Seth Meyers can't turn around without someone talking to him about patience. "I think when people tell you to be patient, it's just a way of them trying to get a confident performance out of you," suggests Meyers, appreciative of any form of encouragement. At the same time, he's not naive: "I'm sure if there's a problem a month from now, the patience statement can be refined."
THR COVER: Seth Meyers on 'Late Night' Jitters, Lorne Michaels' Advice and Leaving His Dream Job
Unlike David Letterman, who came of age coveting the role of Johnny Carson, or Jimmy Kimmel, who looked to follow in the footsteps of Letterman, Meyers had no ambitions of being a late-night host. He was raised in suburban New Hampshire, where his French teacher mother — "Madame Meyers," he teases — and finance-industry father took him and his younger brother, Josh, also now a comedian, to see Neil Simon plays and stand-up acts such as Jerry Seinfeld or Gilbert Gottfried. Also popular in the Meyers' house: Steve Martin, Monty Python and, yes, SNL.
Meyers joined the cast in 2001, the same year Amy Poehler did, but it would take him a few seasons to get comfortable. "I had so much self-doubt about my role on the show," he says, aware that he "couldn't hold a candle" to Fred Armisen or Will Forte as a sketch performer, and castmates Bill Hader, Andy Samberg and Jason Sudeikis simply were "better actors." He heaped pressure on himself: "After every table read where things didn't go well, I was worrying about what that meant on a grander scale … making every micro a macro."
Lorne Michaels, who will executive produce Late Night as well as Fallon's Tonight Show, suggests Meyers was one of the "happiest" at SNL, a word rarely used in the cutthroat world of comedy, much less the pressure cooker of SNL. Meyers, who lacks both an ego and an edge, describes even the most grueling aspects of the weekly show — the infamous all-nighters, the last-minute rewrites, the ruthlessly Darwinian selection of sketches — with genuine enthusiasm, as though he has blocked out all of the agony.
Given that Late Night is just down the hall from the SNL stage, Meyers intends to have many of the castmembers stop by, with Mike O'Brien already on one of his mid-February test shows. (Others guests included screenwriter Brian Koppelman, designer Zac Posen and Today co-hosts Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford.)
In early February, Meyers announced he had tapped another SNL vet, Armisen, to be his bandleader, a plan that came together during Meyers' final week on SNL. For now, Armisen claims he's more focused on making music with the newly formed in-house 8G Band than he is on reviving or creating characters, but it's hard to imagine the pair responsible for SNL's Ian Rubbish won't have some fun together. Meyers admits as much: "I think eventually we'll see [some character] stuff from Fred."
In his first few practice shows, Meyers experimented with his stable of characters either joining him or interrupting him, depending on the bit. If it sounds like the plan has the potential to reinvent the broadcast genre, much as The Daily Show did the cable one, Meyers insists that's not the goal. "The idea of blowing it up," he says, "sounds better than it actually is."
Meyers has spent recent months consulting with other hosts in preparation, including a January sit-down with Jay Leno in his Burbank office, during which the two discussed the value of a lengthy monologue. Says the recently departed Tonight Show host, "It'll be a quieter show, and I think it'll be very good."