Jon Hamm's Comedy Gut Test: ‘Do Anything Tina Fey Says’

If you ever wondered how and why Jon Hamm went from the womanizing Don Draper in Mad Men to the woman-collecting cult leader Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne in Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, it’s because of one simple reason and one genius woman. Tina Fey told him to.

The serious-actor-cum-funnyman shed light on how he uses Fey as his litmus test to make his most important career decisions during a live interview at the New Yorker Festival in New York City, on Saturday, October 7. Hamm recalled when Fey and Kimmy Schmidt co-creator Robert Carlock asked him to join the show: “Tina and Robert came to me and they were like, ‘We want you to play this guy, it’s a super important part, it doesn’t shoot that much.’”

His interest piqued, he asked them (with a bit of skepticism, of course) what was the catch. The Mad Men star continued, “They said, ‘He’s the guy…who keeps women in a bunker underground…It’s funny. It’s not a weird sex thing.’ And I was like, ‘What?’ But I just leaned back on my No.1 rule of comedy, which is basically just do anything Tina Fey says.” Smart man.

In addition to playing the handsome but insane reverend on Kimmy Schmidt, Hamm portrayed Liz Lemon’s (Fey’s character) short-lived pediatrician boyfriend, Dr. Drew Baird, on 30 Rock.

He does have the jawline of a Good News weatherman.

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