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Jane Lynch and Kate Flannery — Meredith from ‘The Office’ — are real-life BFFs who want to spread holiday cheer
Lynch, in Boston next week with her "Swingin' Little Christmas" show, talks "Glee," Christopher Guest, Frosted Flakes — and why she can't be taught to dance.
Jane Lynch is about to go to the airport. And she’s thrilled.
“We’re so thrilled every year that this comes around. We go to the airport soon to start this tour and we’re all texting each other. We can’t wait,” she tells Boston.com in a recent phone interview.
Part of the group chat? Lynch’s real-life BFF Kate Flannery, a.k.a. Meredith from “The Office,” and Tim Davis, Lynch’s musical director on “Glee.” (Fun Fact: there’s a “Glee” episode of “The Office,” “Viewing Party,” that I will now watch in a new light.)
Lynch and her musical buddies are headed to Boston for two shows at Boston’s City Winery with the Tony Guerrero Quintet Dec. 5 and 6. Waitlists are open for the sold-out “A Swingin’ Little Christmas With Jane Lynch, Kate Flannery, Tim Davis.”
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Aside from belting out holiday classics in her retro jazzy holiday show, singing has factored into Lynch’s resume at other times, notably as Sue Sylvester on “Glee,” and Laurie Bohner, the color-worshipping ukulele player who blew town at 15 and ended up as a New Main Street Singer in Christopher Guest’s iconic folk mockumentary “A Mighty Wind.”
A regular in Guest works — my favorite role might be Christy Cummings handling Boston native Jennifer Coolidge’s poodle in “Best in Show” — she’s likely made you laugh as Constance Carmell on “Party Down,” Cindi Lightballoon on “Arrested Development,” Sophie Lennon on “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” or, well, any number of other things. Most recently, she played Steve Martin’s stunt double on Hulu’s “Only Murders in the Building.”
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I called the five-time Emmy winner — who has an honorary degree from Northampton’s Smith College — ostensibly to ask about her swingin’ Boston shows. She talked quickly, all energy, and laughed often as we talked Frosted Flakes, the Brady Bunch, and why she can’t be taught to dance.
Boston.com: I know you started with “See Jane Sing,” a cabaret-style show with this crew. How did it turn into a Christmas show?
Jane Lynch: Well, doing “See Jane Sing,” we were on the road, and I forget who it was, maybe Tony [Guerrero] who said, “Let’s do a Christmas album. We’ll find public domain Christmas songs and do our own arrangements.” Which is a late ’50s, early ’60s jazzy big band-vibe. That was July 2016. We absolutely loved [making that album]. So we thought, “Let’s do a Christmas tour.” We’ve been doing Christmas tours since.
Kate Flannery is one of your oldest friends. How did you two meet?
We met in Chicago. We matriculated in the same comedy groups and realized we love singing the music that our moms and dads grew up with — the big bands, Rosemary Clooney, Jo Stafford, all that stuff.
We started singing together, doing songs and shows — silly little things. Then we all moved out to L.A. and we started doing a comedy revue [with] a bunch of our friends from Chicago, some of The Groundlings. We’d do a sketch show every Monday. She got “The Office,” I got “Glee,” and then our shows were canceled at the same time. We used to be a tour-de-force; now we’re forced to tour.
[laughs] Right. You two also worked together in “The Real Live Brady Bunch” in Chicago with Andy Richter. You played Mrs. Brady.
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Yes, Kate was one of two people who played Alice. We started to become better friends around that time. Joey Solloway was basically our leader. Her sister Faith Solloway, who lives in Boston, is a musician and a wonderful composer. She did music for us.
You came from a musical family, too.
Loosely. Let’s say I came from a music-loving family. [laughs] We’re not talented musicians or anything like that.
But we adore music. My father and mother used to sit around the kitchen table drinking whiskey and harmonizing on musicals like “The Music Man,” Frank Sinatra, Andy Williams. That was their jam.
You and your mom loved show tunes. “Funny Girl” was a big one for you guys.
Yeah! That was a huge one. We both adored that. She would play that and I would act it out — then of course I got to play Mrs. Brice on Broadway. That was great.
Was music or acting your first love?
Acting was my first love. I wanted to do what the people were doing on television, and on stage. I remember the first play I ever saw. I was very young. It’s a cloudy memory, through Vaseline, but I remember being in a school gym, and the lights went down. Then the lights came up — and it was a whole new world. And ohhhh, I was just smitten.
How did you grow from there? How did you land your first gig?
Well, I acted in high school, got a bachelor’s in theater, and an MFA in theater performance [from Cornell in 1984]. Then I went to Chicago and eventually hooked up with the Second City Touring Company. Improvisation scared the hell out of me, but for some reason, I got picked.
I love your roles in Christopher Guest movies. How did you get in with him?
I was doing commercials in the late ’90s. I did a Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes commercial directed by Christopher Guest. Improvising still scared the hell out of me, but his [style] is different. His improv isn’t working for a joke. It’s more behavioral.
That’s true.
He’ll shoot and shoot and there’s no pressure to do anything except play this character you’ve created. Because you’ve created an oddball, it’s going to be funny just by virtue of the behavior. Then he takes it into a darkroom and edits and comes up with that funny stuff. So you just have to trust him, and he has to trust you.
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I guess we did that with each other on that commercial. I ran into him at a restaurant a few months later, and he said, I’m doing this dog show [movie], we’re going to shoot in Vancouver, let’s have a talk. And before I knew it, I was heading to Vancouver to do “Best in Show.”
Those movies are all improv. Do you have a favorite line you came up with that made it in?
Nothing that sticks out to me as briiilliant. [laughs]
[laughs] Do you have a favorite Christopher Guest role?
The most fun was “A Mighty Wind.” Because before we shot one ounce of film, we rehearsed the music. I was in the New Main Street Singers — [Boston native] John Michael Higgins arranged every one of those songs to create harmonies so intense, they’re almost over the top, which makes it funny. Like “Wanderin'”… Oh my God. Listen to the chords. They’re just insane.
“Glee” is also based on singing.
I knew Ryan [Murphy] from working on “Popular.” Sue Sylvester was not in the “Glee” pilot. An executive at FOX said: You need a villain. So [Murphy] came up with Sue Sylvester and gave it to me. It ended up being the role of a lifetime and experience of a lifetime.
Do you have a favorite role?
Right now I’m loving “Only Murders in the Building” [playing Sazz Pataki]. And I will never probably ever get a better role than Sophie Lennon in “Maisel.”
Do you prefer acting or singing? I know it’s a hard question.
I like it all. I mean — aaugh. I don’t know. We act like we have so much control over our lives, like, “Oh I prefer this to that.” But whatever rolls in at my feet is the thing I’m doing. When I get a job, I still jump up and down.
I read that you’re deaf in one year — is that true?
It is. My right ear had nerve deafness. It probably happened when I was a baby. It’s dead as a doornail.
How does that affect singing?
Well, I don’t know, because I’ve never had two ears.
[laughs] OK.
What’s interesting — go with me on this — the right ear, which is deaf, is controlled by the left side of your brain [which controls comprehension and speech]. So I have a hard time learning a musical part [of music on paper]. I can’t be taught that. I sweat. But if I hear it, I’m really great at it. Same thing with dancing — this has nothing to do with my ear — but I can’t be told how to dance. I can’t. But I can move around. And I’m pretty good at it. [laughs]
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Interview has been edited and condensed.
Lauren Daley can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @laurendaley1.
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