The tenth episode was our green screen episode, which was a storyline where you find out that we tape every episode in green bodysuits in front of a green screen and we put the environment and the guests in later. Then the green screen breaks in the middle of the episode and we have to fix it. I remember wanting to do that episode a little earlier in the run, like episode five, and the network said, “You know what? Establish your template first before you deviate from it,” which I think was good advice.

That ended up being more of the template for season two and beyond where we had storylines that would be established in the cold open—that was another change. Starting with season two, we were mandated to have a cold open. That became what I was a little more interested in doing, and then when we learning that we were doing 20 more next year we knew we had to have plotlines because we had run out of TV tropes to mess around with. It became more a narrative show mixed with a talk show.

This season you have Weird Al as your bandleader, which is very exciting and feels like a natural fit for the show. Does switching bandleaders continue to keep things exciting, and how does Weird Al fill this role differently than say a Reggie or a Kid Cudi?

Yeah, you know, it’s really interesting. When Reggie wanted to leave I got very nervous because I kind of just envisioned the show being the same for every single episode. I didn’t want the sets to change. I didn’t want the people to change. I just wanted it to be trapped in amber, which did not work for Jurassic Park, so I don’t know why I thought of that. And then when it became final that Reggie was going to leave—I have to say—I miss Reggie, but it gave us an opportunity to get a kick in the ass creatively. We got to do a goodbye episode, which is such a TV trope.

I got to do a beloved character says goodbye episode, and we got to figure out how to make a character’s goodbye emotionally impactful, which was such a challenge and I’m so glad that we got to do. And then we got to do a new character replacing that character, like Woody did on Cheers. I got to figure that out and I thought we did a great job with that. It’s all of these little cool challenges that became very freeing. I think it’s been really interesting and a way for the audience to get excited about a new season. “I wonder what Al is going to do on the show this year?” I think it’s great. As far as the second part of your question goes–and let’s be honest, it’s two different questions.