Adam McKay on Vice, Second City and more

Bullseye with Jesse Thorn

NPR

Society & Culture

4.7 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 12 February 2019

⏱️ 34 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Adam McKay has had a pretty eclectic career. He started in sketch comedy first as a founder of the Upright Citizens Brigade, then as a writer on Saturday Night Live. He studied at Second City, too, so throw that in there. Then, movies: He collaborated with Will Ferrell to make some stone cold comedy classics: Anchorman, Step Brothers, Talladega Nights. Lately, though, his work has been more serious. Topical. Political. A few years back, he wrote and directed The Big Short, which deconstructed and explained the 2008 financial crisis. He helped create the HBO show Succession - a drama about a family that owns a colossal American media empire. Now there's Vice, his latest movie, which is the story of former Vice President Dick Cheney. It's playing in theaters now and is up for eight Academy Awards. The common thread with McKay's work is that it's never boring, never forced. He'll take an extremely dumb joke and frame it in a way that's so clever and compelling that you just lose it. He'll find a way to explain credit default swaps that are so entertaining and engrossing that you forget you're learning about... credit default swaps. In this conversation, Adam tells Jesse how he manages to keep his films fresh, funny and weird, and also shares some of the more reckless tales in improv comedy from his time in Chicago.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Bullseye with Jesse Thorn is a production of MaximumFun.org and is distributed by NPR.
0:07.8	I'm Jesse Thorn, it's Bullseye.
0:19.4	Can you find a through line in the work of Adam McKay?
0:28.4	Is there any common elements?
0:30.4	It's had a very eclectic career.
0:32.0	He started in sketch and improv comedy.
0:34.9	First as a founder of the upright citizens brigade, then as a writer on Saturday Night Live.
0:40.0	He worked on the show between 1995 and 2001.
0:43.4	He studied at Second City, so throw that in for good measure.
0:47.2	And then he started working in movies.
0:49.3	He collaborated with Will Farrow to make some stone-cold comedy classics,
0:53.5	Anchorman, Step Brothers, Taladega Knights.
0:56.4	And lately though his work has been more serious, topical, political.
1:00.4	Few years back he wrote and directed The Big Short, which deconstructed and explained the
1:05.3	2008 financial crisis.
1:07.6	He helped create the HBO show's succession, a drama about a family that owns a colossal
1:12.6	American media empire, and then there's Vice, his latest movie.
1:16.5	It's the story of former Vice President Dick Cheney, displaying in theaters now and it
1:20.8	is up for, checking my notes, eight Academy Awards.
1:26.5	I guess here's the common thread with McCays work.
1:29.4	He sells it.
1:30.6	It's never boring, it's never forced.
	...

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