In support of her newest movie, Tuesday, and her own podcast, Wiser Than Me, Julia Louis-Dreyfus guest-starred on Trevor Noah‘s podcast What Now? with Trevor Noah Thursday and talked about everything from her workaholic nature to her experience grappling with the grief of losing her mother. The actress also finally revealed the exact scene from Veep that still makes her cackle.
The scene in question takes place in the series finale, Season 7 Episode 7, and it’s the physical comedy of her costar Tony Hale that really sells it for her.
“My character’s having, I can’t even talk about it, it still makes me laugh, my character’s having a really bad time, per usual, nothing’s quite going her way, and she’s flipping out. And I’m sitting at a couch, and Tony Hale, who plays my beloved — or would like to think he’s beloved — assistant comes up to me and he says and I’m out of my mind, and he comes up to me and he goes ‘Do you want do you want six almonds?’” Louis-Dreyfus remembered.
“Sort of a nod to — do you remember the Obama almond story?” she continued. “Yes, which was seven almonds for him. And so he goes ‘Do you want six almonds?’ And I, and this is physical comedy that I thought really helped that joke because it was written, ‘Do you want six almonds?’ But then what happened was Tony comes up sort of behind the couch and into my ear, and I turn and I scream at him, full pitch scream in his ear, ‘No!’ I’m telling you this now, It’s not funny in the telling. But it’s a huge scream at him, and he fell backwards behind the couch. And I honestly, to this day, as you can tell, I think it’s one of the funniest things I have ever been a part of, his fall. And it made me think of it because it was a fall because he also falls out of frame. Which is, you know, it doesn’t get better than that.”
If you want to revisit that moment in its full falling glory, watch the tail end of the promo embedded above.
Veep, streaming, Max