Former Saturday Night Live writer Jorma Taccone has been left unable to walk after suffering a 20-foot fall at his home.
During Tuesday's episode of The Lonely Island & Seth Meyers Podcast, the 48-year-old comedian and writer on SNL from 2005-2011 recounted the tale of falling 20 feet off a ladder at his farmhouse in Connecticut. Speaking from his hospital bed, he said that the accident occurred when he was painting a mural on a barn for his daughter’s fifth birthday party.
“[My neighbor] was like, ‘Hey, this ladder is bad, like, you shouldn't use this ladder. It doesn't have a footing thing.’ And I was like, ‘No, it’ll be good,’” Taccone explained to Meyers and his fellow Lonely Island members Akiva Schaffer and Andy Samberg.
He then recalled how he started to feel the ladder “give way,” knowing he was going to fall.
“In this moment, my life flashes before my eyes, and I'm like, ‘Oh no, I gotta get off this ladder,’” he continued. “I literally have enough time as I’m falling to be like, ‘I’m going to die.’ So I drop, I look over, and I literally see the yard, and I’m like, ‘This is going to hurt a lot.’ And I fall straight on my butt.”
After doing “a lot of screaming and cursing,” he “felt sort of numb right as he hit the ground.”
Taccone then went to the hospital, where he learned he “shattered [his] pelvis on the left hand side, pretty badly.” He also discovered his sacrum was detached from his spine, among other injuries, before he underwent surgery.
Luckily, doctors said Taccone will make a full recovery, though it will take about three to six months for him to be able to walk again.
He continued to open up about his recovery, saying surgery “couldn’t have gone better” and that he’ll be entering acute rehab. He also noted that he’s started “fighting through the pain,” since he’s already stood and gone to the bathroom.
Although Taccone is on the mend now, with his colleagues on the podcast saying they were “worried sick” about him, he’s “insanely lucky” that his injuries from the fall weren’t more severe.
“My doctor came in this morning and was like, ‘Oh yeah. If you had hit your heels — if you’d landed on both your heels — that would have been 10 times worse,’” he said. “I’m like, ‘10 times worse? I didn’t know pain at that level was possible.’”
