News | 30 Rock live episode came together ‘perfectly’

30 Rock live episode director Beth McCarthy-Miller described the broadcasts as the ‘absolute perfect storm’.

Last October the cast and crew performed the episode twice in one night for both east and west coast viewers in front of a live audience.

Watch a clip from the 30 Rock live episode:

Beth recalled to The Hollywood Reporter how smoothly the shows went:

‘During the show, I was in the booth calling it live, and I think two people missed a line. Not one camera shot was missed. I mean, it was so lucky. All the special effects happened on time; all the cues happened on time. It was crazy how perfectly it all came together.’

Being a fictional version of Saturday Night Live, it was only right that 30 Rock creator Tina Fey and fellow producers pulled in favours from SNL to record the live episode in their studio.

‘It was so much fun,’ Beth continued. ‘The 30 Rock and SNL crews all worked together and made this amazing show. My stage managers were teaching the 30 Rock first ADs how to stage-manage live, and they were showing them what they do as first ADs on 30 Rock, and everybody got along and everybody was so helpful. It was the absolute perfect storm.

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The live episode also included recurring guest stars Elizabeth Banks, Jon Hamm and even Matt Damon who, the true professional he is, found time to take part on the day his wife was due to give birth!

‘His wife was due to give birth on the date we’d scheduled the live show,’ Beth added. ‘We said, ‘Yeah, we heard you’re not available because of the baby.’ He’s like: ‘Well, I could maybe do like a day. Let’s do it!’ So we went through all the rehearsals with a stand-in, and then Matt came in for the rehearsal and the two air shows. He was hilarious and fabulous, but I’m sure his management was angry with us for the timing.’

His management? What about his wife?!

On whether we could be seeing another live 30 Rock episode she said: ‘Nothing formal yet, but yes, everyone was like, ‘I want to do this again!’’

Do it. Do it now.

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