LOS ANGELES _ Bobby Moynihan spent 13 years trying to land a spot on the NBC late-night variety series "Saturday Night Live." The day he finally got the call was the same day he started worrying about how long he would be able to stay on the show. The New York native loved being part of "SNL" and would have stayed forever but he knew that doesn't happen.
His big concern became what would he do when his life's dream came to an end.
Moynihan got his answer when he got the script for "Me, Myself & I," a CBS comedy that looks at three stages of Alex Riley's life _ as a 14-year-old in 1991, at age 40 in present day and at age 65 in 2042. Jack Dylan Grazer (who can currently be seen in "It") plays the young Alex while John Larroquette takes over the role as the senior Alex.
The pain and confusion Moynihan was feeling about leaving "SNL" was easier to deal with because of the comedy.
"I read it, and I fell in love. It's something that I don't normally get to do," Moynihan says. "At 'SNL' I got to do everything I ever wanted to do. I got to be silly and do all characters and the stuff I love to do. But there's this little tiny part of me that was, like, 'I was an acting major in college. I'd like to show people that I can actually be a grown man instead of dressing up as Rosie O'Donnell sometimes.'
"I'm a sentimental person in general. I have a lot of sentimentality for 'SNL.' And when I read the script, I was, like, 'Oh, this is my wheelhouse. I'm not ready to do this, but I have to. I have to do this the show.' This is perfect for me."
And, the timing was right. Moynihan's "SNL" contract was coming to an end and a decision had to be made as to whether he would stay or go. It wasn't only a need to do something different that helped him decide; Moynihan says his life was changing just because he was getting older. At the same time, Moynihan was getting more and more work as a voice actor, including his current job as the voice of Louie Duck in the new Disney Channel series "DuckTales."
The CBS comedy that touched Moynihan so deeply came from executive producer Dan Kopelman ("Malcolm in the Middle") who was inspired by all of the biographies he was reading and the documentaries he was watching. He's worked on a number of TV comedies over the years but none had taken the approach of looking at a person's life over such a broad range.
Each episode has a thread that ties together events in the past, present and future. The 14-year-old is a happy teen living in Chicago, inventing things and celebrating the Chicago Bulls' first championship until his mom moves them to Los Angeles. Alex must reinvent himself in a new school, where he meets his dream girl, Nori. Fast forward to 2017 and the 40-year-old Alex is an inventor/entrepreneur on top of the world until his wife leaves him and threatens to take their daughter. The Alex in 2042 is a successful businessman who, after suffering a minor heart attack, decides he's ready to reinvent himself once again.
Kopelman also was inspired by how his children and parents were getting older and he was nostalgic for what his life was like when he was the same age as his teen children. And he was curious about what it will be like when he is the age that is mom is today. Then it was just a matter of doing what he has done with TV shows for years: just having the writers share their own experiences.
"It was like the writing sessions were like therapy the first couple years because we just all talked about stuff that happened in our childhood, and 90 percent of it was embarrassing, and we'd buried it," Kopelman says. "And we used our TV show to draw out stories, and I took the same approach when we started out with the writers.
"These writers have equally embarrassing stories. But then we also added an element, because a lot of us are parents, about being in your 40s and raising kids and feeling like you were just a teenager just a blink ago, and now all of a sudden you're raising kids."
There was never any thought of using one actor to play the present and future Alex. That meant it was necessary to find three actors of equal skills so that none of the different time threads end up lacking. Kopelman knew Moynihan was the right guy but it meant wrestling him away from "Saturday Night Live."
Moynihan was ready to leave "SNL" but that meant telling his boss of nine years � Lorne Michaels � that he would not be returning. He sent Michaels an email at 2 a.m. before thinking that might be too early.
"I've never emailed him before. Does he check email? I don't know. He emailed me back five minutes later and was like, 'Let's talk in the morning. Don't worry. Everything's cool.' Then when I got back to New York, I went in, and I met with him. And it was perfect. He's the best. I owe him every day," Moynihan says.
The series debuts at 9:30 p.m. Monday, Sept. 25.
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
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