February 9, 2023 • 35 mins
We all adored Jane Lynch on Glee. But did you know there was a decade worth of drama that almost prevented us from ever knowing the joy of watching her breathe life into Sue Sylvester?! (I feel nauseous). Find out how much of Sue was improvised…plus, as much as Jane gave to Sue, apparently she received a pretty big gift in return. If you missed it (and we’re sure you did) don’t fret, it’s all right here!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
And that's what you really missed with Jenna and Kevin
and I heart radio podcast. Welcome to and that's why
you really missed podcast. I'm Jenna. It sounds like Jennifer Coolidge.
I am Kevin, and welcome to today's episode. We we
got we got a big fish today, big big, big
(00:24):
big fish in the small pond. We got Jane Lynch
here people the suso astor herself, um, which you will
hear she believes it's not the villain. UM. I like
hearing her talk about how much she loves too and
the deeper understanding and how also I'm not I'm not
(00:47):
gonna spoil it. There's lots of things we found out
that we did not know about how she got on
the show and stayed on the show. That's right, So enjoy.
Buckle up, enjoy our conversation with Jane Lynch. Jane, Jane Lynch, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome,
(01:07):
Thank you, my friend. Well, I don't know about that.
I think Jane has been the busiest working person in
show business for as long as before we've even met.
I feel like any time we don't know that's true.
A weekend there next month would be an advertisement of
catch Jane Lynch and this thing. How when did she
(01:28):
have the time? I know, because everybody wants you know
what's funny about that? Kids? Well, God bless, I don't
know that that's true, but it's it's lovely to think
and yet and yet my day's yawned before me sometimes. Um,
and when I work, I love it, and I also
love not to work, especially these days. I'm more more
(01:50):
happy to be at home. But um, yeah, it's funny
because you know how it goes. You You do a
guest spot on a sitcom and you're there for three
days and then it comes out and you're in the
show and they're like, oh my god, she's so busy. Yeah,
but we were on greed. We were You were busy.
I was not busy. You guys know what it's like
to be really busy. I strolled in once a week
and said the same same line sometimes that I said
(02:13):
the week before, and you had the compou did. It
was like getting back in my pajamas. I will say, though,
the things that you had to say built up to
be worth a weeks of work. Well, thank you, you
know that's what I think. It was Ian who said
we sprinkle you illiberally, just a little bit of sus
(02:33):
Sylvester goes a long way. And sometimes when I talked,
as you know, I would go on and on and
on and on and on. Yeah, was it was it?
Are you a fast memorizer like or was Sue kind
of hard for you? Did it take a second? I
did take a second. It was harder than you know,
(02:54):
in terms of memorization, than anything I had done. Um.
Sometimes it's just like out of nowhere, these like yeah,
there's still out of context and crazy. Yeah. And I
had to run on sentence once. God, I wish I
could remember what episode it was, but it went about
two pages and it started it was one sentence and
it went the whole it's crazy and Brennan crazy crazy,
(03:16):
And he was a stickler about word for word really
and I'm considered an improviser, and he would I would like,
I'd see what Barb Barbe was an inverted script person.
I'd see her over on the phone going because she
would tell on. She would say, you know, Jane, she
didn't it wasn't a horrible thing. That was her job,
you know, Jans switching up the words. And she changed
(03:37):
the name of this to this, and then she got
Ian said it's really important that it's blah blah blah.
All right, Well, you know, Bab's probably with saying like
I'd probably call Ian and go she has so much
to remember. Do I have to bother her with this?
I'll bet and you know, not looking a gift in
(03:58):
in the mouth because that guy, what he gave me,
Oh my god, just just the two were a match
made in heaven, like what it was. Yeah, and it
was a happy accident too. It's you know, it just
kind of happened. It was a wonderful thing though. When
(04:19):
so we talked to Ryan when we started this show,
and he was saying that when they were creating the
show that, um, they were talking about your character, like, oh,
we wanted Jane Lynch type. And then eventually there's like, oh,
why don't we just ask Jane Lynch ask herself? How
(04:39):
did that happen? Do you remember? Like did he call you?
Did you knew him a little bit? Didn't you a
little bit? But you know I was on the outs
with him at that point. You know, it was about
year ten of being in the ounce where he would
see me in a room and walk out he was
mad at me. He was, you know, and he'll get
mad at people and he holds do it is a scorpio,
(05:01):
that's just how they do it. Um. So I didn't
think i'd ever hear from him again. Um. I was
in Canada doing uh was called camp something with George Lopez.
I forget what it was called, so shooting, and I
got an email from my agent and she said, and
she knew, you know about kind of the uh, the
(05:22):
cold shoulder that he had been given me for now
about ten years. And she said, Rised Murphy called and
he wants you to play this part in his UM pilot.
And it's a guest star, but it could become a
full on role. Now. I forget what came first. I
think I had been in a pilot that got picked
(05:44):
up for CBS and we did not we did not
get into the schedule where they were going to put
us at mid mid season, so I would have to
go to that. So for sure I was gonna do
you know, so we asked would you do it? Because
Sue Sylvester was not in the original pilot script. It
was Kevin um Fox guy Fox. I can't think about
(06:05):
his names. Um. He said you need a um, you
need a villain, and that's when Ryan said her name
will be Sue Sylvester and she will be played by
Jane Lynch. Is well, how I heard it, which is
kind of nice. I don't know that he said it
Jane Lynch type. But anyway, so Ian wrote this thing
and it was just hilarious. I would do it anyway.
I mean I was like, oh, Ryan asked me back,
(06:26):
I'm so happy, So I said yes. I did the
pilot as a guest started the first three episodes as
a guest star, and then CBS dropped my pilot. So
that's how I got to stay on Blee. So, oh
my god. I remember thinking, I thought, weren't you also
on Party Down? Yeah, but that was um uh not
(06:46):
like a contract. You know, it was on stars. We weren't.
We weren't. Nobody was like in first position that type
of a thing. So it wasn't uh like they said
in those days. In the first place, I don't know
that it even had a place. It didn't even know
if it was going to have a second season. So
but I left Party Down to do the pilot, and
I think I missed the last episode of the first
(07:08):
season in party down to do that? What would have
happened if you had gotten that, like your show Hack
I gotten picked up. Yeah, it would have been Emmy less,
been emless, Golden globe forget it. And also such a
(07:32):
wonderful experience that we all had. God it was. It
was such a moment in time, wasn't it. It was
a articular moment in time. Yeah, before that, you know,
I mean we did some things in the beginning that
we can't do now because of the kind of weakness
that it's good too, Like I don't think that you
could have been the wheelchair kid because you're not in
a wheelchair. And I think, and you know, I completely
(07:54):
understand that that. Yeah, we talked about how things don't
age quite well or times wouldn't. Yeah, times have changed,
and Asian camp I don't think we would have been
allowed to say I can't remember that Asian one, Asian two.
You couldn't even refer to us like that. That's what
I was going to ask you, Sylvester. Yes, you had
(08:16):
a lot of crazy ass lines, but had corner was
really bad. How did it feel having to do that? Though,
Like at the time, I was like, oh, this is
what I'm given, I'm gonna do it. Yeah, I loved it.
I loved how extreme she was. She didn't like her
coffee hot. It was in the pilot, I said, I
liked my coffee scalding. She never did anything halfway. It
(08:41):
was extreme. Are I never heard the words scalding again
the same ever since that. It's right, It's right. And
the track suits, I mean the track suits, they just
became such an iconic thing. And they did. You know
who used to wear those track suits was like Russian
eyes walking up running canyon. You ever seen that? And
(09:03):
they were bling yeah yeah and matching like Adida's track
suits in their chest, hair sticking up. It was the
Russians and run DMC. They were just yeah, yeah, exactly.
Uh what what I know? Because you got you, you
got to do some musical numbers, You got to work
with some of your icons, feel like, yeah, you had
(09:27):
been a huge fan of hers growing up? Did Ryan
know that? Yes? In fact, when we remember that first
dinner we had at that steakhouse. Remember before we even started,
we had a big dinner at a steakhouse and Dana um,
I can't remember anybody's life. Walden stood up and said,
your lives are going to change. And you know, I've
(09:48):
been to those pilot dinners before where they say, you know,
you're on the verge of something big and then you're
canceled after three episodes. So I took it with a
grain of salt. But she was right. She was right,
especially for you guys really changed. But there was a
guy at that restaurant and I forget his name, but
the first one is John. He wrote UM, I Honestly
(10:09):
Love You, which um was her big hit. She also
wrote these an Australian two. He wrote the song from Glee,
but not Glee Greece yeap Hopelessly Devoted. He wrote that,
and he wrote physical And so Ryan saw him in
the restaurant that night and said, that's that guy. So
(10:31):
we went over there and said, you know, we love
your music and he said you know who I am
and I said, yeah, you wrote blah blah blah blah blah,
and he said, oh, he was so impressed. And we
said we're doing a musical show. We'd love to have
a living Newton John and it could you connect us?
And I don't know if that's how it got connected,
but Ryan probably didn't hurt. Ryan sent her a letter
(10:51):
and uh, she said, I'd love to and Carol Carol
Burnett too, So we remade physical with a living Newton
makes and shot for shot numbers. That was pretty Yeah.
Don were you a big singer before this? Like did
you sing a lot about the same as I sing? Now?
(11:14):
You know, I'm not like the best singer in the world,
but I love it and I'll put on a harmony
if um, you know, like Kate Flannery and I over
the Country's Show. Oh, Tim, Yeah, and Tim too. Tim
is in the Christmas Show with us, and he arranged
our Tim Davis is the arranger of the all the
vocals on Glee, and he arranged all of our stuff
(11:36):
that we do in the Christmas show. And we have
an album called Swinging Little Christmas. It's so good. I
ran in the Kate last week and he's like, I
call for you guys to get back on the road. Yeah.
She's in a neck brace, half body neck brace. Yeah,
so we had to, I know, we had to cancel
the Christmas tour, but we did a show in Orange
(11:57):
County where she she we can't keep her off this stage.
We planned it without her. We got other people to
come sing and with the same band, and then she
shows up. She was cunning Internet brace and she comes
out stage and said, it took me three buses to
get here because she can't drive. So um, but she
can't be kept from the trotting the boards. That's right.
(12:19):
Do you love touring? Do you love performing? I love
performing touring him al right about you guys toured You
guys toured hard. We toured hard. You got to pop
in and do some intro fun intro is huh in
New York? I did. Yeah, it came out to New York.
But I know you guys were working hard a f
Yeah that was tough. Yeah, you probably saw us looking
(12:41):
a little ragged little yeah hard. You know. You know,
my niece Megan is a good friend of um you guys,
and she was, um she carried your luggage when he
first job. Yeah, it was her in. She she locked
(13:01):
in though so quickly. She is like one of us,
and we were like, we're never letting you go. So
it was so it's so fun to see. So I
keep in touch with you guys is through her. Let's
go on with Kevin and Jenna, because your family is incredible.
So she does. Oh thank you know, Meg's does hold
(13:22):
all the secrets. And I'm an astrological person. As you know.
She has a Scorpio moon, which means she gets deep
and dark. She is loyal to death to the death,
and she will hold all of your secrets. But but
if she's mad at somebody, you know it. Yes, she's
(13:46):
the most loyal person in the world. That that makes total.
You have to do, you have to do um Emma's chart,
my daughter's chart. I would love to love that. Yeah, yeah,
I know what time I was born. So I don't
think you can even right well, you know I can't.
But there are astrologers who can trace back your like
(14:07):
instances in your life and they can figure out if
this happened at this time, you probably have this rising
side been into like the astrology and yeah, kind of yeah,
I've always been kind of new AG and I hope
I've graduated from new AG into something deeper and profound. Um,
but I did. I started out with astrology, you know,
(14:29):
I want to know me, I want to know yeah,
And now it's it's just fascinating how the world of
events are playing out and I'm looking at some of
these major movements of the bigger planets, and it's just amazing.
And there I said amazing twice because I can't think
of another word. I follow an astrologer called Pam Gregory,
(14:52):
and she's like, she needs one more follower, but she
she is profound and deep and learning so much. So
I love it. I just love it. I gotta go follow.
Just give us five minutes. We gotta follow her. Um,
you had, obviously prigily were very successful, and but coming
(15:17):
into the show and having it play out the way
it did, becoming this weird, seemingly overnight success. Did you
feel a difference in your professional and personal life pretty quickly?
Like we all huge huge Um. I mean there's just
(15:39):
such power to going into people's living rooms. And this
was during appointment television, wasn't it. This wasn't before before
the streaming, that's right. Yeah, even more, I think because
there were there were less shows on television. We were
about we were at the last of the network television,
you know, domination. And it may come back from what
(15:59):
I've been hearing keeping my ear against the wall, but yeah,
changed completely. I got it recognized everywhere I went. Um,
I loved it. I had no problem with it at all. Um,
I took pictures with people all the time. But I
did learn like Matt Morrison, you know, is younger than
I am, so he would watch me do things and
go I'm gonna do that. There were times when it
(16:20):
just got to be too much and you're just really
trying to pick up your coffee at Starbucks and I
would say can I take a picture? And I'd say, oh, no, thanks,
that's like, yeah, I have actually witnessed that. I witnessed
that at the Apple store. I'm like, who, who's famous,
who's here? Who's here? And across the way into Jane,
I'm like hey Jane. She's like hey, and I think
(16:42):
you thought I was a fan At first. Probably I
was like, oh, I got that, Jenny. I've done that before.
I see people and I go and I think they're
a fan. They're like, hey, it's me. It's your your
friends from fifty years Oh sorry, you want to Well
all came up to me a blue bottle and he
was behind me and he said, hey, can I have
(17:04):
a picture? And I went ready to be like no,
thank you, ready to say no thank you. I probably
would have, but anyway, we did take a picture anyway,
and he was behind me like this, and I was like,
I got to see you do that in Monaco for
that TV festival thing. That God, that was a trip,
(17:24):
you guys. And we were being mobbed and very late
to this thing, and I had never seen you do
it before. And these people came up to you and
so sweetly You're like, no, thank you, And I was like,
wait a second, that's an option. I stopped in my tracks.
I was like, that is absolutely master class. And it
(17:45):
stops them too, because they go and then maybe two
seconds later they go, what But you're gone by then.
But you know, sometimes yeah, sometimes you just gotta keep moving.
But wasn't that the weirdest trip? Um uh Glee was
in a first season? It was this huge and they
invited Kevin, Jenna and me and maybe they invited more,
(18:07):
but we said yes and we got to take his
He couldn't go, so we and they were like, would
you guys be each other's plus one if you want
to go? Absolutely? Yeah? And you know what I remember
most of all, Kevin is you bought like three jackets,
three suit jackets to go and one was a tailor
too tight. You had them Taylor was taken in at
(18:30):
the back. It was taking him like at the back
at the back scene or something like that. It was
terrible and you had it on, but you're a tiny guy.
You could not even the two wins would not even mean.
But remember count velvet. Yes, it was also very hot there.
That's right. It was red. It was it was red velvet.
It was so hot here. But it was fun. That
(18:52):
was a wild That was a trip in to this.
This is great. Yeah. The ceremony, it's it was like
four hours long, remember, and all the presenters were drunk. Yes,
and the French. Yeah, it felt like we were kind
of in jail. Yeah, I did. I was with Dante,
remember Dante de Loretto. Yes, I was with him and
(19:15):
we left early. I think, Yeah, that was smart. I
think that was that trip. Or Dante was the one
who encouraged as Janet to get and pictures by the paparazzi.
That was. Yes, we were so every yeah yeah, yeah,
oh I bet, I'll bet yeah. That great dates and
we were dating, so it wasn't that great. You know
(19:37):
what's crazy to me to think about that. You were
just supposed to be a guest start it reminds me
of like The West Wing, where Martin Sheen was only
supposed to be a guest start in the pilot, and
then they realized that's everyone's favorite character. It's a very
it's just right. Yeah. Oh and yes, I mean he
(19:59):
was the show. He was the focus of the show,
where I think in a lot of ways, for Glee,
it was like there's no Glee without Susa Vester like that,
there's no way. Oh yeah, well you needed your villain,
that's for sure. Yeah, that's for sure. As we're rewatching
(20:23):
again for the fifth time, um, it's uh, it's I'm
watching it with new eyes and I'm really enjoying it,
but I'm watching it as a fan now, and like,
my favorite scenes truly are yours and Matt scenes in
principal Principal Figgins office, Figgin's office. Oh but Matt, Yeah,
(20:45):
he's such a smart actor. I don't think he knows
how smart he is. He played such a good person,
and he is a good person, he certainly has that
in him. But he played it was such a dichotomy
to who Sue was. It was like he walked through
the world forgiving. Yeah, and I'm talking about Schuster now
and Matts like this too. But he was forgiving. He
(21:07):
saw the best and everybody he trusted people, he hoped.
You know that. You know, he gave people a bill.
He gave me a billion chances as sus Sylvester, and
deep down inside, Sue Sylvester was like him. There was
a there was the Sue Sylvestor. I mean that track
suit was not an accident. I don't know that they
(21:29):
thought this deeply when they were creating the character, but
that was her uniform. She was like a warrior. But
you take that uniform and you go just below skin
level and there's this tender heart, this this heart that
breaks for her down syndrome sister who flux Becky out
of obscurity and makes her cheerio. I was watching the
(21:52):
auditions for the Cheerios, and I was so cruel, you know,
telling everybody how terrible they were. And Becky comes in
and she jumps rope and she can't do it. And
Matt's looking at me like, I don't do it, see anything,
don't do it soon, And I'm watching and I'm watching,
and then I go report tomorrow at noon. You're a cheerio.
(22:12):
Congratulations and she's like really and that she was just
like she was so kind to her mum and not
to anybody else. But when it came down to it, though,
she was you know, she was like Megan. She had
a scorpio moon. She was the most loyal. She would
she would kill for you, she would she would kill
(22:34):
for the vulnerable. She was like protector of the vulnerable.
M hmm. I always tell people that a little deep there. No,
it's good that I feel like Jane as a person
to do with a one No character like that could
be one character isn't. But you know that's so much Yeah,
exactly going to say about Jane. You were pon go
(22:58):
back to that when we when we foresee you with
your sister and glee Sue with her sister. I always
feel like that's you as a human in real life,
where if I see you out in the street, you
are the most loving, warm, loyal person and you're able
(23:18):
to then add those layers to someone like Sue because
you do feel that deeply. I think in real life
I do, and I feel, you know, I crumble around
the babies and the old people and the senior dogs.
We always have at least three or four in the house. Yeah,
I'm I'm um, I'm almost almost. Sometimes I'm afraid, I'm
(23:41):
afraid i wake up in the middle of the night
that I'm going to just fall apart with with the detection. Yeah,
feeling for the vulnerable. That's why you're so good though,
gets it? Yeah? Where Megan gets it now? And then
you slap something mean on top of there, and I
think that's when, Oh my god, I'm gonna sound so
(24:01):
braggy now. But when I found my own secret sauce
in in um and acting, where things got really kind
of deep for me is when I was able to
access that the stuff that makes me collapse and then
slapped the meanest person in the world on top of it.
And then then you got a person had an interest person.
(24:21):
When was that? What? At what point did you find
the secret sauce um? Probably glee. Let me think what
I did before that that. Oh you know, I used
to do this character that led to Sue Sylvester. I
used to do this character and like cabarets and stuff,
I would do one person show or I'd just show
up do a monologue at um Largo or something, and
(24:43):
I wore a neck brace and I dressed like Janet
Reno where this terrible eight suit. Janet Reno was the
Attorney general. And this shows how long ago I did it,
which was this woman. She was so angry and she's
so upset, and she's one of those people who's all
always hurt. She's always got something. Somebody did something to
her and injured her, and she's so angry. And I
(25:06):
would enter to Wagner's um right of the vulkyries, do
you know that? And I'd get up to the mic
and really close and I can only talk this loud,
and I tell the story of what someone did to me.
(25:28):
And then at the end she would just like burst
into some kind of like tears or dissolve onto the
floor and do something embarrassing. I'll usually she wet her pants.
I mean that's basically what I had her do, and
I had a sound effect. But that kind of led
to Sue Sylvester because I actually wrote that monologue for therapy.
(25:48):
My I was complaining about something in my therapist write
that is a monologue, and I was like, then I
want when I wrote it as a monologue, and young
Lady came out, Yeah, this is bliss actor. It was
not a conscious thing, unhealthy psychologically. No, No, it wasn't
a conscious thing. I did it as a psychological exercise
(26:09):
because I was suffering. Yeah, I was suffering with the
polarities of my own self, and I brought them together
in a hilarious character that I could laugh at myself,
laugh at that polarity. And then I, you know, basically
do that with every character I play. I pulled that out.
(26:29):
Give the people what they want, you know, the people
exactly do you think that when you got to um,
because I was thinking about this earlier, the way you
can like drop your voice down to you. I guess
this answers that question actually that you just said. Because
when you're like, yes, like all of that the ring,
(26:53):
I started Destination Horror Horror Club. Yeah that now, I've
been kind of doing stuff like that, you know, and
and oh I did so many like little sketch comedy shows,
and um, I think that part of my voice that
came in, like there's I did it. If you look
at some of the old stuff I did, and I
(27:14):
don't even know how you pull that up. But I
would play like the neighboring lady and I'd be down
here and I do it in animation all the time.
It's it's one of my tricks. So because Ian was
such a stickler um for the words, how precise of Sue,
I'm sure you got to play a lot also, like
(27:35):
how much did you feel like you got to actually
improv that made it into what we saw on the show? Well,
I rarely wanted. The reason I would change some of
the words is because it was easier for me to
remember that I can't I'm not able to do this,
but I can't do this, and I no, you gotta
do what's written because he's precise, and I'm very precise too,
(27:55):
so I you know, I bout to the altar of
Ian's decision. But there were little things that I mean,
the thing that I loved about Sue, and that always
was encouraged if it wasn't extreme enough in the script,
if I took it like one more place once notch higher,
and I would do that a lot. But I remember
(28:17):
there was one where I got so mad at Biggins
that I started destroying the office and they played some
you know, the opera music, and I was like, things, Oh,
that was the most fun. And then I go into
the gym and I pick up the not the children, like,
not the kids to the children. Oh, push people down
(28:43):
the stairs. You hit people. I knocked an old lady
down the stairs. Remember that. It's very satisfying, Yes, yes,
very much. That was fun cutting guy's hair. Remember I
cut that guy. I really cut his hair too. Yeah,
I said, you haired hippie looking like a girl. Oh
my god, we couldn't do that today now. And I
(29:04):
went like this, and someone gave me a pair of
scissors and I literally took it in my hands, his hair. No, no,
I mean to be fair, it was a wig? Did
you think it was? He was knowing that that was
going to happen, And then I saw him in the
trailer and they were giving him a cute little haircut,
trying to work around my shreds. I thought you thought
(29:28):
it was a wig? You're like that, wouldn't that be terrible?
I'm sure the kid would have stopped me, or maybe
he wouldn't have. He signed up that exactly. He wanted
to work again, so he let me do it. Terrible,
did you? One of my favorite things that Sue did
(29:49):
was Sue's journal. It was absolutely dear journal, delicious. Yes,
oh my here I am almost thirty. Do you have
people coming up to quote you to your face all
the time with these lines? I used to not so
much anymore, but I used to. For sure. There's one
(30:11):
that we just watched that you at the end of it,
you say it will love you like a sister. You do,
I like a sister. Was that you were? I think
that might be me? I don't know. He might have
(30:31):
said that too. I mean he is so precise. I
mean he just fed right into my better instincts. A
good pairing the two, yes, exactly, you know, God with
a funny guy. What a great guy, what a weird guy.
You know, We're from the same town we grew up.
I'm twenty years older than he used but yeah, Chicago,
(30:54):
same comedic sensibilities. Yeah, exactly. Kind of dark, but Frank,
he's the nice the sky in the world. And then
he writes about he used to say, you know, sometimes
my mom would open up the dishwasher and the knives
would be sticking up, and I think, what would happen
if I threw her on top of that? Knowing his
(31:17):
mother too, Charman, she's such a sweetheart. Like here's Mildred
mil She looks like a Mildred sweet. I forced her
to kiss me, give me your face, Mildred, Mildred. We're
gonna ask Mildred and Jane, um, what what is the
(31:39):
feeling that Glee leaves you with? Like, yeah, looking back
on it, on it all, Yeah, what does it leave
me with? It was well, moment in time it was.
It was one beautiful, perfect moment um where the um
(32:06):
everything kind of it was kind of lightning and a bottle. Yeah.
And I remember, uh, we knew we were breathing rarefied air.
Ye remember Ryan saying that to us at some point
he said, you know, the most important thing for you
guys to realize right now is that you're we are
all breathing rarefied air. This doesn't happen because of the
impact that the show had, the good it had, and
(32:30):
um boy, we could use something like it now where
um everybody. It was kind of a microcosm of the world,
even for adults. It's like the McKinley high being metaphor
for the world where it's cruel and he gets slushies
in the face and there's a group's and factions again
(32:51):
it's each other. It's very tribal. Then you get into
that choir room and everybody's got your back. And there's
nothing more beautiful than raising your voice in song together
and making a joyful noise. It's where you do it together.
It's where the football player, uh and the kid, the
little nerd in the wheelchair can be pals, where the
(33:11):
gay kid can be passed with the football player and
the greaser. You know, Mark Sally's character was could be
so dark and yet and that you know when he
was winning the same thing with the guy, when he
was with us, there was something about him that was lighter, right, Yeah, yeah, yeah,
that's beautifully said, good one in true Jane form of Silvester.
(33:37):
Well maybe on the exterior exactly. And you know what's
interesting too is that you guys started out you didn't
know each other before this, right, and you were basically
paired together. It's kind of a romantic couple and then
just best friends and and you became that in real life.
So there were all of these beautiful kind of happy accidents,
(33:58):
um of like casting, we didn't know each other. And
look what happened to Chris Colefort too. He wasn't even
out right, he was like eighteen years old and he
wasn't even out and he was a child, and now
he's the best selling author with children's foction. Yeah exactly.
You know, he's kind of a so so many people,
(34:22):
you know, young people just look up to him. Yeah. See,
we're lucky to when you get casting things, you don't
know who's going to be on the other side. And
we were all we were all very, very lucky because
we were all obsessed with each other from the get go.
So that was a real thing. Yeah. Well, we're gonna
have you back for and ask me anything at some point.
(34:43):
We we love you so much. Thank you for spending
your time and giving us your wonderful nuggets of joy
and love to your house right now. The Royal love it. Yes,
that would be great, great guys. Um Jane is everybody's
(35:04):
best friend. I wanted to read my drop, my calendar
and uh my chart, my chart, my calendar, my chart.
Jane's good people. You know, if you can't tell from
that interview, she is just she's liked it all the time.
She's so sweet, she cares, deeply cares about the role
(35:25):
she's playing. Um, and that's what makes her so talented
and good. And people keep wanting to work with her
kind feelings, big feelings. Well, we're grateful for Jane for
coming on the show. We hope you guys enjoyed it.
Thanks for listening, Thanks for joining us, and that's what
you really missed. See you next week, by bye. Thanks
for listening, and follow us on Instagram at and that's
(35:47):
what you really miss pod. Make sure to write us
a review and leave us five stars. See you next time.
And that's what you really missed with Jenna and Kevin
and I heart radio podcast. Welcome to and that's why
you really missed podcast. I'm Jenna. It sounds like Jennifer Coolidge.
I am Kevin, and welcome to today's episode. We we
got we got a big fish today, big big, big
(00:24):
big fish in the small pond. We got Jane Lynch
here people the suso astor herself, um, which you will
hear she believes it's not the villain. UM. I like
hearing her talk about how much she loves too and
the deeper understanding and how also I'm not I'm not
(00:47):
gonna spoil it. There's lots of things we found out
that we did not know about how she got on
the show and stayed on the show. That's right, So enjoy.
Buckle up, enjoy our conversation with Jane Lynch. Jane, Jane Lynch, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome,
(01:07):
Thank you, my friend. Well, I don't know about that.
I think Jane has been the busiest working person in
show business for as long as before we've even met.
I feel like any time we don't know that's true.
A weekend there next month would be an advertisement of
catch Jane Lynch and this thing. How when did she
(01:28):
have the time? I know, because everybody wants you know
what's funny about that? Kids? Well, God bless, I don't
know that that's true, but it's it's lovely to think
and yet and yet my day's yawned before me sometimes. Um,
and when I work, I love it, and I also
love not to work, especially these days. I'm more more
(01:50):
happy to be at home. But um, yeah, it's funny
because you know how it goes. You You do a
guest spot on a sitcom and you're there for three
days and then it comes out and you're in the
show and they're like, oh my god, she's so busy. Yeah,
but we were on greed. We were You were busy.
I was not busy. You guys know what it's like
to be really busy. I strolled in once a week
and said the same same line sometimes that I said
(02:13):
the week before, and you had the compou did. It
was like getting back in my pajamas. I will say, though,
the things that you had to say built up to
be worth a weeks of work. Well, thank you, you
know that's what I think. It was Ian who said
we sprinkle you illiberally, just a little bit of sus
(02:33):
Sylvester goes a long way. And sometimes when I talked,
as you know, I would go on and on and
on and on and on. Yeah, was it was it?
Are you a fast memorizer like or was Sue kind
of hard for you? Did it take a second? I
did take a second. It was harder than you know,
(02:54):
in terms of memorization, than anything I had done. Um.
Sometimes it's just like out of nowhere, these like yeah,
there's still out of context and crazy. Yeah. And I
had to run on sentence once. God, I wish I
could remember what episode it was, but it went about
two pages and it started it was one sentence and
it went the whole it's crazy and Brennan crazy crazy,
(03:16):
And he was a stickler about word for word really
and I'm considered an improviser, and he would I would like,
I'd see what Barb Barbe was an inverted script person.
I'd see her over on the phone going because she
would tell on. She would say, you know, Jane, she
didn't it wasn't a horrible thing. That was her job,
you know, Jans switching up the words. And she changed
(03:37):
the name of this to this, and then she got
Ian said it's really important that it's blah blah blah.
All right, Well, you know, Bab's probably with saying like
I'd probably call Ian and go she has so much
to remember. Do I have to bother her with this?
I'll bet and you know, not looking a gift in
(03:58):
in the mouth because that guy, what he gave me,
Oh my god, just just the two were a match
made in heaven, like what it was. Yeah, and it
was a happy accident too. It's you know, it just
kind of happened. It was a wonderful thing though. When
(04:19):
so we talked to Ryan when we started this show,
and he was saying that when they were creating the
show that, um, they were talking about your character, like, oh,
we wanted Jane Lynch type. And then eventually there's like, oh,
why don't we just ask Jane Lynch ask herself? How
(04:39):
did that happen? Do you remember? Like did he call you?
Did you knew him a little bit? Didn't you a
little bit? But you know I was on the outs
with him at that point. You know, it was about
year ten of being in the ounce where he would
see me in a room and walk out he was
mad at me. He was, you know, and he'll get
mad at people and he holds do it is a scorpio,
(05:01):
that's just how they do it. Um. So I didn't
think i'd ever hear from him again. Um. I was
in Canada doing uh was called camp something with George Lopez.
I forget what it was called, so shooting, and I
got an email from my agent and she said, and
she knew, you know about kind of the uh, the
(05:22):
cold shoulder that he had been given me for now
about ten years. And she said, Rised Murphy called and
he wants you to play this part in his UM pilot.
And it's a guest star, but it could become a
full on role. Now. I forget what came first. I
think I had been in a pilot that got picked
(05:44):
up for CBS and we did not we did not
get into the schedule where they were going to put
us at mid mid season, so I would have to
go to that. So for sure I was gonna do
you know, so we asked would you do it? Because
Sue Sylvester was not in the original pilot script. It
was Kevin um Fox guy Fox. I can't think about
(06:05):
his names. Um. He said you need a um, you
need a villain, and that's when Ryan said her name
will be Sue Sylvester and she will be played by
Jane Lynch. Is well, how I heard it, which is
kind of nice. I don't know that he said it
Jane Lynch type. But anyway, so Ian wrote this thing
and it was just hilarious. I would do it anyway.
I mean I was like, oh, Ryan asked me back,
(06:26):
I'm so happy, So I said yes. I did the
pilot as a guest started the first three episodes as
a guest star, and then CBS dropped my pilot. So
that's how I got to stay on Blee. So, oh
my god. I remember thinking, I thought, weren't you also
on Party Down? Yeah, but that was um uh not
(06:46):
like a contract. You know, it was on stars. We weren't.
We weren't. Nobody was like in first position that type
of a thing. So it wasn't uh like they said
in those days. In the first place, I don't know
that it even had a place. It didn't even know
if it was going to have a second season. So
but I left Party Down to do the pilot, and
I think I missed the last episode of the first
(07:08):
season in party down to do that? What would have
happened if you had gotten that, like your show Hack
I gotten picked up. Yeah, it would have been Emmy less,
been emless, Golden globe forget it. And also such a
(07:32):
wonderful experience that we all had. God it was. It
was such a moment in time, wasn't it. It was
a articular moment in time. Yeah, before that, you know,
I mean we did some things in the beginning that
we can't do now because of the kind of weakness
that it's good too, Like I don't think that you
could have been the wheelchair kid because you're not in
a wheelchair. And I think, and you know, I completely
(07:54):
understand that that. Yeah, we talked about how things don't
age quite well or times wouldn't. Yeah, times have changed,
and Asian camp I don't think we would have been
allowed to say I can't remember that Asian one, Asian two.
You couldn't even refer to us like that. That's what
I was going to ask you, Sylvester. Yes, you had
(08:16):
a lot of crazy ass lines, but had corner was
really bad. How did it feel having to do that? Though,
Like at the time, I was like, oh, this is
what I'm given, I'm gonna do it. Yeah, I loved it.
I loved how extreme she was. She didn't like her
coffee hot. It was in the pilot, I said, I
liked my coffee scalding. She never did anything halfway. It
(08:41):
was extreme. Are I never heard the words scalding again
the same ever since that. It's right, It's right. And
the track suits, I mean the track suits, they just
became such an iconic thing. And they did. You know
who used to wear those track suits was like Russian
eyes walking up running canyon. You ever seen that? And
(09:03):
they were bling yeah yeah and matching like Adida's track
suits in their chest, hair sticking up. It was the
Russians and run DMC. They were just yeah, yeah, exactly.
Uh what what I know? Because you got you, you
got to do some musical numbers, You got to work
with some of your icons, feel like, yeah, you had
(09:27):
been a huge fan of hers growing up? Did Ryan
know that? Yes? In fact, when we remember that first
dinner we had at that steakhouse. Remember before we even started,
we had a big dinner at a steakhouse and Dana um,
I can't remember anybody's life. Walden stood up and said,
your lives are going to change. And you know, I've
(09:48):
been to those pilot dinners before where they say, you know,
you're on the verge of something big and then you're
canceled after three episodes. So I took it with a
grain of salt. But she was right. She was right,
especially for you guys really changed. But there was a
guy at that restaurant and I forget his name, but
the first one is John. He wrote UM, I Honestly
(10:09):
Love You, which um was her big hit. She also
wrote these an Australian two. He wrote the song from Glee,
but not Glee Greece yeap Hopelessly Devoted. He wrote that,
and he wrote physical And so Ryan saw him in
the restaurant that night and said, that's that guy. So
(10:31):
we went over there and said, you know, we love
your music and he said you know who I am
and I said, yeah, you wrote blah blah blah blah blah,
and he said, oh, he was so impressed. And we
said we're doing a musical show. We'd love to have
a living Newton John and it could you connect us?
And I don't know if that's how it got connected,
but Ryan probably didn't hurt. Ryan sent her a letter
(10:51):
and uh, she said, I'd love to and Carol Carol
Burnett too, So we remade physical with a living Newton
makes and shot for shot numbers. That was pretty Yeah.
Don were you a big singer before this? Like did
you sing a lot about the same as I sing? Now?
(11:14):
You know, I'm not like the best singer in the world,
but I love it and I'll put on a harmony
if um, you know, like Kate Flannery and I over
the Country's Show. Oh, Tim, Yeah, and Tim too. Tim
is in the Christmas Show with us, and he arranged
our Tim Davis is the arranger of the all the
vocals on Glee, and he arranged all of our stuff
(11:36):
that we do in the Christmas show. And we have
an album called Swinging Little Christmas. It's so good. I
ran in the Kate last week and he's like, I
call for you guys to get back on the road. Yeah.
She's in a neck brace, half body neck brace. Yeah,
so we had to, I know, we had to cancel
the Christmas tour, but we did a show in Orange
(11:57):
County where she she we can't keep her off this stage.
We planned it without her. We got other people to
come sing and with the same band, and then she
shows up. She was cunning Internet brace and she comes
out stage and said, it took me three buses to
get here because she can't drive. So um, but she
can't be kept from the trotting the boards. That's right.
(12:19):
Do you love touring? Do you love performing? I love
performing touring him al right about you guys toured You
guys toured hard. We toured hard. You got to pop
in and do some intro fun intro is huh in
New York? I did. Yeah, it came out to New York.
But I know you guys were working hard a f
Yeah that was tough. Yeah, you probably saw us looking
(12:41):
a little ragged little yeah hard. You know. You know,
my niece Megan is a good friend of um you guys,
and she was, um she carried your luggage when he
first job. Yeah, it was her in. She she locked
(13:01):
in though so quickly. She is like one of us,
and we were like, we're never letting you go. So
it was so it's so fun to see. So I
keep in touch with you guys is through her. Let's
go on with Kevin and Jenna, because your family is incredible.
So she does. Oh thank you know, Meg's does hold
(13:22):
all the secrets. And I'm an astrological person. As you know.
She has a Scorpio moon, which means she gets deep
and dark. She is loyal to death to the death,
and she will hold all of your secrets. But but
if she's mad at somebody, you know it. Yes, she's
(13:46):
the most loyal person in the world. That that makes total.
You have to do, you have to do um Emma's chart,
my daughter's chart. I would love to love that. Yeah, yeah,
I know what time I was born. So I don't
think you can even right well, you know I can't.
But there are astrologers who can trace back your like
(14:07):
instances in your life and they can figure out if
this happened at this time, you probably have this rising
side been into like the astrology and yeah, kind of yeah,
I've always been kind of new AG and I hope
I've graduated from new AG into something deeper and profound. Um,
but I did. I started out with astrology, you know,
(14:29):
I want to know me, I want to know yeah,
And now it's it's just fascinating how the world of
events are playing out and I'm looking at some of
these major movements of the bigger planets, and it's just amazing.
And there I said amazing twice because I can't think
of another word. I follow an astrologer called Pam Gregory,
(14:52):
and she's like, she needs one more follower, but she
she is profound and deep and learning so much. So
I love it. I just love it. I gotta go follow.
Just give us five minutes. We gotta follow her. Um,
you had, obviously prigily were very successful, and but coming
(15:17):
into the show and having it play out the way
it did, becoming this weird, seemingly overnight success. Did you
feel a difference in your professional and personal life pretty quickly?
Like we all huge huge Um. I mean there's just
(15:39):
such power to going into people's living rooms. And this
was during appointment television, wasn't it. This wasn't before before
the streaming, that's right. Yeah, even more, I think because
there were there were less shows on television. We were
about we were at the last of the network television,
you know, domination. And it may come back from what
(15:59):
I've been hearing keeping my ear against the wall, but yeah,
changed completely. I got it recognized everywhere I went. Um,
I loved it. I had no problem with it at all. Um,
I took pictures with people all the time. But I
did learn like Matt Morrison, you know, is younger than
I am, so he would watch me do things and
go I'm gonna do that. There were times when it
(16:20):
just got to be too much and you're just really
trying to pick up your coffee at Starbucks and I
would say can I take a picture? And I'd say, oh, no, thanks,
that's like, yeah, I have actually witnessed that. I witnessed
that at the Apple store. I'm like, who, who's famous,
who's here? Who's here? And across the way into Jane,
I'm like hey Jane. She's like hey, and I think
(16:42):
you thought I was a fan At first. Probably I
was like, oh, I got that, Jenny. I've done that before.
I see people and I go and I think they're
a fan. They're like, hey, it's me. It's your your
friends from fifty years Oh sorry, you want to Well
all came up to me a blue bottle and he
was behind me and he said, hey, can I have
(17:04):
a picture? And I went ready to be like no,
thank you, ready to say no thank you. I probably
would have, but anyway, we did take a picture anyway,
and he was behind me like this, and I was like,
I got to see you do that in Monaco for
that TV festival thing. That God, that was a trip,
(17:24):
you guys. And we were being mobbed and very late
to this thing, and I had never seen you do
it before. And these people came up to you and
so sweetly You're like, no, thank you, And I was like,
wait a second, that's an option. I stopped in my tracks.
I was like, that is absolutely master class. And it
(17:45):
stops them too, because they go and then maybe two
seconds later they go, what But you're gone by then.
But you know, sometimes yeah, sometimes you just gotta keep moving.
But wasn't that the weirdest trip? Um uh Glee was
in a first season? It was this huge and they
invited Kevin, Jenna and me and maybe they invited more,
(18:07):
but we said yes and we got to take his
He couldn't go, so we and they were like, would
you guys be each other's plus one if you want
to go? Absolutely? Yeah? And you know what I remember
most of all, Kevin is you bought like three jackets,
three suit jackets to go and one was a tailor
too tight. You had them Taylor was taken in at
(18:30):
the back. It was taking him like at the back
at the back scene or something like that. It was
terrible and you had it on, but you're a tiny guy.
You could not even the two wins would not even mean.
But remember count velvet. Yes, it was also very hot there.
That's right. It was red. It was it was red velvet.
It was so hot here. But it was fun. That
(18:52):
was a wild That was a trip in to this.
This is great. Yeah. The ceremony, it's it was like
four hours long, remember, and all the presenters were drunk. Yes,
and the French. Yeah, it felt like we were kind
of in jail. Yeah, I did. I was with Dante,
remember Dante de Loretto. Yes, I was with him and
(19:15):
we left early. I think, Yeah, that was smart. I
think that was that trip. Or Dante was the one
who encouraged as Janet to get and pictures by the paparazzi.
That was. Yes, we were so every yeah yeah, yeah,
oh I bet, I'll bet yeah. That great dates and
we were dating, so it wasn't that great. You know
(19:37):
what's crazy to me to think about that. You were
just supposed to be a guest start it reminds me
of like The West Wing, where Martin Sheen was only
supposed to be a guest start in the pilot, and
then they realized that's everyone's favorite character. It's a very
it's just right. Yeah. Oh and yes, I mean he
(19:59):
was the show. He was the focus of the show,
where I think in a lot of ways, for Glee,
it was like there's no Glee without Susa Vester like that,
there's no way. Oh yeah, well you needed your villain,
that's for sure. Yeah, that's for sure. As we're rewatching
(20:23):
again for the fifth time, um, it's uh, it's I'm
watching it with new eyes and I'm really enjoying it,
but I'm watching it as a fan now, and like,
my favorite scenes truly are yours and Matt scenes in
principal Principal Figgins office, Figgin's office. Oh but Matt, Yeah,
(20:45):
he's such a smart actor. I don't think he knows
how smart he is. He played such a good person,
and he is a good person, he certainly has that
in him. But he played it was such a dichotomy
to who Sue was. It was like he walked through
the world forgiving. Yeah, and I'm talking about Schuster now
and Matts like this too. But he was forgiving. He
(21:07):
saw the best and everybody he trusted people, he hoped.
You know that. You know, he gave people a bill.
He gave me a billion chances as sus Sylvester, and
deep down inside, Sue Sylvester was like him. There was
a there was the Sue Sylvestor. I mean that track
suit was not an accident. I don't know that they
(21:29):
thought this deeply when they were creating the character, but
that was her uniform. She was like a warrior. But
you take that uniform and you go just below skin
level and there's this tender heart, this this heart that
breaks for her down syndrome sister who flux Becky out
of obscurity and makes her cheerio. I was watching the
(21:52):
auditions for the Cheerios, and I was so cruel, you know,
telling everybody how terrible they were. And Becky comes in
and she jumps rope and she can't do it. And
Matt's looking at me like, I don't do it, see anything,
don't do it soon, And I'm watching and I'm watching,
and then I go report tomorrow at noon. You're a cheerio.
(22:12):
Congratulations and she's like really and that she was just
like she was so kind to her mum and not
to anybody else. But when it came down to it, though,
she was you know, she was like Megan. She had
a scorpio moon. She was the most loyal. She would
she would kill for you, she would she would kill
(22:34):
for the vulnerable. She was like protector of the vulnerable.
M hmm. I always tell people that a little deep there. No,
it's good that I feel like Jane as a person
to do with a one No character like that could
be one character isn't. But you know that's so much Yeah,
exactly going to say about Jane. You were pon go
(22:58):
back to that when we when we foresee you with
your sister and glee Sue with her sister. I always
feel like that's you as a human in real life,
where if I see you out in the street, you
are the most loving, warm, loyal person and you're able
(23:18):
to then add those layers to someone like Sue because
you do feel that deeply. I think in real life
I do, and I feel, you know, I crumble around
the babies and the old people and the senior dogs.
We always have at least three or four in the house. Yeah,
I'm I'm um, I'm almost almost. Sometimes I'm afraid, I'm
(23:41):
afraid i wake up in the middle of the night
that I'm going to just fall apart with with the detection. Yeah,
feeling for the vulnerable. That's why you're so good though,
gets it? Yeah? Where Megan gets it now? And then
you slap something mean on top of there, and I
think that's when, Oh my god, I'm gonna sound so
(24:01):
braggy now. But when I found my own secret sauce
in in um and acting, where things got really kind
of deep for me is when I was able to
access that the stuff that makes me collapse and then
slapped the meanest person in the world on top of it.
And then then you got a person had an interest person.
(24:21):
When was that? What? At what point did you find
the secret sauce um? Probably glee. Let me think what
I did before that that. Oh you know, I used
to do this character that led to Sue Sylvester. I
used to do this character and like cabarets and stuff,
I would do one person show or I'd just show
up do a monologue at um Largo or something, and
(24:43):
I wore a neck brace and I dressed like Janet
Reno where this terrible eight suit. Janet Reno was the
Attorney general. And this shows how long ago I did it,
which was this woman. She was so angry and she's
so upset, and she's one of those people who's all
always hurt. She's always got something. Somebody did something to
her and injured her, and she's so angry. And I
(25:06):
would enter to Wagner's um right of the vulkyries, do
you know that? And I'd get up to the mic
and really close and I can only talk this loud,
and I tell the story of what someone did to me.
(25:28):
And then at the end she would just like burst
into some kind of like tears or dissolve onto the
floor and do something embarrassing. I'll usually she wet her pants.
I mean that's basically what I had her do, and
I had a sound effect. But that kind of led
to Sue Sylvester because I actually wrote that monologue for therapy.
(25:48):
My I was complaining about something in my therapist write
that is a monologue, and I was like, then I
want when I wrote it as a monologue, and young
Lady came out, Yeah, this is bliss actor. It was
not a conscious thing, unhealthy psychologically. No, No, it wasn't
a conscious thing. I did it as a psychological exercise
(26:09):
because I was suffering. Yeah, I was suffering with the
polarities of my own self, and I brought them together
in a hilarious character that I could laugh at myself,
laugh at that polarity. And then I, you know, basically
do that with every character I play. I pulled that out.
(26:29):
Give the people what they want, you know, the people
exactly do you think that when you got to um,
because I was thinking about this earlier, the way you
can like drop your voice down to you. I guess
this answers that question actually that you just said. Because
when you're like, yes, like all of that the ring,
(26:53):
I started Destination Horror Horror Club. Yeah that now, I've
been kind of doing stuff like that, you know, and
and oh I did so many like little sketch comedy shows,
and um, I think that part of my voice that
came in, like there's I did it. If you look
at some of the old stuff I did, and I
(27:14):
don't even know how you pull that up. But I
would play like the neighboring lady and I'd be down
here and I do it in animation all the time.
It's it's one of my tricks. So because Ian was
such a stickler um for the words, how precise of Sue,
I'm sure you got to play a lot also, like
(27:35):
how much did you feel like you got to actually
improv that made it into what we saw on the show? Well,
I rarely wanted. The reason I would change some of
the words is because it was easier for me to
remember that I can't I'm not able to do this,
but I can't do this, and I no, you gotta
do what's written because he's precise, and I'm very precise too,
(27:55):
so I you know, I bout to the altar of
Ian's decision. But there were little things that I mean,
the thing that I loved about Sue, and that always
was encouraged if it wasn't extreme enough in the script,
if I took it like one more place once notch higher,
and I would do that a lot. But I remember
(28:17):
there was one where I got so mad at Biggins
that I started destroying the office and they played some
you know, the opera music, and I was like, things, Oh,
that was the most fun. And then I go into
the gym and I pick up the not the children, like,
not the kids to the children. Oh, push people down
(28:43):
the stairs. You hit people. I knocked an old lady
down the stairs. Remember that. It's very satisfying, Yes, yes,
very much. That was fun cutting guy's hair. Remember I
cut that guy. I really cut his hair too. Yeah,
I said, you haired hippie looking like a girl. Oh
my god, we couldn't do that today now. And I
(29:04):
went like this, and someone gave me a pair of
scissors and I literally took it in my hands, his hair. No, no,
I mean to be fair, it was a wig? Did
you think it was? He was knowing that that was
going to happen, And then I saw him in the
trailer and they were giving him a cute little haircut,
trying to work around my shreds. I thought you thought
(29:28):
it was a wig? You're like that, wouldn't that be terrible?
I'm sure the kid would have stopped me, or maybe
he wouldn't have. He signed up that exactly. He wanted
to work again, so he let me do it. Terrible,
did you? One of my favorite things that Sue did
(29:49):
was Sue's journal. It was absolutely dear journal, delicious. Yes,
oh my here I am almost thirty. Do you have
people coming up to quote you to your face all
the time with these lines? I used to not so
much anymore, but I used to. For sure. There's one
(30:11):
that we just watched that you at the end of it,
you say it will love you like a sister. You do,
I like a sister. Was that you were? I think
that might be me? I don't know. He might have
(30:31):
said that too. I mean he is so precise. I
mean he just fed right into my better instincts. A
good pairing the two, yes, exactly, you know, God with
a funny guy. What a great guy, what a weird guy.
You know, We're from the same town we grew up.
I'm twenty years older than he used but yeah, Chicago,
(30:54):
same comedic sensibilities. Yeah, exactly. Kind of dark, but Frank,
he's the nice the sky in the world. And then
he writes about he used to say, you know, sometimes
my mom would open up the dishwasher and the knives
would be sticking up, and I think, what would happen
if I threw her on top of that? Knowing his
(31:17):
mother too, Charman, she's such a sweetheart. Like here's Mildred
mil She looks like a Mildred sweet. I forced her
to kiss me, give me your face, Mildred, Mildred. We're
gonna ask Mildred and Jane, um, what what is the
(31:39):
feeling that Glee leaves you with? Like, yeah, looking back
on it, on it all, Yeah, what does it leave
me with? It was well, moment in time it was.
It was one beautiful, perfect moment um where the um
(32:06):
everything kind of it was kind of lightning and a bottle. Yeah.
And I remember, uh, we knew we were breathing rarefied air.
Ye remember Ryan saying that to us at some point
he said, you know, the most important thing for you
guys to realize right now is that you're we are
all breathing rarefied air. This doesn't happen because of the
impact that the show had, the good it had, and
(32:30):
um boy, we could use something like it now where
um everybody. It was kind of a microcosm of the world,
even for adults. It's like the McKinley high being metaphor
for the world where it's cruel and he gets slushies
in the face and there's a group's and factions again
(32:51):
it's each other. It's very tribal. Then you get into
that choir room and everybody's got your back. And there's
nothing more beautiful than raising your voice in song together
and making a joyful noise. It's where you do it together.
It's where the football player, uh and the kid, the
little nerd in the wheelchair can be pals, where the
(33:11):
gay kid can be passed with the football player and
the greaser. You know, Mark Sally's character was could be
so dark and yet and that you know when he
was winning the same thing with the guy, when he
was with us, there was something about him that was lighter, right, Yeah, yeah, yeah,
that's beautifully said, good one in true Jane form of Silvester.
(33:37):
Well maybe on the exterior exactly. And you know what's
interesting too is that you guys started out you didn't
know each other before this, right, and you were basically
paired together. It's kind of a romantic couple and then
just best friends and and you became that in real life.
So there were all of these beautiful kind of happy accidents,
(33:58):
um of like casting, we didn't know each other. And
look what happened to Chris Colefort too. He wasn't even
out right, he was like eighteen years old and he
wasn't even out and he was a child, and now
he's the best selling author with children's foction. Yeah exactly.
You know, he's kind of a so so many people,
(34:22):
you know, young people just look up to him. Yeah. See,
we're lucky to when you get casting things, you don't
know who's going to be on the other side. And
we were all we were all very, very lucky because
we were all obsessed with each other from the get go.
So that was a real thing. Yeah. Well, we're gonna
have you back for and ask me anything at some point.
(34:43):
We we love you so much. Thank you for spending
your time and giving us your wonderful nuggets of joy
and love to your house right now. The Royal love it. Yes,
that would be great, great guys. Um Jane is everybody's
(35:04):
best friend. I wanted to read my drop, my calendar
and uh my chart, my chart, my calendar, my chart.
Jane's good people. You know, if you can't tell from
that interview, she is just she's liked it all the time.
She's so sweet, she cares, deeply cares about the role
(35:25):
she's playing. Um, and that's what makes her so talented
and good. And people keep wanting to work with her
kind feelings, big feelings. Well, we're grateful for Jane for
coming on the show. We hope you guys enjoyed it.
Thanks for listening, Thanks for joining us, and that's what
you really missed. See you next week, by bye. Thanks
for listening, and follow us on Instagram at and that's
(35:47):
what you really miss pod. Make sure to write us
a review and leave us five stars. See you next time.
Host
Jenna Ushkowitz
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