Bill Hader and John Mulaney are among the most prolific performer-writer duos in Saturday Night Live history. But for all their accomplishments together, the pair did find their sketches eventually overstayed their welcome.
Stefon is arguably SNL's most famous character of the past 20 years, and it's all thanks to Hader and Mulaney. The hyper-specific character served as a prime example of the kind of comedy Hader and Mulaney gravitated toward, even if not everyone at Saturday Night Live felt the same way.
“Lorne [Michaels] ... likes a home run hitter," Conan O'Brien said to Hader on Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend. "He likes someone who’s gonna go out there, like, ‘Gimme your church lady. Gimme the character that everyone just can’t wait to see,’ softball down the middle.”
That's essentially the exact opposite approach taken by Hader and Mulaney at SNL. O'Brien knew at much, adding he knew Michaels would grow frustrated with the cast member and writer.
The reputation followed Hader even after he left Saturday Night Live. The actor told O'Brien that when he returned to host SNL in 2014, producer Steve Higgins gave him a warning. “When I came back to host, Steve Higgins said out of the gate, he goes, ‘All right, none of that sandwich in a briefcase s*** that you and Mulaney like so much.’”
Hader burst out laughing just recalling the phrase "sandwich in a briefcase," saying it perfectly summed up the sense of humor he shared with John Mulaney. Hader even recalled a failed sketch that may have inspired Higgins' descriptor.
“It was a cop show, a ’70s cop show called 'Kanish.' And the host was Kanish, and then we basically just did that thing we ripped off from the Police Squad! where we all froze and we pretended to be frozen. And someone came in. The joke was that they would freeze too early,” Hader said.
The writers' room at SNL is a notoriously cutthroat place (even if Tina Fey thinks it's gone soft). A bad sketch will quickly become dead on arrival and play to silence. That's exactly happened with Hader and Mulaney's "Kanish" sketch.
“Everybody was like, ‘Why is this happening?’ And ... we could not get through it, we were laughing so hard," Hader shared. “Everybody was just dropping it, looking at the next sketch, like, ‘There’s no way we’re doing this.’
Thankfully for Hader and Mulaney fans, the sketch did make its way online. SNL uploaded the dress rehearsal version to its YouTube channel. The failed bit featured Zach Galifianakis and Hader as Judd Hirsch.
The sketch didn't fair much better in front of a live audience as it did in the writers' room. But Hader essentially admitted on Conan's broadcast that he and Mulaney often focused on what made them laugh and hoped the audience would come along for the ride. "Kanish" is just one of those "sandwich in a briefcase" sketches that didn't quite stick the landing.