Nicole Sullivan appeared on The Late Late Show (hosted by
Craig Kilborn) on July 31, 2000. The segment (actually, two segments)
ran for over ten minutes (not surprising, since she was the first
guest, for perhaps the first time in her television career, not counting
Later, on which she was the only guest). Her appearance was
preceded by a video clip (from the season five premiere, with Sullivan
as Britney Spears). During this appearance, Nicole Sullivan discussed
the following:
Nicole Sullivan (the cast is off, but her wrist is still broken)
on The Late Late Show.
The opening video clip from the Britney Spears "making of the video" parody
from MD-501 provided a good point of departure for the segment. Ms.
Sullivan talks about going to a Britney Spears concert with three
unnamed guy friends (who will figure into the conversation later on
as well) and refuses to divulge how much money she spent on the tickets.
Kilborn goes off on a long tangent about how the last concert he went
to was to see Prince during the Purple Rain tour (he paid
$35). Then he mentions that she also does cartoon voices, including
Baby Blues (which debuted the Friday before this segment aired).
Kilborn himself tries his hand at cartoon voices, including one which
sounds strikingly similar to Yogi Bear. Then they talk about her
30th birthday party, which she threw for herself, renting a room at
a cafe for 150 of her closest friends. The owner of the cafe let other
people into the room which she rented, and when Sullivan tried to
expel the miscreants, one of them apparently took a swing at her.
Her friends went to confront the man, and this uninvited guest allegedly
put a cigar out on the face of one of her friends.
At this point, there is a commercial break, and Kilborn asks about the collar she has on her wrist (the cast is off, but there is obviously some kind of padding and probably a splint underneath). She again rehashes the story of how she broke her wrist skateboarding, although in less detail than before. Kilborn takes this opportunity to deride "razor" skateboards (really thin, flimsy-looking things that are apparently in vogue now). He notes with some obvious glee that he would like to seize them from the kids and break them over his knee. [This stark admission that he finds these skateboards wimpy and thus has feelings of contempt for people who use them contrasts well with the late night hosts of the 11:30 time slot, who can sometimes take on-air congeniality to nauseating levels. David Letterman even has become a Kathie Lee Gifford supporter in these troubled times.] Then Kilborn subjects Nicole Sullivan to "Five Questions," a device he carried over from The Daily Show and one of the staples of the show that make it well worth watching. Nicole Sullivan got three out of five; she was unable to name a character (besides the Mad Hatter) from Alice in Wonderland and also she incorrectly guessed that Steve Guttenberg was at the Brad Pitt/Jennifer Aniston wedding.
This appearance was probably Nicole Sullivan's best guest appearance on a talk show ever. The fact that she was the first guest may be an indication of her rising stardom, although being first on The Late Late Show isn't as good as being on one of the 11:30 talk shows. But the type of show which Mr. Kilborn runs on CBS, while still highly derivative of other TV talk shows, still seems somewhat more laid-back than either The Tonight Show and The Late Show, and it works to his advantage here - the rapport with the guests seems less contrived. The anecdote about the altercation at her birthday party strikes me as something that probably wouldn't find its way onto the shows that Jay Leno and David Letterman host. This was definitely a more edifying talk show appearance than any of her other appearances in recent times. [And who knows: possibly in her three friends we will see the genesis of a Nicole Sullivan-led rat pack, less intimidating than the entourages of A-list celebrities, but a force to be reckoned with nonetheless.]
Video clips (in Quicktime 4.0 format):