Was The Pentaverate an idea influenced by the COVID pandemic? I’ve always been fascinated with the Black Plague and how it changed society, and then here we are with the pandemic of our own. But it’s pure coincidence. The fun part of making stuff is when things become strangely au courant when they were always there. What’s your process to play multiple characters? Louie Zakarian, the makeup genius at Saturday Night Live, and I designed the makeup. I’ve worked with him for many, many years and we developed it together. The outside tells the inside; the inside tells the outside. That might be my favorite process in all of this, making the characters. In addition to performing with yourself, you have some great co-stars in The Pentaverate. Do you think of who you want to cast while you’re writing? For example, had you worked with Keegan-Michael Key before and wrote with him in mind? Or do you write the part and cast using the normal process? With Keegan-Michael Key, I wanted to work with him for years. I think he’s just fantastic and I’ve been a huge fan of his, so I wrote this part for him and then we worked together on it. I love working with someone like SethGreen, RobLowe, ElizabethHurley or, of course, DanaCarvey. Working with Dana is like, “Dude, what do you got for me?” He’s one of the greatest comedians ever. And that, to me, is a great process of working. R.J. Wagner had some fantastic ideas, as did MindySterling, who is also from the Austin Powers movies. When all these people have ideas, it just makes it better. And they always have great ideas, so Keegan was fantastic. Ken Jeong, I wrote his role for him. I love him, I worship him. Debi Mazar…and, of course, Jennifer Saunders is just a genius. RichardMcCabe was somebody I didn’t know and have come to love. LydiaWest, who is just the sweetheart of sweethearts, she just stole everybody’s heart. She’s just a lovely person and a great comedy actress, so it was a joy. I had such a great time making this. The movie has characters who are conspiracy theorists. Do you enjoy a good conspiracy theory? To me, conspiracy theories are fun until they’re not. This is the problem. I grew up in Canada. We love our institutions in Canada. I have British parents who were in World War II. Institutions and expertise have taken a beating in the last little while, being supplanted by conspiracy theory. And so I thought, Well, what if the world was run by people, but what if they were nice? And what if they were good at their job? Wouldn’t that be a surprise to everybody? Why do we assume that they’re not nice? But at the same time, for me, I think people need to trust the experts. But the experts need to serve the people and the experts need to represent the people. And so, there is a little bit of a message in there. I grew up in a country where government works. I am the specter of big government. I went to a high school that was well funded, a public high school. I took public transport that was well funded. And I worked at the CBC, which is a government institution. And I’m thrilled with government, and I would love that to be the case. But I understand where it falls down, and I just think it all could work better. The Pentaverate is labeled a benevolent secret society. But when five people try to run the world, isn’t that an oxymoron that it can be benevolent? Because they’re taking away people’s free will. A hundred percent. This is the inherent contradiction of expertise—that expertise by its nature has to be an exclusive experience. But we would hope that it’s in service to others, you know what I mean? When expertise meets public service, you have limitless possibilities. And if there’s a message of the show, I believe that message should come in the form of Flintstone vitamins, which is you’re eating Barney and Dino; you don’t need to know it’s good for you. You joined Instagram just to promote this project. What is your philosophy of social media? My philosophy of social media is that it democratizes but it’s also a funhouse mirror. It’s yet another modern-life contradiction. There are a lot of things that are cheers and jeers. Cheers to social media for creating a democratization of the media, but it is a wild, wild West in terms of fact-checking. And the idea of a moveable truth is tough. The idea that the marketplace of ideas is a level playing field, that’s what democracy is and should be. It requires constant vigilance. I know that sounds like a serious thing, but my favorite social satires have been silly. If you look at—I don’t dare touch the hem of the garment of Dr. Strangelove, but it is what we all who work in comedy aspire to that level. But it’s a farce, it’s not reality. The other one is The Great Dictator. Again, I dare not touch the hem of that garment, but The Great Dictator is also farcical. That to me is the best delivery system, which is to entertain people. And I love entertaining people, and I always have. I love to be entertained. And that’s my goal: if we can entertain people, then you can reach people. Follow Mike Myers on Instagram You brought back Dr. Evil for a Super Bowl LVI commercial. Now there’s a rumor that Austin Powers 4 might happen. I can neither confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of such a program should it exist or not exist, but I would love to see it. I enjoy doing it. I had such a blast making that commercial and I love working with those people. What keeps you coming back to Shrek, whom you’ve voiced in four films? I love the emotional center of that character. This is going to sound a little serious, but the director SidneyLumet used to say that people who we’ve dismissed as freaks are more like ourselves than we often care to admit. I love that the traditional villain in the world of fairy tales was the hero. February was the 30th anniversary of Wayne’s World. When you think back to the making of that, do you have a favorite memory? I think it’s Dana and me on the hood of the car when the plane flies over. We got very, very close during the making of that. And Dana is just one of the funniest human beings in life, which is what I love. He’s not a I’ve-suffered-for-my-art-and-now-it’s-your-turn type of comedian. He likes to laugh, and he likes to play. And that laugh is one of the greatest things that [director] PenelopeSpheeris put into the movie. Her contribution was huge on that film, and I thought she did a fantastic job. But that was an outtake of Dana just making me laugh that she put into the film. Dana maintains a fantastic esprit de corps and has everyone laughing. It was a very popular set. And we talk. Dana and I talk about once or twice a week. We’ve kept in touch; it’s been very lovely. Yeah, it’s just great advice on being a dad, and we both love the Beatles, so we had the craziest long conversation about the Get Back movie. We went into granular detail about that. You stepped away from acting for a while. Was that to recharge your batteries? I always take time off. I love making things, and because I write stuff, it takes a long time to write stuff. I have three kids under the age of 10, and that’s been my primary and I’ve loved every minute of it. I just wanted to be present for that experience because everybody tells me it’s long days but they’re short years. Do you think comedy, or your style of comedy, has changed since your days on Saturday Night Live? Or do you think comedy doesn’t change? It’s always what’s going on the world that people find funny, so that’s what’s different? Since the beginning of time, I think entertainment has been a dialog between the performer and the audience. And then with the advent of mass media, there was a third voice, which is the means of how it gets to people. When I was at Second City, I performed every night in front of a live audience. Then when I got to Saturday Night Live, it was once a week. And then when you do movies, you write it and perform it and it can be a year and a half before somebody [sees it]; it’s almost like it got sent out into space. You’re always trying to figure out what people will get and what they won’t get. I think a famous comedian—I’ve got to fact-check this—had on his tombstone: “But will they get it…” What are you dreaming up next? What do you have left to do that you want to do? I’m in a movie, an as-yet-untitled David O. Russell film, that’s coming out in the fall. I always have several projects circling the airport and I’m not sure which one’s going to land. But it’s one of those things. When I did Austin Powers, I’d also had a Battle of Britain movie in my head. It’s one of those things, but the Austin Powers plane landed first. Is the David O. Russell movie a comedy, or are you going back to drama? It’s a drama role, yeah. It was a fantastic experience and I feel very, very blessed. It’s got ChristianBale in it, MargotRobbie, JohnDavidWashington, MichaelShannon, ChrisRock and RobertDeNiro. Perhaps you’ve heard of Robert De Niro? We had a little rehearsal and it just felt like I was at Madame Tussauds, you know what I mean? Like, “Oh, my God.”
