh, she was used to a different kind of treatment and it wasn’t necessarily a good way of being treated.

[00:16:24] But she allowed herself to be treated that way because she. Wanted a relationship so desperately, but when she saw the way we treated each other 

[00:16:34] JULIA: with respect, 

[00:16:36] JANE: with respect, um, she, she wanted to study it. 

[00:16:41] JULIA: Hmm. 

[00:16:42] JANE: Because it was foreign to her. 

[00:16:45] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:16:46] JANE: And it was foreign to a, a lot of the people up there. 

[00:16:49] JULIA: Right.

[00:16:50] JANE: I wanted her desperately to be happy, but she kept going in the wrong direction. And then when I, I met Jean, she wanted me to meet Jean, 

[00:16:59] JULIA: Jean [00:17:00] Wilder. 

[00:17:00] JANE: Yeah. And I was like eight months pregnant. And, and uh, we had dinner with them and I saw how they interacted and I realized that that’s not what, she doesn’t want what I had.

[00:17:11] JULIA: Mm. 

[00:17:12] JANE: She wanted something very different. 

[00:17:14] JULIA: Oh, interesting. 

[00:17:15] JANE: She wanted a dad. 

[00:17:18] JULIA: Oh, I see. And he was that. 

[00:17:21] JANE: He was that. At least that was the dynamic I saw the first time I met them. She deferred to him and he clearly thought he was the better of the two. 

[00:17:34] JULIA: Oh my God. 

[00:17:35] JANE: Which I found very interesting. 

[00:17:37] JULIA: Was he respectful of her?

[00:17:40] JANE: Yes. Yes. As a dad would be. 

[00:17:44] JULIA: Wow. 

[00:17:45] JANE: That was my impression. I could be totally wrong, but they had a wonderful relationship. They had a wonderful marriage. 

[00:17:51] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:17:51] JANE: So whatever it, it worked. 

[00:17:53] JULIA: It worked. Right. 

[00:17:54] JANE: Whatever it was. 

[00:17:55] JULIA: Right. 

[00:17:55] JANE: But it wasn’t what she thought, you know, it wasn’t what we [00:18:00] had, wasn’t what she wanted.

[00:18:02] JULIA: I understand. 

[00:18:02] JANE: Yeah. 

[00:18:03] JULIA: But she found, she found her way ultimately. 

[00:18:05] JANE: She found her way ultimately. Yeah. 

[00:18:07] JULIA: I’m glad you had the friendship that you had with her. I mean, lucky you talk about good luck to have a, 

[00:18:14] JANE: and lucky me to have a friendship with Lorraine. Who has had a very interesting life. 

[00:18:20] JULIA: Yes. 

[00:18:21] JANE: And I just adore her.

[00:18:24] JULIA: I 

[00:18:24] JANE: know. She’s fabulous. She’s the queen of, of voice work. I mean, she is, she’s amazing. And, and, uh. We’re still friends after 50 years, and she was my rock at the 50th. 

[00:18:39] JULIA: Really? 

[00:18:40] JANE: She was my rock, you know, like I sat next to her. 

[00:18:42] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:18:43] JANE: So 

[00:18:44] JULIA: she knew and you could just sort of Yeah. She was your, your partner there that night.

[00:18:49] JANE: Yeah. 

[00:18:49] JULIA: Yeah. Well, I mean, the three women had a, you guys were, were joined at the hip. 

[00:18:55] JANE: Yeah, we were, 

[00:18:56] JULIA: and we were all the beneficiaries of that. Uh, [00:19:00] conjoin, you know? 

[00:19:01] JANE: Yeah, 

[00:19:01] JULIA: yeah. 

[00:19:02] JANE: Well, 

[00:19:02] JULIA: yeah. 

[00:19:03] JANE: I’m so, I mean, we’re, we, were lucky we had each other. 

[00:19:06] JULIA: Yes. 

[00:19:06] JANE: We were lucky that we were picked. Mm-hmm. 

[00:19:09] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:19:10] JANE: To spend five years together.

[00:19:12] Yeah. And, and, uh, interesting times. Very interesting times. 

[00:19:16] JULIA: Yeah, totally.

[00:19:23] We will be right back with more from Jane Curtin. After this break.

 

[ AD BREAK 1 – 19:38 ]

 

[00:19:38] So Jane, I want our listeners to understand the schedule at SNL. I’ve, I’ve talked about it before on this podcast, but just to reiterate, uh, the first two days of the week, which are Monday, Tuesday, uh, you meet the guest host and then you sort of pitch and write if you’re a writer and [00:20:00] um, or if you’re only an actor, you go around and.

[00:20:03] Hope that writers will write for you. And then Wednesday is the table read day, and that’s when everybody comes together and reads mountains of material, mountains of material. And it’s from that table read certain decisions are made about what is going into the show. And so you opted, as I understand it, not to be there on Monday and Tuesday.

[00:20:27] Is that correct? 

[00:20:28] JANE: Well, you know, the first. I think it was the first couple of shows I, I did what I was supposed to do or what everyone else did. 

[00:20:36] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:20:37] JANE: And I would go up there, but I had no connection to anyone. 

[00:20:40] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:20:41] JANE: Um, Garrett and I were the only ones that really had no connection to anyone. They were, everybody else was from, uh, either the Groundlings or from Second City.

[00:20:51] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:20:52] JANE: Or had, um, you know, made connections out in la. But I was the only one really that, that came into this without [00:21:00] any. Uh, connection to the writing staff. Also, I wasn’t hired as a writer, 

[00:21:05] JULIA: right? I wasn’t either, 

[00:21:07] JANE: so I thought, why am I supposed to be going up and writing things? ’cause I’m not, they’re not paying me as a writer, 

[00:21:12] JULIA: right?

[00:21:13] JANE: I’m an actor, I’m a performer. That’s what I’m getting paid for. So I go up there, I walk around. Paying any attention to me because they don’t know me and they don’t trust me. 

[00:21:24] JULIA: Right. 

[00:21:25] JANE: They know the other people, so they trust the other people. They’d never seen anything I’d done ’cause I hadn’t done anything that they could have seen.

[00:21:32] So, uh, it, um, it was a waste of time. And until, you know, on the Wednesday read throughs. That was my favorite day because I love reading scripts. I love reading things out loud. I just put my whole heart and soul into everything because I want the writers to, to be able to have something on, on the air. And so that was my favorite day of the week.

[00:21:56] JULIA: And you are reading cold too, right? 

[00:21:58] JANE: I’m reading Cold, [00:22:00] yeah. 

[00:22:00] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:22:00] JANE: And so from that. They started to trust me, so then I didn’t have to, I, no guilt involved in not going out Mondays and Tuesdays. And, uh, it was great. I, I had, um, more than a life, but I expected on that show. But I just saw how futile it was for, you know, a lot of people to get the attention that they needed in order to be.

[00:22:25] Put into one of those scripts. 

[00:22:28] JULIA: God, I really wish I’d spoken to you back then. I wish I’d known you and you could have told me that you would’ve saved me a lot of heartache. 

[00:22:36] JANE: You know, there was no handbook. There was no handbook about what you were supposed to do. 

[00:22:41] JULIA: Right. 

[00:22:42] JANE: And the thing was that Lauren loved this competition.

[00:22:46] And he thought everyone should be competing with everybody else. I didn’t. I don’t believe in that. I don’t, I believe in cooperation, 

[00:22:52] JULIA: nor do I 

[00:22:53] JANE: and I, yeah, that’s what Lorraine and Gilda believed in as well. So he was thwarted [00:23:00] on that, on that aspect. Um. Because we proved that you don’t need to compete, uh, and everybody is not on the same plane.

[00:23:10] Everybody is not destined to do the same things. 

[00:23:13] JULIA: How did you know that he wanted you guys to compete specifically? 

[00:23:16] JANE: He said it. 

[00:23:17] JULIA: Ah-huh. Okay. 

[00:23:20] JANE: So I figured well, he means it. 

[00:23:22] JULIA: Right. Right. I I wanted to ask you about the sexism that was clearly in place when you were there. Um, and it was very much in place when I was there.

[00:23:32] Was that in any way undermining to you or were you able to sort of power through it without looking back? You know how sexism has a way of sort of seeping into everything and, and can in fact, uh. Affect you from a confidence point of view. What about that for you? 

[00:23:51] JANE: Uh, because of my experience in the proposition, which was my first professional experience [00:24:00] mm-hmm.

[00:24:00] Um, the women in that show were more powerful than the men. As far as performers went. 

[00:24:09] JULIA: Oh. 

[00:24:10] JANE: Um, but there was no, there was no problem with that. 

[00:24:14] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:24:15] JANE: Um, and, uh, 

[00:24:16] JULIA: it just happened to be, 

[00:24:17] JANE: it just, it just happened to be at one point there were, there were a couple of guys that were better than the women, but they left and it was the women that, that were better than the men at that time.

[00:24:27] So I was totally shocked at the attitude that I discovered when I entered the eight H studio. I had never experienced anything like that in my life. 

[00:24:39] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:24:40] JANE: I mean, my brothers could be assholes and, and sure did not respect my sister and me, but that was the culture 

[00:24:46] JULIA: Uhhuh, 

[00:24:47] JANE: and they still, I think, would’ve protected us at all costs.

[00:24:50] The contempt for women that I felt from some of the men there was stunning, stunning. [00:25:00] And it, uh, because it was so foreign to me and because it was something that I thought, you know, this was the time of the Equal Rights Amendment 

[00:25:09] JULIA: Right. That didn’t pass. 

[00:25:11] JANE: No. And I believed that it was going to, I believed 

[00:25:15] JULIA: mm-hmm.

[00:25:16] JANE: That we were an enlightened group. 

[00:25:18] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:25:19] JANE: That my peer group was. The peer group that is going to give equal rights to women. 

[00:25:25] JULIA: Sure. 

[00:25:26] JANE: And they weren’t. 

[00:25:27] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:25:28] JANE: And that shocked me. So I was incredibly disillusioned by, by certain men’s behavior. And on the other hand, there were men that were just lovely.

[00:25:41] Couldn’t have been nicer, couldn’t have been more appreciative of everything that you do. Uh, but, but that overwhelming, aggressive misogyny. Was a little hard to deal with, but it didn’t get rid of my confidence because I had fought to be in this business. I mean, I just one [00:26:00] day put my hand on a rock and said, okay, that’s what I’m gonna do.

[00:26:02] JULIA: Yeah, 

[00:26:03] JANE: okay. Let me end. Let me end. I’m here, I’m gonna do it. Uh, but I had no training. I had no reason why. 

[00:26:09] JULIA: Wow. 

[00:26:10] JANE: So because of that, I was fighting to be, to just be a part of it. So I had to have my confidence up. I had to keep that confidence going based on nothing. Absolutely nothing. 

[00:26:26] JULIA: Well, where did that come from?

[00:26:28] JANE: I have no idea. 

[00:26:29] JULIA: For real, 

[00:26:30] JANE: for real? 

[00:26:31] JULIA: No, you have to have some idea. 

[00:26:34] JANE: No, I wanted to go into the foreign service, 

[00:26:36] JULIA: right. 

[00:26:37] JANE: And my transcripts were never sent out to the Georgetown School of Foreign Service, so I had no place to go. I did the, uh, I did summer stock. 

[00:26:48] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:26:48] JANE: And, um, one of the women I met called me, she was going to school at bu and she called me and she said, I have an audition in Cambridge.

[00:26:55] Come with me. And I said, what’s it for? And she said, it’s for an improv group. And I said, [00:27:00] what’s improv? And she said, oh, just come with. So I went with her and it was a little Reconverted bakery in, um, Inman Square in Cambridge. And there were a bunch of people that were auditioning and there were maybe like 150 seats maybe.

[00:27:17] And there was a little stage and people were doing things on the stage and they, other people were saying thank you, and other people would get up and do things. Thank you. And so my friend got up and she did it. She was the last one. They said thank you. And then they said, does anybody else want to audition?

[00:27:34] And I went, 

[00:27:37] JULIA: wow. You raised your hand. 

[00:27:38] JANE: I raised my hand. 

[00:27:39] JULIA: Do you remember what you did for the audition? 

[00:27:42] JANE: No. No. I remember, I, I had props. I had to go into the back room and get props and I, so I had props. I don’t know what I did. I have no idea. 

[00:27:49] JULIA: Yes. 

[00:27:50] JANE: But that was, uh, and because I had no reason. To be accepted. I thought, I just have to keep fighting.

[00:27:58] I just have to keep [00:28:00] telling them that there’s a reason why I’m here. 

[00:28:02] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:28:02] JANE: I have to convince them constantly that there’s a reason I’m here. 

[00:28:06] JULIA: Maybe that came through. I think that came through by the way, in your performance. You know, it was a strong, um, well, righteous isn’t the word, but it was an authority that you had.

[00:28:19] You did. You had an authority that held and held a viewer. By the way. Yeah. 

[00:28:24] JANE: Wow. 

[00:28:24] JULIA: Yeah, that’s what I think. I read that you were talking about the curse of the catchphrase, which is something that I can certainly relate to from Seinfeld days. Yeah. Um, and. I mean, is it safe to say we’re grateful that something caught on and sort of catapulted you into a certain area?

[00:28:47] But it does have its downside and I’m of course referring to a genuine new ignorant slut. 

[00:28:52] JANE: Oh, right, right, right. Yeah. 

[00:28:54] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:28:54] JANE: I mean it was very, very funny at the time and shocking 

[00:28:59] JULIA: [00:29:00] shock. I remember being shocked. 

[00:29:02] JANE: Totally shocking at the time. And the shockingness of it is. What I find, um, is the most reason for the repetition.

[00:29:12] JULIA: Yes. 

[00:29:13] JANE: And it’s mostly repeated by. 

[00:29:18] JULIA: Oh, what a surprise. 

[00:29:19] JANE: Yeah, but I just did a movie with Chris Walken. 

[00:29:23] JULIA: Mm. 

[00:29:24] JANE: And he’s got the curse of the catchphrase as well. 

[00:29:27] JULIA: Wait, what’s his, sorry, 

[00:29:28] JANE: Laura Cowbell. 

[00:29:29] JULIA: Oh, of course. Of course I was gonna ask you like, what would you say now to the younger version of yourself dealing with all of the conflict and difficulty of SNL days?

[00:29:43] But it sounds like you said it to yourself, you don’t need to give yourself advice from back in the day. You, you? 

[00:29:48] JANE: I think I did. Okay. 

[00:29:49] JULIA: You did okay. 

[00:29:50] JANE: I think I did. Okay. Yeah. And I watched people make mistakes, which is. What I think the youngest in a family has a tendency to do. You know, you can sit back and [00:30:00] watch your siblings 

[00:30:01] JULIA: Oh, 

[00:30:01] JANE: how they handle situations and, and you learn from it.

[00:30:05] And I learned a lot from watching just about everybody on the show and decided that my route was the right route for me. And I didn’t like the kind of attention we were getting. 

[00:30:19] JULIA: Oh, really? 

[00:30:20] JANE: It was over the top. And it was all intentional. You know, Lauren wanted that big PR machine, wanted us all to be stars before we had even done anything.

[00:30:32] So there was the hype of the show and then the actual show. And what happens is that it puts you on a, on a plane up here and the normal people are down here. 

[00:30:43] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:30:44] JANE: So when you go out into the world, the normal people cannot interact with you. It is impossible. You are so much cooler than they could ever be.

[00:30:54] I would walk my dog at like seven o’clock in the morning and people would shake. When I would walk [00:31:00] by them because of the hype of the show, and I didn’t like it. 

[00:31:05] JULIA: Well, it’s a lonely feeling, isn’t it? 

[00:31:07] JANE: It’s a lonely feeling. And it doesn’t have to be, 

[00:31:11] JULIA: it’s like you’re not, you’re not connected anymore. 

[00:31:14] JANE: You’re not connected anymore.

[00:31:15] You have no connection to the Earth. 

[00:31:18] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:31:18] JANE: You are not, your plane is not on the earth. 

[00:31:21] JULIA: Yeah. Right. 

[00:31:22] JANE: And that’s why I did Caden Alley. Because the show was so accessible, the characters were so accessible. People wanted to help Kate and Allie. They didn’t want to feel as though Kate and Ellie were better than they were.

[00:31:40] JULIA: Interesting. 

[00:31:40] JANE: Kate and Ellie just were these two gals who were trying to make every 

[00:31:44] JULIA: women. 

[00:31:45] JANE: Yeah. And, and so I went from here, which I didn’t like at all, back down to Earth. 

[00:31:52] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:31:54] JANE: And it helped tremendously.

[00:31:59] JULIA: It is time to [00:32:00] take another quick break. My conversation with Jane Curtin continues in just a moment. And by the way, we just launched a Wiser Than Me newsletter where you can get behind the scenes details from my conversation with Jane Curtin and more. You can subscribe now at Wiser than me.substack.com.

[00:32:17] You’ll get photos, videos, letters from me. Think. Exclusive bonus snippets. Glimpses behind the scenes of the making of the podcast. A deeper dive into every guest, plus a place to connect with other wiser than me listeners, I hope you subscribe at wiser than me.substack.com and stick around to see what we have in store.

[00:32:37] Be right back.

 

[ AD BREAK 2 – 32:50 ]

 

[00:32:50] But let’s talk about going to Kate and Ally, which you did right after SNL or not right after, but a few years later, and what that. [00:33:00] Experience was like from a actual work point of view as compared to SNL, because I did the same thing. I went from SNL and then eventually did sitcoms, some more successful than others.

[00:33:13] But it was an extraordinary experience to walk into a place where there was a script. There and with jokes or a proper story all in place, and they’re wanting you to do it, and you don’t have to fight tooth and nail for the material, right? 

[00:33:35] JANE: Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:33:36] JULIA: It was, it’s like a treasure trove. 

[00:33:38] JANE: It’s like doing a play.

[00:33:39] Uhhuh, you’ve been cast in this play. And you go in and you go to the theater and you have your script in hand, and you, you rehearse and you create this lovely thing. And, and, um, Saturday Night Live was chaotic, 

[00:33:54] JULIA: right? 

[00:33:54] JANE: And it, it’s, I don’t, I don’t function well in chaos. It just does [00:34:00] not my, my style. But the funny things happen in chaos, but funny things also happen.

[00:34:06] In controlled situations. Mm-hmm. And I thought Kate and Ali was very funny, 

[00:34:10] JULIA: hilarious. 

[00:34:11] JANE: And I thought it was very topical. And my baby was eight months old when we started, and Susan’s baby I think was like 11 months old when we started, so. 

[00:34:22] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:34:22] JANE: Uh, and we had the kids on the show, Allison and Ari and Freddy and Billy Persky at the helm.

[00:34:28] So it was like leaving my home and going to another home 

[00:34:32] JULIA: with ours that were reasonable. 

[00:34:34] JANE: Oh my God. This was on videotape. Oh, this was even pre reasonable. This was, this was uber reasonable. 

[00:34:40] JULIA: Right. 

[00:34:41] JANE: I mean, we would go in and we would start work at Bay 10 and then we’d, um, work until 1130 and then we’d start talking about what we were gonna have for lunch.

[00:34:51] Mm-hmm. And this was on a day when there were no cameras. And then we would have lunch and like at around two we’d say, okay, that’s it. And we [00:35:00] go home. I could pick up, you know, I, my daughter and, and I could cook dinner and it was amazing. And then on show day, we had a rehearsal with the cameras on a Thursday, I think.

[00:35:11] And then this is for the first year. And then on Friday, uh, we had rehearsal with the cameras. You went in at 10 and you rehearsed, and then you did the run through at two. And then the run through was generally done at four, and then the show started at seven. Well, there was one day when we did the run through and it ended at three.

[00:35:32] We went to the movies. 

[00:35:34] JULIA: No, it’s not even true. 

[00:35:36] JANE: It’s true. We went to the movies 

[00:35:38] JULIA: and then you came back to do the show before the audience. 

[00:35:40] JANE: We started the show at seven and we were done at eight 30. 

[00:35:44] JULIA: It’s just, it’s like a dream. 

[00:35:46] JANE: It was a dream. It’s a dream. It was a complete and total dream. 

[00:35:50] JULIA: This was at the Ed Sullivan Theater, 

[00:35:51] JANE: ed Sullivan Theater.

[00:35:53] JULIA: Please. 

[00:35:53] JANE: I mean, when, when, um, I think it was Reagan. Was in town and, and, uh, Gorbachev was in [00:36:00] town and they said the motorcades coming down seventh Avenue, the motorcades coming down seventh. I’m there with a, a green kimona on and hot rollers in my hair and I’m going, I wanna see them. So I run out to seventh Avenue and Broadway and I’m waving to Gorbachev and Reagan in my hot rollers.

[00:36:16] JULIA: Oh, I hope somebody got a picture of that. That’s hilarious. 

[00:36:19] JANE: I don’t think they did, but there was a, there was a cop who was doing crowd control that day and he’s the comedy cop and he, he’s a real cop, but he does standup comedy for real. And he, oh yeah, for real. He took off his hat and he gave me his card and uh, yeah, he is the comedy cop.

[00:36:37] I loved New York in the seventies. Oh, in the eighties. It was so much fun. 

[00:36:41] JULIA: But then you moved to California? Yeah. 

[00:36:43] JANE: No, no, no, no, no. 

[00:36:44] JULIA: Oh, you didn’t? 

[00:36:45] JANE: Well, no. I moved to California, uh, for For Third Rock. 

[00:36:49] JULIA: For Third Rock. And then you got to work with the wonderful John Lithgow. Oh, I know. Who was the greatest man ever.

[00:36:55] JANE: I know. 

[00:36:56] JULIA: Yeah. 

[00:36:57] JANE: Yeah. 

[00:36:57] JULIA: He’s a good guy. 

[00:36:58] JANE: Oh man. Did we have [00:37:00] fun on that show? 

[00:37:01] JULIA: Yeah. That was evident. That was very evident. It, it’s funny how having a good time can just ooze through into performance, right? 

[00:37:09] JANE: Yeah, it does. It does. Well, you see it in, in what you do. You have that same, you have that same positivity.

[00:37:15] JULIA: Mm. 

[00:37:15] JANE: When you work, there is a positive energy that oozes out from you. That’s what leads it. 

[00:37:22] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:37:22] JANE: That’s what leads people into thinking, oh, well, they’re having a great time. 

[00:37:27] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:37:28] JANE: Which is what you want to see. 

[00:37:29] JULIA: Yeah, of course. Yeah. Even if you’re depicting a bad time, you’re having a good time depicting it.

[00:37:35] Right, 

[00:37:36] JANE: right. I’ve worked on a couple of shows where you walk into the studio and. It’s heavy. 

[00:37:42] JULIA: Oh man. Is that the worst? 

[00:37:44] JANE: The studio vibe is heavy and you think, oh God, there’s nobody here that’s happy. Mm-hmm. Not fun. Mm-hmm. Not a fun place to be. 

[00:37:52] JULIA: Mm-hmm. I know in, in fact my, uh, third year at Seinfeld was when Larry David was there.

[00:37:58] He was only there for that [00:38:00] one year, and it was. And I glommed onto him because we sort of were both unbelievably miserable together, so we adhered to one another and shared the misery in a way that was very pleasant. 

[00:38:13] JANE: Yeah. You know, it, it’s important to have a, have a misery buddy. 

[00:38:17] JULIA: It’s true. 

[00:38:17] JANE: No, it is. 

[00:38:18] JULIA: Yeah.

[00:38:19] A misery buddy. Uh, can, can speak volumes. Um, but now you grew up in a very sort of traditional family, right? You were, you were raised Catholic, you’re a debutante, and your mother stayed home to raise you and your, you have three, you had three siblings. 

[00:38:34] JANE: Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:38:35] JULIA: Um, was your mother funny? 

[00:38:37] JANE: Oh, my mother and her sister’s very funny.

[00:38:40] JULIA: Really 

[00:38:40] JANE: very funny. Yeah. 

[00:38:41] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:38:42] JANE: And um, there is a Boston funny, like there’s a Chicago funny. Yeah, I know. You know, I know. It’s a silly, funny And it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s something that you pick up just walking around the streets. 

[00:38:54] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:38:54] JANE: And, um, yeah, my mother and her sisters would all get together and it [00:39:00] was nothing but laughing.

[00:39:01] Drinking, but it was also a lot of laughing. Um, and there were times when my mother and my sister would come down to visit me for a weekend and we’d be in the kitchen cooking and we’d be in different areas of the kitchen and all of a sudden, spontaneously, we will all laugh at the same time. Not having spoken.

[00:39:20] It’s just it has to come out. It’s in there. It has to come out. It was fun with my mother. My mother was a lot of fun. Oh, I’m 

[00:39:27] JULIA: sure. Yeah. Oh, I’m sure. It sounds like, and also there’s something very, very, um, mm. It’s like a balm. The female, uh, comradery within a family itself. Yes. Uh, is. Hard to describe, but it’s like just, I don’t know.

[00:39:47] It’s 

[00:39:47] JANE: made up of belly laughs. 

[00:39:49] JULIA: Yeah. Nothing like it. 

[00:39:51] JUDITH: Yeah, 

[00:39:51] JULIA: nothing like it. How did you reconcile, uh. You know, I’m a mother [00:40:00] too, and I had my kids in sort of the middle of my career. Both of them were born during Seinfeld days. And how did you do the work thing and the motherhood thing? How was straddling both universes for you?

[00:40:15] Was it a challenge? How did that work for you? 

[00:40:19] JANE: I had a husband. 

[00:40:21] JULIA: Hmm. 

[00:40:22] JANE: Who was a wonderful father. 

[00:40:24] JULIA: Mm. 

[00:40:25] JANE: And when we started dating and decided that we were going to get married. Neither one of us had great ambitions because we didn’t know what we were going to be doing. We didn’t have a clue. We had an idea that maybe we wanted to do this and maybe we wanted to do this, but it wasn’t written in stone.

[00:40:44] It wasn’t something that we were, you know, we leads are focused on. Exactly. Mm-hmm. Um, and we just decided, let’s see where this adventure takes us. 

[00:40:52] JULIA: Oh wow. 

[00:40:54] JANE: It was such a wonderful way to approach what we were about to do [00:41:00] because we were just open to see what ev we were available. 

[00:41:04] JULIA: I heard you were set up on a blind date with your husband, is that right?

[00:41:07] JANE: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 

[00:41:08] JULIA: What was the date? What’d you guys do? 

[00:41:10] JANE: Well, uh, I was in the proposition at the time and he, um, he had been at, at Yale Drama School and, uh. He had, he had gone to Brown and then gone to Yale after Brown. And uh, when he was at Brown, he was dating this woman Gail. And um, they both went to Yale together and uh, they broke up.

[00:41:31] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:41:32] JANE: But they were still very friendly. They were still great friends. And this woman, Gail, I had met through a woman that we were going to hire for the season, and she came out to dinner with us, with my husband. We were all at this big table, uh, in Boston. It was the only place that was open after 11.

[00:41:50] And, uh, we were, we were all sort of talking and of course we were all very stoned because this was the sixties. 

[00:41:58] JULIA: Yeah, sure. 

[00:41:59] JANE: And, uh, [00:42:00] so I saw him across the table and I thought, well, he’s cute. Uh, but I didn’t talk to him. Gail called me about four months later. We were all in New York and she said, Patrick Lynch just called me and has tickets for a hockey game, but I hate hockey, but you like hockey.

[00:42:15] Um, I’m gonna call him back and tell him you like hockey. I said, Gail, I can. She hangs up on me and she calls Patrick Lynch and she says, Jane cur, you met her. She loves hockey, so she’d love to go to the game with you. Oh my God. What 

[00:42:27] JULIA: a setup. 

[00:42:28] JANE: He’s, he’s going, Gail, I can perfectly capable if she hangs up on him.

[00:42:33] So she calls me back and says he’s calling you. She calls him back and says she’s waiting for the call. 

[00:42:38] JULIA: No, this Gail is too much. 

[00:42:41] JANE: Yeah. And so, um, he thought I was someone else in the proposition. 

[00:42:47] JULIA: Oh, come 

[00:42:47] JANE: on. So his plan was. He was going to, we were gonna meet outside the, uh, GM building on 57th and fifth, and he was going to take me to an Italian restaurant with a hand on the side of the building that said [00:43:00] One flight up.

[00:43:00] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:43:01] JANE: And we were gonna go for beers, but instead we ended up at the plaza, at the Palm Court, and we had a little champagne before we went to the hockey game. And we went to the ho. We just started talking and talking and talking and talking and talking and talking and talking. And uh, we went to the hockey game and he thought, oh shit, I’m gonna have to explain hockey to her.

[00:43:20] And I said, oh my God, ACE Bailey changed his number. And he said, how do you know this? But anyway, so he liked me because I didn’t, he didn’t have to explain hockey. He liked me because I didn’t take that much time in the bathroom. 

[00:43:32] JULIA: Oh. 

[00:43:32] JANE: And so after the hockey game, we went down to, um. Burger place down in the village and they had to kick us out.

[00:43:39] And I mean, and we started talking then and we never stopped. 

[00:43:44] JULIA: Oh my God. Oh, that’s so beautiful. That’s a lovely story. 

[00:43:49] JANE: Yeah, 

[00:43:50] JULIA: that’s a lovely story. 

[00:43:51] JANE: Pretty great. 

[00:43:52] JULIA: And so were you his caregiver at the end of his life? Were you sort of 

[00:43:56] JANE: Yeah. 

[00:43:56] JULIA: You were. That’s hard or is it hard? 

[00:43:59] JANE: It is. [00:44:00] But you don’t wanna be anywhere else.

[00:44:02] JULIA: Yeah, right. Mm-hmm. 

[00:44:03] JANE: You know, 

[00:44:05] JULIA: so. Mm-hmm. 

[00:44:05] JANE: It’s what you do. And it’s what he would’ve done as, as well. So, 

[00:44:09] JULIA: and, and how, if you don’t mind my asking, what did he, uh, pass away from? What did he die from? 

[00:44:15] JANE: Oh, he had so many different things, uh, wrong. He had COPD, he had three different kinds of aggressive cancers that sort of showed their evil heads.

[00:44:24] Oh. Uh, the last month. It was just, it was a long slog. 

[00:44:32] JULIA: And so he just recently passed away. It wasn’t that long ago. 

[00:44:35] JANE: April. Yeah. 

[00:44:37] JULIA: So how are you in grief now this day? I mean, I’m sure it’s every day is a different day. I’m imagining 

[00:44:43] JANE: every day is a different day. You never know when it’s gonna hit you. Um, eh, it’s a biological thing.

[00:44:50] JULIA: Tell 

[00:44:51] JANE: because you are suffering from PTSD essentially. And so it is a biological reaction, grief, and, and you [00:45:00] have no control over it. 

[00:45:01] JULIA: Hmm. 

[00:45:01] JANE: So you just have to let it go. 

[00:45:03] JULIA: How does it show up? 

[00:45:05] JANE: You cry in the car. Oh, it, it, it tears. And, and your brain is, is, uh, out of whack. And, and it, it. You have to reconnect yourself because you have a new reality that that is totally different from the one you had before.

[00:45:25] JULIA: Yes. Yeah. It’s a new way of being in the world. 

[00:45:29] JANE: Exactly. Exactly. For instance, up in Canada, I had no one to call. When you’re killing time and you want to, you’re in a trailer and you wanna call and you wanna chat, but you don’t have anything to say. 

[00:45:41] JULIA: Yes. 

[00:45:41] JANE: So you call your husband because they’re the ones that will listen to you.

[00:45:47] Yes. And you know, say, but how’s it going? And this and that. But there was no, no backup. 

[00:45:53] JULIA: So Jane, how in that moment I wonder ’cause so many people are, are [00:46:00] walk with grief. I mean, we all do as living human beings. Um, in that moment when you have nobody to call, how do you fill that space in that moment? Like, what did you do?

[00:46:13] JANE: You get over it, you talk yourself out of it. You say, okay, I have, I have things to do. 

[00:46:19] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:46:20] JANE: I have things to do. Mm-hmm. Like grocery shopping, like the, you know, I can’t, I can’t sit and, and and mm-hmm. Think about things that are just making me sad. 

[00:46:32] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:46:32] JANE: So I, you know, just have to get out of my head and into the world.

[00:46:39] JULIA: Have you worked a lot since your husband passed? 

[00:46:42] JANE: Well, the 50th was the first thing. Oh wait, I’m getting a phone call. 

[00:46:47] JULIA: Oh, that’s all right. You can get it if you want. 

[00:46:49] JANE: I don’t want to. Um, and also, I don’t know how to answer that phone. I keep hanging up on people. Okay. They’ll call back. [00:47:00] Um, but, uh, the 50th was the first thing I had done when he was that sick.

[00:47:06] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:47:07] JANE: And, uh, he and my daughter both said, you have to go. You have to go. And I didn’t want to because 

[00:47:13] JULIA: oh, 

[00:47:14] JANE: I should have been home, so I wasn’t really there. It was so surreal because not only did I not have my home base, but you know, he was always with me at those things. But I was at sea, so I didn’t know what to do with myself.

[00:47:31] JULIA: Oh. 

[00:47:32] JANE: So I didn’t really have a good time, but I remember meeting people that were just so fun and so thrilled to be there and, and I couldn’t really. Participate, 

[00:47:46] JULIA: connect. 

[00:47:46] JANE: Yeah. 

[00:47:47] JULIA: Yeah. I, I completely understand that you were unmoored 

[00:47:51] JANE: totally 

[00:47:51] at 

[00:47:51] JULIA: that time. 

[00:47:52] JANE: Totally. 

[00:47:53] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:47:54] JANE: And, uh. This movie that I just did with Chris Walken has [00:48:00] been in, in, uh, the works for about a year.

[00:48:02] So I didn’t know whether I would be able to do it or not. 

[00:48:07] JULIA: Mm. 

[00:48:07] JANE: And um, it was, it was the right thing for me to do. ’cause you get into. You get into a sort of a loop when you’re trying to recreate or, or reinvent yourself. 

[00:48:17] JULIA: Ah, 

[00:48:17] JANE: and I was trying to, you know, pay the bills and do the taxes and do all of this kind of stuff, which I don’t know how to do, but I got into this loop of paying attention to that and not dealing with the outside world.

[00:48:31] JULIA: I see. 

[00:48:32] JANE: So the movie got me away from that. Back into the world and dealing with adorable human beings. And, uh, it was good. It was a good thing to do. 

[00:48:44] JULIA: Yeah. So maybe more of that’s a good idea. 

[00:48:47] JANE: I think it is. 

[00:48:49] JULIA: Okay. Well, we always end with some quick little questions and I’m wondering, Jane, is there anything you’re looking forward to?

[00:48:59] JANE: No. [00:49:00] 

[00:49:00] JULIA: No. 

[00:49:01] JANE: No. I just wait for the phone to ring and it 

[00:49:05] JUDITH: just did. You 

[00:49:06] JULIA: did And you didn’t take the fuck me off. 

[00:49:08] I 

[00:49:08] JANE: didn’t take it. I didn’t take it. But no, I just, I just wait for things to happen. I, no, I’m not looking forward to anything tomorrow. 

[00:49:15] JULIA: Tomorrow. 

[00:49:16] JANE: I’m looking forward to tomorrow. 

[00:49:17] JULIA: Well, that’s very good. I like that there, there’s so many of these questions.

[00:49:22] There’s no reason for me to ask you because I know what the answers are gonna be like something you’d go back and say yes to. I don’t think there’s anything in there that you would. You’ve already said yes, everything you wanted to say yes to. Am I right about that? 

[00:49:33] JANE: Yeah. Pretty much everything that I could do.

[00:49:37] JULIA: Yes. Understood. Is there something you would like to tell me about aging? 

[00:49:45] JANE: Just keep moving. I’ve been doing Pilates, uh, for 40 years. 

[00:49:50] JULIA: No. 

[00:49:51] JANE: And yeah, and I have a reformer at my house. I have a little gym I started out doing with a concept to ergometer rowing machine [00:50:00] because I wasn’t moving enough. You know, I was, I was working, but I was working and then sitting.

[00:50:06] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:50:06] JANE: Um, so I started out rowing, which I really liked. ’cause you could sit. And you could watch tv. 

[00:50:12] JULIA: Mm-hmm. 

[00:50:12] JANE: Um, and then a friend of mine said, no, you gotta do Pilates. So I started doing Pilates and, uh, I’ve been doing it for a long time and I am not, you know, I don’t do the entire routine every day, but I work on the things that I need to work on, and it has, it has saved my life.

[00:50:30] My mother had arthritis that was pretty bad, and, uh, she couldn’t do a lot of things that I can do now. Um, and it’s all because I kept moving. So that’s the most important thing to do. 

[00:50:44] JULIA: Keep moving, 

[00:50:45] JANE: keep moving, keep moving. 

[00:50:47] JULIA: Well, I thank you for spending time with us today. It’s really been delightful to talk with you.

[00:50:53] I hope our paths cross again because, um, I admire you so deeply and I just think. [00:51:00] You’re obviously a wonderful person and you’re, uh, an extraordinary performer, actor, and I just, I’m, I’m a big fan, so thank you for taking the time. It’s very generous of you. Thank you. 

[00:51:12] JANE: Well, thank you Julia. It was very generous of you to say those lovely things.

[00:51:16] This was great. I appreciate it. It was fun. 

[00:51:19] JULIA: Likewise. Thank you.

[00:51:23] Well, that was historic to be able to talk at great length with Jane Curtin. She just, she means so much to me. Wow. I know my mom’s gonna get a kick outta the fact that I got to talk with her. Let’s get her on the Zoom.

[00:51:43] Hi, mommy. Hi, love. Hi. So, um, guess who we spoke to today? Who? Jane Curin. 

[00:51:52] JUDITH: Oh, I love Jane Curin. 

[00:51:54] JULIA: Did you watch Saturday Night Live the first year? Mom, do you remember watching it at all? 

[00:51:59] JUDITH: Oh, [00:52:00] well, we used to watch it all the time at home. I remember that we used to, on Saturday nights, everybody would come in or we would be in that.

[00:52:07] We probably didn’t watch it every Saturday night, but it was a, I remember it was a family deal. 

[00:52:12] JULIA: I know Gilda of course got a lot of attention, but Jane was. And Lorraine, all of them, they were this team of women. It was pretty amazing to, particularly now in retrospect, to think of them and what they were doing in that moment because it was such a cultural revolution that SNL represented.

[00:52:33] Do you remember mom, when I got cast on SN. 

[00:52:37] JUDITH: Are you kidding? 

[00:52:38] JULIA: Well, I’m asking ’cause I wonder what you remember about that. 

[00:52:40] JUDITH: Well, what I remember is that we got a call maybe 1230 or one o’clock in the morning and you’re hush hush. And you say, we’re going to New York, we’re going to Saturday night by. They’ve come and they’ve hired the whole game.

[00:52:54] And of course I was convinced that you were calling ’cause you’d gotten killed in [00:53:00] automobile acid

[00:53:03] and it was a long distance call. 

[00:53:06] JULIA: Right. 

[00:53:06] JUDITH: And you went, I mean, it was just unreal. It just seemed to me like you were just sort of snatched out of the world and, and put on television. 

[00:53:14] JULIA: Yeah. ’cause we were, 

[00:53:15] JUDITH: I, I just remember that time as being, you know, like people had said along, oh, you know, joy is so good and so good and so good.

[00:53:23] And I kept thinking, well, yeah, Bessie used to say, yeah, but you can’t make a nickel or a dime doing it. And so when you actually got hired and we’re gonna be paid and we’re gonna be a pro, that was, that became like, oh my God, you can, you know, you can make it life this way. 

[00:53:39] JULIA: Were you worried that it wouldn’t work?

[00:53:43] JUDITH: No, I didn’t think it would ever work. No, I’m taught that, you know, you would sort of grow up and, and that would be over 

[00:53:51] JULIA: and get a job at a bank. 

[00:53:52] JUDITH: Yeah, yeah. Or you could be a secretary, you know? No kidding. Yeah. No, no. I, I know that sounds awful, but it never [00:54:00] occurred to me at the way I was raised that you could, that you could, you know, find a way to get into the, into it and to make a living out of it and just 

[00:54:09] JULIA: uhhuh 

[00:54:10] JUDITH: that happened to other people always, and not to anybody I knew.

[00:54:14] JULIA: Right. Interesting. The Jane spoke a lot about her husband, whose name was Patrick Lynch and he died recently. And um, so she’s very much in the throes of making that adjustment. 

[00:54:33] JUDITH: Mm-hmm. 

[00:54:34] JULIA: And she was talking about her marriage, and I was asking about how she did it because I mean, she’s worked a lot as an actor.

[00:54:44] And I asked her how did she balance that? And she said, well, she was married to a Mr. Mom. And I almost said, oh, well, I was married, I was, I am married to one too, but. She is clearly very indebted to him [00:55:00] for the success that she’s had. And also when he was working, you know, she wasn’t working and so she sort of.

[00:55:08] Held down the fort and they did that back and forth in the same way that, you know, Brad and I have done it. 

[00:55:14] JUDITH: Yes, yes. 

[00:55:15] JULIA: Yeah. Right. 

[00:55:17] JUDITH: It’s remarkable. And, and what’s more, I think it’s wonderful for the children because the roles aren’t like father and mother. They’re, they’re sort of nurturing, they’re nurturing roles.

[00:55:28] JULIA: I remember back when I was, uh, doing Veep and I, we shot Veep. The first four years, I can’t even believe it, but the first four years we shot it in Baltimore, Maryland, as you know. And so Brad was really on deck with our youngest Charlie, and one of the things they did was, oh God, what’s chef’s name? Jamie Oliver.

[00:55:51] And he had these like, I don’t know, 25 minute meals. And so Brad and. Uh, with Charlie made sort of a game [00:56:00] out of making these things. So it was really fun because then when I came home, there was a particular burger they made that had a lot of cumin and spices in it that was off the charts good to this day.

[00:56:09] That, that he still makes. It was absolutely delicious. But it was just an example of the many sweet things that, um, 

[00:56:16] JUDITH: yeah, that they did together that that made it so much just fun. And the fact that, that Brad had fun being with the boys. 

[00:56:22] JULIA: Yes. 

[00:56:23] JUDITH: He, he just really, Brad was just, he really got down and played with the guys, with the boys.

[00:56:28] Yeah. 

[00:56:28] JULIA: He certainly did. Still does for that matter. 

[00:56:31] JUDITH: But, and Brad, do you know what? 

[00:56:33] BRAD: Hi, Judy. No, what? 

[00:56:34] JUDITH: I remember that you had to have back surgery and you said to me, well, I’m not gonna have it until Charlie can, no longer needs to be, go piggyback with me. 

[00:56:44] BRAD: Well, that’s why I’ve waited until now. 

[00:56:48] JULIA: Yes. That’s how he put off his back surgery until both boys were men.

[00:56:53] BRAD: Yeah. 

[00:56:53] JULIA: Uh, to, to actually, in fact, it’s true. It is true. Because Brad did not, I’m not gonna pretend you’re [00:57:00] not on this call, on this, Brad. Yeah. So that he was a devoted. And is a devoted parent, and then did get the surgery, and I think he would still give them piggyback rides if, if they wanted it. We’ll see.

[00:57:12] JUDITH: Exactly. But so they had to carry him to, to the room. 

[00:57:15] JULIA: Yeah. By the time he got, he got the surgery, they had to piggyback him in, but then he got it and it was successful, so that was good. 

[00:57:22] JUDITH: Anyway, I, I’ve never questioned Brad’s, uh, uh, fidelity or I know devotion, devotion. 

[00:57:29] JULIA: Yeah. Fi, fidelity. Maybe you have questions?

[00:57:32] Fidelity? 

[00:57:33] JUDITH: No, I think, I think we better stop now. I’m 

[00:57:37] JULIA: before, yeah, I think, uh, 

[00:57:39] JUDITH: I’m on a power trip. 

[00:57:40] JULIA: Yeah.

[00:57:44] Ah. Okay, mom. Well, um, I’m so happy to talk to you and I love you so much. 

[00:57:50] JUDITH: And I love you too, and we’ll talk soon. 

[00:57:52] JULIA: Okay. Bye bye.[00:58:00] 

 

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Wiser Than Me, is a production of Lemon Media created and hosted by me, Julia Louis Dreyfuss.

[00:58:48] The show is produced by Chrissy Pease and Oja Lopez. Brad Hall is a consulting producer. Rachel Neal is consulting senior editor and our SVP of Weekly Content and Production [00:59:00] is Steve Nelson. Executive producers are Paula Kaplan. Stephanie Whittles Wax, Jessica Cordova Kramer, and me. The show is mixed by Johnny Vince Evans with engineering help from James Barber, and our music was written by Henry Hall, who you can also find on Spotify or wherever you listen to your music.

[00:59:19] Special thanks to Will Schlagel and of course my mother, Judith Bowles. Follow wiser than me wherever you get your podcasts and if there’s an old lady in your life, listen up.