Meanwhile, Haders longtime Weekend Update foil Seth Meyers moves to host NBCsLate Nightin early 2014.)
Clickherefor more of EW.coms Best of 2013 coverage.
I think my last season, we kind of made a point of not doing too many Stefons.
Maybe I felt like I was running out of gas.
I probably still have it I just jotted it down on a piece of paper.
Like, Oh, heres what the final Stefon would be.
In like, two sentences.
It kind of proves that Stefon wasnt crazy those things actually do all exist.
And thats the end of it.
Now, Lorne and everybody, their feeling initially was not fantastic, lets go do it.
They were like, You know, Stefon is a great live sketch.
Why do you want to make it all a pretape?
And then, in the middle of it, you get mad at me and walk off.
And I get mad and I leave.
Seth was like, I think thats a big letdown.
Itll be more of a surprise.
He was totally, 100 percent right.
We were so concentrated on the video.
Thats probably me being hard on it; theres some laughs in there.
That was the idea we had.
It sounds corny, but we wanted it to be emotional.
Its the rare instance where theres two characters onSNLthat youre somewhat invested in, you know?
I would hear that from people: Man, you and Seth have to get together!
And I was like, Its a sketch show.
Its a fake news segment on a sketch show.
I think it was also the way I was feeling because I was leaving.
And man, he knocked it out of the park.
When we saw it, we all got choked up watching it.
Some wonderful intern went through every single Stefon Update and lifted all the things that I talked about.
Theres an email chain someone sent, that was like, Heres everybody you mentioned.
And then of those, I said, These would be fun to see [in the video].
And then Mulaney added a couple more.
But Ben Affleck just happened to be hosting the show, and that was great.
And he was so funny, he really sold it.
He was very happy for his brother.
[The shoot] was very relaxed.
It was on a Thursday; usually, we shoot those things on a Friday.
Rhys and Alex, his cameraman, just really knew what they wanted.
Rhys had it all storyboarded out, exactly the same coverage asThe Graduate.
The little girl who played Menorah the Explorer was really sweet.
She was so funny and game.
We had her say so many different lines.
Can you say oy vey?
Thats one that we shouted out to her.
We couldnt do the ravioli-hand prosthetics; he couldnt actually operate the thing [with them on].
We talked about that, believe me.
Were like, Shouldnt he have ravioli hands?
I was overthinking things.
And I remember Seth went, No, dont do the crossword puzzle for people!
Let them figure it out on their own!
And everyone laughed, so we did that.
[Anderson] could not have been nicer, and very excited to be there.
He seemed very genuinely like a fan ofSNL.
He was very patient, very game for anything.
I think hed be a great host.
We did it at dress, and it went okay.
So that was added before air.
I never got emotional all week.
Like, I never really cried all week.
I get very focused on work, and I dont fully get the weight of things sometimes.
Then I start getting a little emotional.
And I was like, Aww, man!
And then that was it.
And there was Kristen Wiig.
I had no idea she was going to be there.
She ran over and gave me a big hug, and she was crying.
And I was like, Yeah, I guess.
Then I just got dressed for the next sketch.
And then I was fine.
[On whether Hader might do a Stefon cameo someday:]Maybe.
It just depends if anything warrants it.
The new cast theyll find something thatll be the next big thing.
I mean, John just told me Stefon was a question onJeopardy.
So, I was like, Oh, we did it.
No need to do anymore.
[Alex Trebek] said, Who played him?
… and the girl went, Who is Taran Killam?
