Writers strike has Seth Meyers focused on podcasts and standup comedy

‘Late Night’ host returns to NH on Nov. 4 to perform a benefit show

Seth Meyers hasn’t had to stay up late since early May, when the Writers Guild of America went on strike. But he can’t wait to get back to work, especially now that the union reached a tentative deal Monday with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

The former “Weekend Update” anchor for “Saturday Night Live” and current host of “Late Night with Seth Meyers” has spent part of the layover appearing on “Strike Force Five,” a weekly podcast with Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Stephen Colbert and John Oliver, which has raised money to help the striking writers.

The former Bedford resident also was busy co-hosting the “Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers” podcast with his younger brother, Josh.

Meyers returns to the Granite State on Nov. 4 to perform a benefit concert at SNHU Arena for Court Appointed Special Advocates of New Hampshire and the Granite State Children’s Alliance. (Visit casanh.org/seth-meyers for ticket info.)

Part two of this interview, which took place by phone Sept. 23, will appear in the November issue of New Hampshire Magazine.

The first episode of the “Strike Force Five” podcast with your fellow late night take show hosts left listeners hanging. Are your eyes “Ocean Blue” as you claimed, or “Gatorade Blue,” as John Oliver insisted?

That is what a jealous person says. They describe ocean blue eyes as Gatorade blue. I think he showed his true colors there, John Oliver.

You all seemed to give each other room, without talking over each other. Had you ever gathered with all of those guys before in any way?

Only just with the unrecorded Zooms we were doing in the run-up to the writers strike and then a month after it started. It was really nice and useful to be on that same page with your colleagues at a time like that. We had joked about those early ones that we should record it, and I don’t think any of us actually took it seriously. Credit to Jimmy Kimmel, who sort of pulled together the idea of doing the podcast as a fundraiser.

Most importantly, you’re doing this podcast to raise money for your writers while they are on strike. As someone who had a long tenure as head writer at “Saturday Night Live,” what do you see as the most important issues at stake for them?

A thing I said even on the air right before we went on strike is, look, nobody is entitled to a job in show business. But for those who do have a job, it has to be a living wage, and there has to be a means forward to make a career out of it. I think show business would suffer if it became a gig economy.

You want people to get in. And not only continue to learn from people who are senior to them, but then to be able to pass on that education to the next generation of writers. And that’s how it’s always worked. And that’s why we have such robust television and film. I’m hopeful, as we talk, that they’re hammering out a deal, and that’ll be what we’re looking at.

Stephen Colbert compared the unexpected vacation to getting a colonoscopy. What do you miss the most right now from not being able to do “Late Night”?

It’s just so nice to go into an office and be surrounded by people who make you laugh. It has been wonderful to spend extra time with my family, but my kids just aren’t old enough to have insightful commentary on current events. They make me laugh. They just don’t make me think.

This is the second unexpected vacation you’ve experienced over the past few years. Did you learn anything from working through the pandemic that will help your team get back to work faster once the strike ends?

I only hope that because of how nimble we had to be during COVID, that everybody will come back and hit the ground running. But don’t get me wrong, COVID was a far worse reason to be off than the writers strike. I don’t have to explain why that was a more tragic time, but we did get to do the show through it. This will be a situation where I would expect a little bit of rust, but I think that we’ll shake it off quickly just due to the enthusiasm and getting into our show together again.

You’ve been spending more time at home. Are your sons and your daughter wondering why they see you hanging around so much?

I think the heartbreaking thing is we realize they had no idea that there was even a strike. But they are pretty happy to have me around. And ultimately, I tried to do a fair amount of standup during the time off. And the great thing for me in standup is the more time you spend with your kids, the more material they give you. It’s been a very nice trade off. I give them dad time and they give me jokes.

This morning, while waiting for your call, I had a conversation with my wife where I would tell her something, and she would say, “Yeah, I just told you that.” That happened two or three times. It was because I was interviewing you in my head. Have you ever had a guest scheduled that drove you to that kind of distraction?

I get caught by everyone in my family talking to myself. Constantly. I am always thinking about the next time I have to perform or, yes, the next time I have to interview somebody. I would say the ones where I was most likely doing that in the last few years would be Bruce Springsteen and David Letterman. Those were two people where I was very aware of the fact that they were sort of in my future as a guest that I would have to have a conversation with.

The thing that makes it hard is you know they don’t want to spend 10 minutes having you tell them how great they are. They’ve heard it, and I think they’re very humble people who don’t quite know how to receive that sort of a message.

And what they really want to do is have a good conversation. You have to kind of remind yourself that even though it’s crazy that you’re not spending the whole time telling them how they changed your life, you got to be a little bit better than that.

And you get to do it because you’re doing your job, not because you’re just a fan.

You’ve got to remember this is not actually a conversation for you. This is a conversation for other people.