E-mail a friendLisa Kudrow
airdate July 8, 2009
Lisa Kudrow appeared on two of TV's most popular series: Mad About You and a 10-year Emmy-winning stint on Friends. She transitioned to film, with credits that include Analyze This and the sequel and a dramatic turn in Wonderland. Kudrow planned to become a medical researcher and has a biology degree from Vassar. She's an alum of the Goundlings comedy troupe and co-created, wrote and exec produced HBO's The Comeback. She added a Webby to her trophy case for starring in Web Therapy, which she co-writes and co-produces.
Actress discusses the freedom of Internet media and her web series, Web Therapy. (2:26)
Full interview. (11:19)
Lisa Kudrow
Tavis: Pleased to welcome Lisa Kudrow to this program. The Emmy-winning actress and former "Friends" star is the creator and star of the popular web series "Web Therapy." The show now in its second season and this year features another familiar friend. Here now, a scene from "Web Therapy."
[Clip]
Tavis: (Laughter) Funny stuff. Lisa, nice to see you.
Lisa Kudrow: Good to see you. Thanks for having me.
Tavis: Oh, I'm delighted to have you on. Tell me about "Web Therapy."
Kudrow: Well, so that was a bit of it. Just thought it would be really funny to have an extremely dismissive person offer therapy on the Internet - not in person, and not for 50 minutes, but just for three minutes at a time. (Laughter)
Tavis: Tell me more about where the concept comes from. Then I want to get into how you have made this thing work on the Internet, specifically.
Kudrow: Well, so the concept came, honestly - honestly it was out of rejecting the notion of doing a web series. That's how it started. We were asked to come up with a web series and I just dismissed it out of hand.
And then my brain just kept working on it, like it does, to torture me, and just thought it would be funny if there was this really bad idea and something geared toward the internet - something small, in small increments, beginning, middle, and end, and just therapy seemed like the worst idea to do in a short amount of time.
Tavis: And the Internet piece of it - part of what makes it fascinating and makes it work is that it is, in fact, on the Internet for short spaces of time. Conceptually, tell me why you thought this - because it's working, obviously, but conceptually why you thought it would work on the Internet.
Kudrow: Well, I just - because it's what's happening right now, because it's part of everyone's experience right now. And there is also something fun in making fun of the idea that you can go on the Internet and there are people on there you can't - there's no vetting process.
Tavis: Whatsoever.
Kudrow: At all. And anyone can just hang out a shingle and say, "I'm an expert in this and I can help you," and PayPal is easy. (Laughter) And we haven't really gotten into it, but we've decided she charges $25 a session, which is a lot. And a busy days is - you know, she's booked, she has an hour's worth of - solid sessions. (Laughter) So yeah, that - I think - I don't know, I think that's why.
Tavis: And the character is based on? Is this an assemblage of people, or?
Kudrow: Always. Not like I do characters that are so far away from me, but no, it is - I did kind of pick someone intentionally that I think is actually a really intelligent, poised, sexy, woman and she's very articulate and a wordsmith, but then I filter it through me and she's idiotic. (Laughter) So it's really not that person but that was my jumping-off point.
Tavis: Tell me the kinds of people that you have to have as the persons you're giving advice or therapy to to make the shtick work.
Kudrow: Well, okay, that's where Don Roos, who's a really well-known writer and director, and Dan Bucatinsky, who's my partner and he's on the show and he's also a great writer, but that's where they really help. We write the outlines and especially with Don, for the first season his guidance in which character do we need to reflect which aspect of Fiona that we want to show or talk about?
So he was really good about that, about making sure that all right, what does she want out of this person? How is this person going to advance her career or agenda? So that's sort of how we went.
Tavis: Could this work, could it be funny, with everyday people? People who are not Courtney Coxes?
Kudrow: Oh, you mean like just regular folks (unintelligible)?
Tavis: The people you're giving - absolutely.
Kudrow: I don't know. We've talked about it because when we sort of syndicated it on the web - it's on Hulu and YouTube and it's on iTunes - and so when you think about what you can do for each site that's going to be different, and one idea thrown out was that she does sort of a live session with people. And I think somebody thought that it might be too risky, legally. (Laughter)
Tavis: I can't imagine a lawyer thinking that in this town. (Laughter)
Kudrow: Or on the Internet.
Tavis: Yeah, yeah - I'm sure every lawyer you have said, "No, we're not going to do that."
Kudrow: But I thought it could be really fun, because the show is improvised. We just write the outlines, and I thought it could be really fun to just destroy someone.
Tavis: This is part of your (laughter) - I'm spitting everywhere now. This improvisation obviously is part of your background, but what's it, to the best of your ability to describe it, what's it like being on this sort of high wire, even though it's for a short period of time, with these outlines and making it all come together and work?
Kudrow: Well, it doesn't feel like a high wire. It feels more like just sort of like a fun roller coaster that's not too risky. (Laughs) You don't go upside-down; it's just nice and fast.
Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs)
Kudrow: Because we shoot it and then there are a few takes, and there are two cameras so you know editing will help. And yeah, and Don also - the way we shoot it is we're looking at the camera but there's a monitor hooked up to it, a prompter, but it's the other person's image.
So it's in real time, we're looking at each other and we've got these earwigs, I think they're called, and we can hear each other, and we can hear Don or if Dan's directing that episode, we can hear the director telling us, "All right, that's good, now go back - let's get this piece back here."
Tavis: So the everyday person wouldn't work, you'd have to be a pro to make all this work.
Kudrow: Well, to edit it together.
Tavis: You got that many folk in your ear telling you what to do, that's another issue.
Kudrow: No, no one's telling me what to say. Sometimes they do. (Laughter)
Tavis: What have you learned - what's been fascinating for you about this whole process on the Internet? Because what really got my attention about this first, beyond, obviously, your talent, was what - I'm an entrepreneur so I'm thinking what made Lisa Kudrow want to do this on the Internet?
So tell me about the business side of this, and how this is working on the Internet, and what you're learning from this whole process.
Kudrow: Well, I think financially it's yet to be seen what's going to - how wonderful that's going to be. Luckily, that's not the reason we did it. Mostly we did it because I don't know where else you can have an idea and just do it and no one's telling you that you have to make sure you're attracting a certain audience or you're appealing to someone's demographic.
It's the most freedom, aside from getting your friends together and putting a show up on a stage somewhere. So that's really it, and I have to say thanks to Lexus, because they really made it possible. They underwrote it and then gave us absolutely no parameters.
Tavis: Is there an end game here for you? I hear your point that it's not like being on "Friends" where you got demos you've got to play to and advertisers you've got to appeal to and numbers you have to hit. I hear the argument about freedom, but what's the end game? You're not doing it for money, you're not doing it for - but what's the end game?
Kudrow: Well, here there's the potential for money, so you do what you can for the people who invested the money and also for yourself, it wouldn't be a bad thing. So you can keep doing it, certainly. But if that doesn't happen it's still okay because we're proud of this. We think it's really funny and we're happy to do it.
So I guess yeah, I guess that's it. But we also - like, people suggest also, like, "Well, you should Twitter" and now you have to have a Facebook page and that stuff, honestly, I'm not that comfortable with because that's more self-promotion. I've always been comfortable promoting a film or a TV show or something, but that other stuff is just self-promotion, which I'm not sure about.
Tavis: You don't want to tweet and tell everybody all your business, what you're doing every freaking minute of the day? (Laughter) That doesn't turn you on?
Kudrow: Well, when you put it that way, now I'm interested. (Laughter) No. But to me, if there's something funny that can come out of it, then - so now we are thinking of maybe Fiona Wallace, who is a shameless self-promoter, maybe she would tweet. I haven't done it yet. I don't know who would show up, but that could be funny that this woman would tweet, but only during office hours, which are, like, for 15 minutes, from 1:00 to 1:15, and something like that, and people are talking to us about doing an application for iPhone apps or something like that.
Tavis: I think it's all going to happen. I can see it developing now.
Kudrow: Well, we have a funny idea for it, so yeah, we might. But we'll see. But I don't know - I don't know. I don't know what's required. I know that when you do a TV show it is required to promote it, and you go do that, but for the web, short of going out with Paris Hilton or something I don't know (laughter) how to get everybody's attention.
Tavis: More power to you.
Kudrow: Not that she's not lovely and I wouldn't enjoy myself.
Tavis: Yeah, absolutely, Paris, absolutely.
Kudrow: Because I would.
Tavis: Last question here - help me situate - the other thing that got my attention when I first saw it, I wanted to know why Lisa is doing this Internet thing. And then the second question I had is, why is Lisa doing this Internet thing? This huge, international TV star - help me - inside baseball - situate this in your career, in your work. Why this now, given all that you have done and other things that you could be doing?
Kudrow: Oh, well, there's a few reasons, and none of them are really noble. (Laughter) It's really easy. It takes two days.
Tavis: I like that - number one, ease. (Laughter) Number two?
Kudrow: It's very fun.
Tavis: It's fun, yeah.
Kudrow: Okay, maybe the one that's more for, like, the artist in us is that, like I said, we can do whatever we want. We came up with this and we were able to do it, and we're not getting notes from anybody.
Tavis: Is that number three? (Laughter) We don't get notes.
Kudrow: We don't get notes, number three. But we think it's funny and we think that there is a lot to make fun of within it about people and about I don't know - I'm not making fun of therapy, because I think it's a good thing.
Tavis: Okay. (Laughter) It's called "Web Therapy." It stars Lisa Kudrow. It is really funny stuff. I'm honored to have you on. Congrats, and nice to have you here.
Kudrow: Thank you.
Tavis: Thanks, Lisa.
Kudrow: I'm happy to be here.
Tavis: That's our show for tonight.
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