-I'm wondering
if it's surreal for you.
You just spent the entire week
in this building,
just down the hall,
hosting an excellent episode
of "Saturday Night Live."
Is it weird,
because most people who host
don't then come back
to the building on Monday.
-Yeah.
[ Laughter ]
I know. I know.
I just -- I spent like four days
straight in this building
without seeing fresh air
or breathing fresh air.
-Yeah.
-And I'm straight back here.
I had a great week though.
It was amazing.
-It was a fantastic --
You did say you feel like
you made a mistake
that you wouldn't make again
when you met the writing staff.
-Yeah. I -- this is something --
Anyone who's gonna host "SNL,"
don't do what I did,
which is go --
when they ask you, "What kind of
things do you want to do?
Do you have any talents?
Do you have anything
that you want to show off?"
And I thought and I thought,
"I have zero talents."
[ Laughter ]
So I said, right, "I'll do
anything you want me to do."
-Yeah, don't do that.
[ Laughter ]
-"Any skit that you have.
Anything that you've
been holding back
that you think is
too controversial,
you know, I'll do it."
And they really took me
at my word.
-Yeah.
[ Laughter ]
-Yeah.
-They all have, like,
five of those.
They're just waiting
for someone to come in
who's as innocent as you
that will make the mistake of
saying that.
-Yeah, yeah, yeah.
-You got to play
Winston Churchill in a skit.
And that is -- is that
the reason you're clean-shaven?
-Yeah. They clean-shaved me.
There were various reasons
I was clean-shaven.
I had to play Michael Jackson
and Winston Churchill.
-Yeah.
-It's a sentence I'll never --
-Famously un-bearded men. Yeah.
-Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Famously hairless men.
So they shaved me,
and it's the first time
I've had a reason to shave
in a long time.
And I did it.
And I feel like I look like
a kind of tired child.
-Yeah.
[ Laughter and applause ]
You also -- this whole city
block, basically, was your week
because then the premiere of
"Game of Thrones" was, I guess,
last Wednesday, right,
at Radio City as well.
So you basically had
your whole life right here.
-Oh, it was bizarre.
I was doing the --
on the Wednesday,
they do a read-through of "SNL,"
and it goes on for a while.
And they were very good
to let me out
'cause it's a busy week
to let me out
to go to the premiere of
"Game of Thrones."
But during the read-through
I could hear --
'cause it was at Radio City --
I could hear the cheers
for my cast mates arriving.
[ Laughter ]
And as they went on,
I was sat next to Lorne.
I was kind of
looking at him, going,
"I think I have to leave."
-Yeah.
[ Laughter ]
-I really do. I mean, the cheers
are getting bigger.
You know, the cheers
are now stopping.
I think I should probably
get over there.
-You're like, "I could go to
the 'Game of Thrones' premiere,
or sit next to Lorne
while he's eating edamame."
I'm gonna guess that's --
-It was!
-Yeah, he was, right, yeah.
[ Laughter and applause ]
-He was. How did you know?
It was.
-Yeah, it was.
-Yeah.
-That's what they're actually --
when "Game of Thrones" is over,
they're replacing it.
The new show is just gonna be
Lorne at a table eating edamame.
[ Laughter ]
I know. They think
it'll go seven seasons.
[ Laughter ]
You also, I will say, while not
your first sketch show --
sketch work in the building.
You did Jon Snow at a dinner
party with us a few years ago.
And still one of my favorite
things we've done on the show.
So thank you so much.
-I loved doing that.
[ Cheers and applause ]
-We obviously -- we took
advantage of the fact
that you play Jon Snow.
You're married to Rose Leslie,
one of your co-stars
on the show, who's fantastic.
And she was here last year and
said you pulled a very cruel --
and it -- the audience agreed
with her
that it was a very cruel
April Fools' Day joke,
which is she opened
the refrigerator
and you had that there.
[ Laughter ]
-Yeah. Yeah.
-So, did you back off
April Fools',
or did you do something --
do you do no pranks
a year after that
or do you try something else?
-See, I started strong.
-Yeah.
[ Laughter ]
-The amount of props at
my disposal has diminished.
-Of course. Sure.
-This year was --
I did pull an April Fools'
on her while we were out here.
And it was the most --
I'm aware this is the most
first-world April Fools' --
[ Laughter ]
Before I tell this story.
But she --
I didn't know what to do.
And she has a favorite
almond milk.
She won't drink any other
almond milk.
So I just wrote an article about
how this company
that makes her favorite
almond milk was going under
because of Brexit.
[ Laughter ]
Now, this backfired 'cause
she immediately rang my P.A.
and got her to bulk-order this
almond milk with my credit card.
[ Laughter ]
So I end up spending 150 quid
on almond milk.
[ Applause ]
-Yeah.
It turns out the only thing
more terrifying
than seeing your severed head
in a refrigerator
is just cartons upon cartons
of almond milk.
You're like, "Oh, no!"
-Yeah, exactly.
-I've heard you talk about,
you know, in the many scenes
you have to do
in "Game of Thrones,"
obviously things as an actor
you probably never would
have expected before.
Seeing what that show
is gonna be.
You were also dead on a table,
naked dead on a table,
surrounded by --
[ Woman cheers ]
Now come on.
[ Laughter ]
[ Cheers and applause ]
No, hold on.
You're cheering
a dead naked body.
[ Laughter ]
Necrophiliac monsters.
[ Laughter ]
Was that embarrassing,
that moment?
-I loved it.
I loved that couple of days.
You know, I got to --
[ Laughter ]
They warmed the room.
I was on a table asleep,
essentially, for two full days.
[ Laughter ]
-I guess compared to some of the
other things they ask you to do,
that's not that bad.
-Yeah.
-Yeah.
-I mean, I fell -- I literally
fell asleep in those scenes.
[ Laughter ]
Yeah.
No, no, that was some of
my best work.
[ Laughter ]
-I will say -- I was like,
"He's really dead."
-Yeah.
-Yeah. He's really --
Man, he's so good at dead.
-It's the way they kept coming
up to me and going, "You do" --
Like, I hadn't had a compliment
from some of the crew
at all about my work.
But they were like, "You do
a really good dead body."
[ Laughter ]
There's a future in "CSI"
for me as a corpse.
-There you go, yeah.
[ Laughter ]
Have you -- when you were
reading the scripts
for the final season, were you
trying to do it in real time?
Or were you skipping ahead
to the end
to see how everything
came to a conclusion?
-I mean, there was a big
temptation to skip ahead
when they sent us those final --
'cause no one wants to know
what happens more than we do.
-Sure.
-But I didn't.
I stopped myself.
They came so late.
They were like three days
before the read-through
'cause they didn't
want any leaks.
And I stopped myself.
And I -- 'cause I thought,
"What's better than hearing it?"
We had this big read-through,
and hearing it
with all the rest of the cast
actually reading
as their characters.
So I became like a litmus test
for the season.
They put a camera on me
to see my reactions
as the events unfolded.
And David and Daniel, the
producers, are looking at me,
and they got
some pretty good reactions.
I think there'll be
a documentary at some point
where you'll see --
[ Laughter ]
where you see me
going like that.
-Were there actual, like,
palpable moments of
this cast and crew
at their last table read?
Like, I mean,
not to give anything away,
but I'm assuming there's moments
where you're like --
-Of course.
-Yeah.
-It's going to be a terrible
last season.
[ Laughter ]
But I've just been,
like, deadpan.
Like, nothing happened.
-Yeah.
[ Laughter ]
It all works out,
and everybody moves into a condo
together, yeah.
-I can say that.
There are definite big moments.
-That's good. I'm very happy.
Always a big moment
to have you here.
Thank you so much, Kit.
Great job, again, on Saturday.
