Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me_ (And Other Concerns) - Mindy Kaling [44]
VAN HELSING
Why was this movie so bad? It had all the ingredients of a great movie. The subject material (handsome European professor annihilates vampires) is the stuff dreams are made of. Hugh was in prime Jackman when he played smoldering Van Helsing. The lovely Kate Beckinsale was there, too, as pale beautiful lady friend or whatever. Why wasn’t this a killer movie and a classic? I could so redo this, with the same cast, and make it a better movie. I’m throwing down the gauntlet, Van Helsing.
And speaking of movies about regular people destroying magical creatures:
GHOSTBUSTERS
I always wanted the reboot of Ghostbusters to be four girl-ghostbusters. Like, four normal, plucky women living in New York City searching for Mr. Right and trying to find jobs—but who also bust ghosts. I’m not an idiot, though. I know the demographic for Ghostbusters is teenage boys, and I know they would kill themselves if two ghostbusters had a makeover at Sephora. I just have always wanted to see a cool girl having her first kiss with a guy she’s had a crush on, and then have to excuse herself to go trap the pissed-off ghosts of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire or something. In my imagination, I am, of course, one of the ghostbusters, with the likes of say, Emily Blunt, Taraji Henson, and Natalie Portman. Even if I’m not the ringleader, I’m definitely the one who gets to say “I ain’t afraid a no ghost.” At least the first time.
Contributing Nothing at Saturday Night Live
I WAS A dreadful guest writer on Saturday Night Live. Not like, destructively bad or anything, just a useless, friendly extra body in the SNL offices eating hamburgers for free, like Wimpy from Popeye.
I came into the show during the hiatus between seasons two and three of The Office. My friend Mike Schur, who had worked at SNL before The Office, recommended me to Mike Shoemaker, a producer over there. Mike Shoemaker and some others had liked an episode of The Office I’d written called “The Injury,” where Michael grills his foot accidentally in a George Foreman Grill. Mike Shoemaker graciously invited me to write there for a few weeks. I later found out that most guest writers were there as a kind of “audition” for a permanent writing job, and they came prepared with lots of hilarious sketch ideas, even some partially written. But since I was coming straight from my Office job, I didn’t have time to prepare, even if I had known I was supposed to.
I guess that’s not entirely true. I was prepared in my own way, which is to say, I had packed several fashion-forward outfits that I bought from Nordstrom Rack with my mom, all of which were rendered useless immediately. Writers and actors at SNL looked cool but casual. When I heard of a “television writing job in New York City,” I imagined a Gossip Girl–type aesthetic. My outfits of button-down shirts, an ironic broach, men’s ties, kilts, and gold high-tops were completely stupid in the face of Seth Meyers’s subtly awesome gray T-shirts and Levi’s or whatever.
So, lesson one: fashion plays a relatively unimportant role in the day-to-day work life of Saturday Night Live. Okay, learned that.
Here’s how the writing worked. The writers either wrote sketches alone or paired up with other people they collaborated with regularly. The problem is, I didn’t know anyone, so I felt shy approaching anybody with ideas.
I shared a tiny windowless office with Kristen Wiig. This was, as you can imagine, incredibly exciting. We had no privacy, which was fine with me, because I was hoping the claustrophobic atmosphere of our shared office would be like a college dorm room, and that we’d become confidantes through our sheer physical proximity. It’d go down something like this:
(Joni Mitchell’s Blue is playing on my computer.)
KRISTEN: God, I love this album.
ME: Me too. Doesn