Show notes
Kevin Heffernan is 1/5 of the comedy group Broken Lizard and has made cult classics like Super Troopers, Beerfest, Club Dread, and the upcoming Quasi out on Hulu on 4/20. Kevin is also the Showrunner of the hit sitcom Tacoma FD on TruTV and streaming on HBOMax.Show NotesKevin Heffernan on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/heffernanrules/Kevin Heffernan on IMDB - https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0373571/Michael's Online Screenwriting Course - https://michaeljamin.com/courseFree Screenwriting Lesson - https://michaeljamin.com/freeJoin My Watchlist - https://michaeljamin.com/watchlistAuto-Generated TranscriptKevin Heffernan:That meeting that we first had with you guys. Yeah. And we, we were at Dave, we were at we were at the three Arts offices. Yep. AndAnd I remember this cuz I was like, you know, let me and I, and you know, maybe you've come to realize this, but let, and I were, were a little bit more insecure about our knowledge about how to make a TV show cuz we hadn't done it before. Right. And and I remember I kept in the meeting, we would have conversations like, he would keep saying things like well I don't know. Cause we only make movies, you know, I don't know. Cause he's gonna make movies. Right. I kept saying that. And what I was trying to say was, I don't know anything about tv. Right. But your partner Sivert, he, he threw that back in my face at one point. He does. He said, but I don't know. Cause I only make TV, you know. Oh my God. Thought was the funniest fucking thing. I thought it was so fucking funny. Michael Jamin:Oh, thank God he didn't take the meeting.You're listening to Screenwriters Need to Hear This with Michael Jamin.Hey everyone, it's Michael Jamin. Welcome back to Screenwriters Need to Hear This, the podcast. I got another great guest for you everyone. Hope everyone's sitting down. It's Kevin Heffernan. He's also my boss, so I'm gonna be extra nice for this. But IKevin Heffernan:Like to think we're coworkers, Mike. Well,Michael Jamin:He likes to say that, but meanwhile he makes him, makes me bring him lunch. I like to and rub his feet while he eats it. I like toKevin Heffernan:But then you get somebody, you get somebody younger to bring you lunch to bring Correct. Isn't that the way it works?Michael Jamin:And rub my feet. Yes. Right. Just kickKevin Heffernan:It down.Michael Jamin:Fine. Kevin, let me give you a proper introduction for those. Okay. Who never, ever heard of you. First of all, he's the star and showrunner of Tacoma fd. We're in season four. We just finished season four right now. But also you may know him from from a million million movies. Supert Trooper. Supert Trooper Two Club, dread Slam and Salmon Beer Fest. Quai he's one of the founding members of, and I'm of Broken Lizard, which is a comedy troop. And he's also an actor. Everyone, please welcome to the show, Kevin Heffernan. Ron, can I applaud? You should definitely applaud, dude. Thank you so much. I, I have to say, and I've said this to you many times publicly, but I gotta say it, that everyone is listening. I always give you and Lemi a lot, so much credit for what you guys have done because like, the way I see my career, I feel like, I guess I'm like a Hollywood insider in the sense that I got hired by someone to be on a show and then I rose up the ranks. And then about halfway through my career, I noticed I was no longer working for Hollywood Insiders. I was working for basically Hollywood outsiders. People who made their own career and made themselves so desirable that Hollywood came to them and said, Hey, will you do stuff for us? And that's what I feel like you guys have done.Kevin Heffernan:Well, it's a little bit like I guess that's part of the, in front of the camera thing that gives you a little extra allure, I guess. I don't know. Or so, or a way to it does made,Michael Jamin:I think so. But when you started broken, you know, when you guys did your first broken lizard movie, you were just, you know, you guys did it on your own. Yes.Kevin Heffernan:Yeah.Michael Jamin:I mean, talk about that. How did you make that happen? You guys were just nobody's.Kevin Heffernan:Yeah, I mean, well we, we were a, you know, a group that was, I guess we were kind of self-contained. You know, a lot of people, they get out of school, whatever it is, and they, they kind of join some other entity whether it's, you know, some performance thing like the Groundlings or they go to a film school or whatever it is. And we just did it. Our, you know, we had five, well we had more, at the time it was like eight or nine folks. And then after we graduated from Colgate University, we went to New York and we started doing live shows and, and just doing everything soup to nuts. You know, we would, did did the acting and then directing, they're producing the editing and the writing and that, that's how kind of we cut our teeth in order to, you know, and then it was just kinda like, you know, Hey, let's make some short films. Let's, you knowMichael Jamin:Where were you showing these films?Kevin Heffernan:Yeah. And then we would show the films during our live shows. So we would do, you know, sketch shows, you know, in New York City and the Village or whatever. And we'd haul this like 800 pound you know, 32 inch tv into the room. And, and then we would just shoot these short videos. And they're essentially designed to show while we were able, you know, gives us a chance to change costumes and stuff, you know what I mean? It was, oh, it was a chance for us to have a, have a costume change and then we would start showing these videos. And then those were the things that always seemed to be really popular.Michael Jamin:And these were in like, small venues, like how big, how many seats?Kevin Heffernan:Yeah, I don't know. 80, you know, would,Michael Jamin:And how would you get people to show up?Kevin Heffernan:Well, we, you know, we went to Colgate, which is kind of a, kind of a big drinking school. And so and a lot of people migrate, you know, when they, it's in upstate New York, so they'll graduate and they'll, they'll move down to New York City. So there was this network of people from our school who were kind of big drinkers and, and young and, and we just kind of put out the word and all the friends would come, you'd get, you know, 50 people in the room. And I remember after the first weekend, the, the place, we were doing a place called the Duplex, which I think is still there. It's in like Christopher or Sheridan Square or something like that. Christopher Street. And the show would end and the bar, the guy who owned the club would walk in and the table would be full of empty beer bottles just full <laugh>. And and he'd be so happy. And he kept offering us more, you know, gigs more nights or whatever. And it was basically cuz our friends came and they drank beer and they had laughs and, and were youMichael Jamin:Hitting the door? Or how, how were you charging?Kevin Heffernan:Yeah, yeah. We, well probably, we probably got some real shitty deal. You know, we probably had some horrible deal. I mean, it was like we were begging for stage time around town, you know? And and these guys, you know, let you start on a Monday night, you know, or whatever, whatever shitty time is, or, you know, Monday at 10 o'clock or whatever, you know, Uhhuh <affirmative> and do the show. And, and we'd get our friends to come and then it was Wednesday night, and then it was Friday night, and then it's, you know, Hey, you're doing the whole weekend. You know, and it kind of, kind of grew that way, but, and that was, and we learned to write sketches mm-hmm. <Affirmative> when we were doing that, you know? And then did youMichael Jamin:Kind of, did you kind of learn in college though, when you were, you were writing sketches in college though?Kevin Heffernan:Yeah, we, we kind of self-taught. We, we, it was kind of later towards the end of our college careers where we started this comedy group. And my buddy Jay Chen Sekar, who's, you know, still in the,Michael Jamin:There he is. Oh, we're gonna plug that Quasi is the movie plugKevin Heffernan:That, but that's him. That's Jay ChenMichael Jamin:Important. That's the most important one. I've left that one out.Kevin Heffernan:Yeah. But that's him. And then he had had some background in Chicago at the IO in Second City and things like that, doing improv. And always wanted to do a show at Colgate. And so he had gotten the opportunity through some student theater group. There was a guy who was like, Hey, why don't you put up a show? And he was like, ah, I don't wanna do it. I don't wanna do it. And then ultimately, I think they gave him like 500 bucks, Uhhuh <affirmative>. And he decided to put together a group of people, and he and I were very close friends. And he knew that I was interested in something like that. And so we put together this group of folks, and it was probably like 15 people at that point in time and, and just started this comedy group. And we didn't know, like we didn't know how to do improv. We didn't know how to write sketches, we know any of that stuff. And it was just, JayMichael Jamin:Took one class, basically, and he's like, I'll, I'll teach you guys how to doKevin Heffernan:It. Well, he, he didn't, he wasn't even the teacher, you know, like he did. Yeah. Like, he did a, a summer, like <laugh> likeGuys. Yeah. And he's like, yeah, I'll try this. And we were miserable. I mean, we were horrible. But the, the thing in, in colleges and, and you probably have the same thing, it's like, you know, I think a lot of comedy is, is is the, you have to laugh out of shared experience, right? So the audience says, Hey, I know that happened to me. You know, that's why they laugh, right? So at college, it's a very insular world that you can do that. So you can make fun of that professor and that security guard and that, you know, fraternity, sorority, whatever it is. And, and that's the thing that you learn to write and that everyone laughs at. And so that's how we started where you would just, you'd make fun of people on campus and people love it. And then you, in that way, you learn how to write and, and do characters and whatever, and Right.You know, whatever. We were all fans of Saturday Night Live and Monty Python and whatever. And I think, you know, the idea was let's just try to do that. And it was very simple because it was a, it's like given a wedding toast, you know? It's like, you know, everyone's on your side, right? Everyone wants to laugh together, the same thing. And, you know, we started doing these shows there, and they were just super popular because there was nothing like it there. And people were, were happy to see us make fun of, you know, that professor or that, butMichael Jamin:Then at some point though, you had to branch out to a larger audience, though.Kevin Heffernan:Well, that's the, that's the, the terrifying thing is we got to, we moved to New York City afterwards and realized you couldn't make fun of the dean or the professor or whatever. You had to figure out what the things are that more people would laugh at. And I think, you know, that's the little of a learning curve. But we did that, and then you just start writing sketches and, and we started making these videos. ButMichael Jamin:Then how did you still, how do you make this jump from, you know, selling tickets to friends, to selling tickets to strangers, basically?Kevin Heffernan:Yeah. I, it's just, I guess it's just word of mouth is, is the way, is the way it happens. Where it's like, I, I, I remember, you know, people would bring their friends, you know, from high school and their other friends and whatever it is, and then all of a sudden you have a group of people who are into it, you know? And and then you'd have, you know, agents start to come and industry people start to show up. And really, theyMichael Jamin:Were trying to show up. You, they weren't, this is fascinating to me. So you didn't even invite them, they would just show up.Kevin Heffernan:Yeah, well, you know, I mean it was kind of a fun time in New York at the time where there was kind of these two, there are different movements that were kind of happening. And one of 'em was the independent film movement, which was, you know, big. It was the Kevin Smith and, and you know, that kind of stuff where you, everyone was making, you know, low budget films. And then it was also, you know, kind of the growth of the comedy group. Again, I guess, you know, where U C B was just, just starting up in New York. And there was another group called The State that was doing stuff in they were outta nyu and they were doing shows. And so there were different kind of like, there was kind of a lot of burgeoning kind of comedy groups that were kind of in that same era. And, you know, people catch on. There was a, you know, M T V wanted to make a sketch comedy show, and they started scouting all these comedy groups, and they picked this group, the state, and they made the, they made their comedy show. So there was a, you know, there were a lot of people out there that had an appetite for, for this kind of thing. And, and you know, we were trying to capitalize on him.Michael Jamin:And the whole time you str all you guys were struggling, but you, you were also attending law school at the sameKevin Heffernan:Time? I did. I went to law school. I, I I I was working at a law firm for, for a couple years out of school. And then, yeah, I went, I ended up gonna law school during the day. Right. And then we would do these comedy shows at night. And they never, they're very different worlds, you know, like, but I remember one time we were taking a tour of the courthouse with my law school class, Uhhuh <affirmative>. And somebody walked up to me who had seen the live show, Uhhuh <affirmative>, who was like, Hey, you are the comedian Kevin hen, da da da da. Not that I was famous anyway, but this guy just happened to be in, and everyone in my law school class has looked at me and like, who the fuck are you <laugh>? Like, they had no idea that I was, had that other thing going on. So. AndMichael Jamin:Did that change the way they looked at you after? Like, they,Kevin Heffernan:I think a little bit. I mean, I was, you know, I, I was not a, a great participant in the law school world. I was kind of a back bencher. I'd sit in the back row and I didn't really, I might crack a joke here and there. And so, but then, yeah, I think, I think they probably got a feeling of like, oh, maybe this is not his his highest priority, this law school thing. DidMichael Jamin:You, well, did you pa take the bar?Kevin Heffernan:I did, yeah. I took the bar. Yeah, I did. I we took the bar. Well, I graduated from law school, and then we made our, I graduated from <inaudible> May, and we were preparing to shoot the first feature film we ever made. We were preparing to shoot it in June. And so I started studying for the bar and I realized, oh, I can't do this. I can't do this stuff. And so I went to my dad and I was like, I'm not gonna take the bar exam. And he's like, what? Are you crazy? And I was like, you know, he goes, you get all, you're gonna get all through law school and you're not gonna take the party time. I was like, well, I'm gonna take it, but I'll take it, you know, six months from now or a year from now. Right. You're not gonna do that. And I said, I…
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