Maya Rudolph is not a childless, self-absorbed talk show host. She just plays one on TV.
“Yeah, I’ve got three kids, so I’m a crazy person,” deadpans the former Saturday Night Live star, who reunites with executive producer Lorne Michaels for the new sitcom, Up All Night.
“The funny irony, really, is that I’m the one without the kid in the show.”
Rudolph plays Ava, the demanding boss to Christina Applegate’s new mom, Reagan (Will Arnett stars as the baby daddy).
Ava’s cluelessness when it comes to the reality of raising a kid spikes on Reagan’s first day back to work; the boss awkwardly pleas that they party in the name of work.
But Rudolph doesn’t have to think back too far to remember what it was like to be perhaps over-invested in her own job.
“Anything outside of New York City when you had show week was really hard to fathom because everything for me was living, breathing SNL at the time,” she says of her former gig. It’s funny when you think back to the person that you thought you were going to be or you hold any sort of judgment over parents,” Rudolph adds, reflecting on her character and younger self.
“You really don’t know (what it’s like to be a parent) until you have that experience.”
Up and down
UP: Prime Suspect
Play along with NBC’s insistence that this isn’t a remake of the British series starring Helen Mirren, and their star, Maria Bello, could be one of the most absorbing homicide detectives on television. (Airs Thursdays on Global.)
DOWN: Whitney
Whitney has potential to be a smart commentary on modern relationships — until you meet the secondary characters. The central couple (Whitney Cummings and Chris D’Elia) has a likable goofiness, sarcasm and heart. But the sloppily written caricatures that surround the duo are painfully unlikable. (Airs Monday nights on CTV.)
