I wasn’t even supposed to get Kevin McDonald, but all the Kids in the Hall were just standing around so they set me up with more interviews. Being totally unprepared, Kevin and I just started talking about TV, since we were at the Television Critics Association fall press tour and big news about Glee was breaking. I almost didn’t have to ask about the IFC series Death Comes to Town since McDonald was ready to talk about music and Monty Python all day.
Kevin McDonald: I haven’t seen Glee, is it good? For the past year I haven’t watched anything which is unlike me.
Crave Online: What’s kept you busy in the last year?
Kevin: I fell in love last year and I’m living in Winnipeg where she lives. I haven’t seen movies. I’m the guy if people wanted to see a movie or a TV show, they would ask me first, “Oh, is that TV show any good, Kevin? Or is that movie any good?” I haven’t been doing my job for the past year.
Crave: You’re with someone who doesn’t watch TV or movies?
Kevin: It’s just so busy. It’s so busy being with her. She has kids. It’s a busy time. She’s seen Jaws. That’s one movie I think she’s seen. I feel like I don’t have time to do anything. I don’t have time to call my sister.
Crave: So how did you have time to get back with the Kids in the Hall?
Kevin: Well, it was before I met her so that’s all I had time for. We seem to be motivated to be together but it all started with the 2008 tour which really started in 2006. That was really the beginning of the TV show, us getting together to write new material for the 2006 tour. It was civilized. We met two or three times a year to do shows in Los Angeles and write. So it was a slow, not that much, not that much, not that much, oh my god we’re doing a tour, OH WE’RE DOING A TV SHOW! It just felt like a snowball effect. At the end it was like a giant snowball.
Crave: Was it like doing a movie because you’re telling an eight part story, and not just sketches?
Kevin: It was totally a movie. In fact, the idea started off as a movie and we always thought of it, even when Bruce said, “Oh, this is too much. Let’s make it a miniseries” because we wanted to go back to TV too, we still always thought of it as a movie. I think we think of everything as a movie. Some sketches we even think some of them as a movie. I always thought that we wouldn’t do TV. In the early ‘80s I thought we’d just be a movie troupe which I guess is impossible. Well, no, Broken Lizard. They went straight to movies so it can be done. It’s more possible now, doing sketches on the internet. I always wonder, if we were young nowadays we would just do internet stuff and perform less live? And would that be a good or bad thing? Does that get you more ready for TV? In a way, yes, but your performing chops, do they suffer? I wonder. I have no idea and I have no opinion and I’m not cutting up the present. I’m not being an old man going, “In my day…” I am, but I’m just curious. It’s just different. When we started – you’re not asking me any questions, I’m just talking – in a way we were a reaction to the comedy troupes in Toronto which was a Second City city. So the three or four troupes that were around had their own clubs and they had a piano on stage and they would have a funny parody song every now and then. So a lot of our comedy was a reaction to that. Anything topical, it was what made us laugh that day, a lot of stuff about our everyday lives. You haven’t asked me anything and I’m talking.
Crave: Do you want me to interrupt you?
Kevin: Yes, please.
Crave: Do you watch any of the internet sketches?
Kevin: I do and I usually think they’re pretty good. People meet me in bars say, “I’m in a troupe, here’s a website, come and see some of our sketches.” It’s usually pretty good. Sorry I’m not talking about a specific group, I’m talking about a whole. But I always think, “Oh, if this was a sketch on a TV show I would cut that and that. I would’ve added this. This is too long.” They tend to be too long but it’s the internet so it’s a different animal. It’s not like part of a half hour show so they wouldn’t have to go too long.
Crave: Did you miss doing sketches then with the long form Death Comes to Town?
Kevin: No, we see it, whether it’s Brain Candy or Death Comes to Town, as a buildup of different sketches adding to the story. That was the goal anyway, that there was a story. But we think in terms of sketches or scenes or moments, funny pieces. The trick is to try and make the funny pieces add up to a whole. That’s what we try to do but I would be happy with Monty Python and the Holy Grail which is basically a sketch movie with a loose theme. The Life of Brian, I love all their movies, but it was their best combination of scenes adding up to a movie, so in a way it’s their best movie. But, if I could only see one Monty Python movie, I would pick Holy Grail because I just laugh a little more.
Crave: And then Meaning of Life and And Now For Something Completely Different are just sketches.
Kevin: Well, Meaning of Life has a theme but it’s an excuse for sketches. It’s a theme/excuse for sketches.
Crave: It seems like maybe they added the theme after they were done.
Kevin: I read the Michael Palin diaries that he released and actually I forget. I think they were always looking for a theme but it changed a bit, so some things were so vague that they could steal some of the things and put them in the theme later. There was a different theme in first.
Crave: I thought it worked in Brain Candy. Are the Kids mainly sour on that?
Kevin: Oh, Brain Candy. I love Brain Candy, even though I’m disappointed in the ending. I really do like Brain Candy. I would’ve put a little bit more comedy in and a little less story. I compare things to the Beatles and I think you have your She Loves You, Yeah Yeah and then they get a little Rubber Soul-ish and then they did Sgt. Pepper. I think we tried to do our Sgt. Pepper right away. I would have done more Rubber Soul which to me would’ve been like Holy Grail, something a little sketchier. It just would’ve been easier and funnier and we would’ve built an audience more. If people laughed more at it, more people would’ve watched it. This is what I’m trying to say: I think Brain Candy should have been our second or third movie. We were ambitious, God bless us. We were trying hard but it was so story oriented, and I really do like Brain Candy although I am disappointed in the ending. We never got the ending right.
Crave: I also hear that was a really demanding shoot in terms of call times for everyone to get into character.
Kevin: In Brain Candy and Death Comes to Town. In Brain Candy I play basically one character, so the easy part for me was my call times were a little later and there was hardly any hair and makeup, I just looked like me. The hard part was I was in every scene. They were much more tired than me I think. Well, actually, no, I got more tired but only because I was in worse shape than them back then. Not anymore!
Crave: How did you plan which characters you’d play in Death, considering you couldn’t have scenes with yourself?
Kevin: That was the hard part. Death Comes to Town was a combination of, as we first sat down and wrote it, Bruce and I with a little bit of Scott at first but Bruce and I were writing the first draft and more Bruce than me, we had characters in mind. We had the Kids in the Hall in mind who’d play the character. There was a few that we didn’t know. We didn’t know who was going to be the mayor’s wife. That could’ve been anybody but we knew Dusty was going to be Scott. There were some things that had to change because of what you said, logistics. “You can’t play this, Kevin, because then you have a big scene with yourself and it would take three days instead of four hours and it costs too much money.” So that had to change but 80% of it at first was we knew who was going to play what but it changed a little. There were characters like the mayor’s wife, at one point I was going to be the mayor’s wife. Then it was going to be Bruce, then it became Dave just because of logistics. By the way, the mayor’s wife is my favorite character on the show.
Crave: I was going to ask if there were any characters you missed out on because of the logistics?
Kevin: I would’ve loved to have been the mayor’s wife but now I’m so happy I didn’t do it because I think Dave is perfect at it. So thank God I didn’t do it.
Crave: How many times did the Kids almost get back together over the years?
Kevin: Only a couple times. We would get together to do the tours but after the second tour, 2002, because we’d done the tour in 2000 and 2002, it seemed like we were in rhythm. So we tried to get back together to write another movie and we had a few meetings. It just fell apart. It turned out that we weren’t ready. I know I wasn’t ready in a way. For some reason, mostly I’m the least important Kid in the Hall physically, but for some reason if I’m not ready, the other aren’t ready. That’s the one thing where my influence may be negative sometimes. Maybe I’m being too hard on myself. Because I didn’t feel ready at the time, I think that’s why it fell apart.
Crave: Who has said you’re the least important Kid and why?
Kevin: Me, I’m just making that up. First they would make jokes where they agreed with me. I think physically I’m the least important. Performance wise, all the areas that I do are covered by everybody else. I do think that, except may be face making.
Crave: Since everyone’s gone off on their own, how is the gang different now?
Kevin: I think we’re more professional. People would laugh if they heard that because we’re really unprofessional. We still horse around too much and get ADs mad and stuff like that, but that’s not what I mean. Between action and cut we’re more professional. We’re tighter. We’ve done so much TV show and movie work, Hollywood or even Canada, we have more of a feel for it. Because we have more feel for it, the rebellious comedy that is The Kids in the Hall gets across better. Like The Clash, I compare things to rock n’ roll, I don’t think London Calling is a sellout album. I think it’s the best produced version of their first two albums. They’re doing it better. It’s still The Clash but it just sounds better. They knew what they were doing. I think that’s what we’re like now. We still do what we do. We just do it clearer.
Crave: Are you the most musical Kid in the Hall?
Kevin: We’re all very musical. Three of us our very rock n’ roll, our tastes, not our lifestyles, Dave and Bruce and I. The other two are musical too but different tastes. We always compare things. Maybe I compare things more than they do.
Crave: How do your new experience in love change your sense of humor?
Kevin: I know it will change a bit. I know I’ll be a little less dark when it comes to kids because I’m around kids a lot more now. That’s not probably what you meant but it’s the first thing that came to mind.
Crave: That’s exactly what I meant. I know once I started having relationships, I no longer find certain romantic comedy humor funny. It’s not funny when people fight.
Kevin: Right. I would like to write a relationship movie where it’s funny and real. My two favorite relationship movies of all time are comedies: Annie Hall and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I think they’re the two best relationship movies ever and I would love to write something like that.
Crave: Isn’t Annie Hall about a couple that should not be together?
Kevin: Yes, but it’s a relationship movie. They shouldn’t be together and they realize that at the end and it’s sort of sad but it’s sort of right that they’re not together.
Crave: I appreciated that more as I had more of those relationships. As a kid I wanted the happy ending. Now I’m like, “Oh yeah, you guys need to stop.”
Kevin: Yeah, yeah, but now I’m old, I’d love to do something real but a happy ending. Not rip off Annie Hall completely. I have to believe there’s real happy endings.
Crave: You should see (500) Days of Summer.
Kevin: I haven’t seen it because I haven’t seen movies for a year. I’ll see, maybe that’s going around. I heard it compared to Annie Hall.
Crave: It is.
Kevin: Is it like a ripoff?
Crave: I don’t think so. It’s this generation’s Annie Hall. It breaks the fourth wall and it’s a relationship movie but it comes from a very different place.
Kevin: I’d love to write a relationship movie. I said that the other day when I was at the lake with my girlfriend.
Crave: Well, I’m happy for you.
Kevin: Thank you very much.
